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Blessington Thomas, a senior scorer and statistician who was an official scorer with the BCCI and worked for more than 30 years with the Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA), has died in Hyderabad following a heart attack. He was 57.Blessington began his scoring career during the Moin-ud-Dowla tournament in 1971 and went on to become the HCA’s official scorer and statistician. He was also involved in training younger scorers at the national level and managed the HCA’s website.Blessington had been involved with Cricinfo since 1998, providing match reports and statistical analysis and helping with coordination of scores for matches played by Hyderabad and Andhra at the domestic level. He was also a member of the Association for Cricket Statisticians and Scorers in India, an organisation which has been in existence since 1987.

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It was a historic day for Bangladesh as they got their first win against an ODI team when they beat Pakistan by four wickets in Kurunegala. Salma Khatun, the Bangladesh captain, scored 53 after offspinner Tithy Sarkar restricted Pakistan to 134.After their crushing 182-run defeat to India on Friday, Bangladesh bounced back impressively to bowl out Pakistan with an over to spare. Sarkar took two wickets in two overs and Pakistan stumbled to 55 for 3 in 19 overs. She picked up two more wickets and ensured no partnership was forged as Pakistan plodded along at less than three an over. Bismah Maroof top scored with 29 and her opening partnership of 27 with Tasqeen Qadeer was the innings’ highest.Though the target was relatively modest, Bangladesh got themselves in to trouble early on, losing three wickets for 26 runs. Then Salma joined Panna Ghosh at the crease and the two added 37 together. Ghosh stayed for 51 balls, for her 14, and allowed Salma to push the chase along. Bangladesh lost two more wickets before Salma wrapped up the match with 27 balls to spare. She hit six fours in her 92-ball innings.
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Mithali Raj followed up her unbeaten century on Friday with a half-century as India continued their winning ways at the Asia Cup with a 29-run victory over Sri Lanka in Dambulla.The Indian openers, Jaya Sharma and Karuna Jain, set the platform for the total with a 62-run partnership before both were dismissed by Shashikala Siriwardene. Raj added another 62 with Priyanka Roy to take India to 227. Suwini de Alwis, who took two wickets against Pakistan, picked up 3 for 36 while Siriwardene ended with 3 for 54.Though Sri Lanka lost two wickets – to Rumeli Dhar – early in the innings, Friday’s top scorer Dedunu Silva hit 74 off 87 balls to take them to the 100-run mark. But Sri Lanka lost their last seven wickets for 66 runs as Pujare Seema and Dhar shared six wickets between them.

Mickey Arthur has said that he has been impressed with his first look of the local talent assembled by Dhaka Dynamites. The team’s head coach believes that hunger within the young Bangladeshi cricketers will help his side.Dynamites’ icon pick had to be Nasir Hossain as they were the last team to be drawn in the lottery in the draft last month. But they picked the sensational Mustafizur Rahman with their first pick and also took Mosharraf Hossain (Man of the Match in 2013 BPL final), Mosaddek Hossain Saikat (who made three first-class double-centuries this year), Shamsur Rahman, Shykat Ali, Farhad Reza, Nabil Samad, Abul Hasan and Irfan Sukkur.Shamsur, Farhad and Abul have played international cricket for Bangladesh while Shykat and Sukkur are impressive young domestic batsmen.This is Arthur’s first stint coaching in Bangladesh although he last toured as coach of the South Africa team in 2008. He was also impressed by how the Dhaka franchise contacted him and has so far run the team.”We have a good bunch of talented young players but T20 is all about one performance,” Arthur said. “Their work ethic has been outstanding, they work incredibly hard. It has been a pleasure. They are looking to make a name for themselves in Bangladesh cricket. If you have guys who are willed to learn and play, you have a recipe of some success.”What interested me are the good talented youngsters out here. The Dhaka Dynamites is very well organised, which also interested me. The communication with everyone was brilliant. They seemed like a professional outfit. I haven’t been let down, it has been a fantastic experience so far.”Arthur said that the likes of Kumar Sangakkara, Yasir Shah and Ryan ten Doeschate will add experience to the Dynamites squad. Apart from these three, they have Mohammad Irfan, Nasir Jamshed, Sohail Khan and Shahzaib Hasan and it is understood that Zimbabwe batsman Malcolm Waller, who scored 68 and 40 in T20s against Bangladesh last week, could soon join them.”I have been really impressed by the local talent. I don’t want to single out anybody. We have Sanga, Yasir Shah and Ryan ten Doeschate; those guys just add the little bit of international experience to the squad. The young players have been trained extremely well and are hungry for success,” Arthur said.Arthur said that while coaching in the Caribbean Premier League he saw how the T20 tournament helped local cricketers learn more from the international players, and hoped the same would happen for the uncapped Bangladeshi cricketers.”It gives international exposure to all the young players that are playing with international superstars. The experience rubs off on them. It just provides them with such a good base to work from.”I coached in the CPL and just seeing what that does for West Indian cricket, I suspect the BPL is going to do exactly the same for Bangladesh cricket.”

Fertile, but poor, Bangladesh straddles the estuary of the River Ganges. It is a country of almost 150 million crowded into an area not much larger than the British Isles with a rich cricket history. Although it only gained independence in 1971, it was originally part of Bengal and after partition became East Pakistan. The ground at Dhaka, which hosted Pakistan Tests, fell into disrepair after the wars which led to independence but cricket emerged as a unifying force and in 1976-77 an MCC side played games in front of massive crowds at Dhaka. Official tours by various countries playing unofficial Tests followed, and in 1976 Bangladesh became an Associate member of the ICC and took part in the inaugural ICC Trophy in 1979, reaching the semi-finals in 1982 and 1990. With huge enthusiasm among the population, Bangladesh’s claims for Test status were greatly boosted when they won the ICC Trophy in 1997 (they had been playing ODIs for a decade) and that dream came true in 2001.

Bangladesh only began an official national first-class tournament in 1999-2000 as they prepared to become Test cricket’s 10th Full Member. In the first year games were not first-class, but from 2000-01 all matches were and the competition is league based with six sides playing each other home and away.

As with the first-class competition, six teams playing each other home and away once in a league.

ScorecardAlex Loudon’s 71 gave England A a sizeable 150-run lead on the third day of the first Test against Bangladesh A at Mirpur before the home side’s openers fought back.Loudon lost his overnight partner, Tim Bresnan, for 32 when he was caught by Mosharraf Hossain off Dolar Mahmud. But Tom Smith hung around for nearly an hour, helping Loudon salvage the entrails of England’s innings who smacked seven fours and a six and was last man out for 71.Bangladesh fought back valiantly though, with Jahurul Islam and Mehrab Hossain jnr putting on 131 for their opening stand, albeit without the aggression England marked their innings with. Loudon ended a fine day by removing Jahurul Islam who was caught behind for 87 shortly before stumps.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out

After all the excellent work done over the last four days, India needed only to complete the formalities on the final morning but they were made to work hard to polish off the remaining 63 runs. Led by a fiery spell from Chris Tremlett, England fought with plenty of heart, and India needed 21 overs before finally completing a seven-wicket victory, their fifth Test win in England and the first at Trent Bridge, to go 1-0 in the series.Wasim Jaffer and Dinesh Karthik resumed the Indian innings at 10 for 0, and motored to 47 fairly comfortably. Karthik played a couple of handsome backfoot punches square on the off side, while Jaffer played his trademark effortless flicks. Both played and missed a few times off Ryan Sidebottom, but a ten-wicket win was on the cards when Tremlett struck – not once, but three times. England’s only hope of gaining some brownie points was to take a few top-order wickets before the Oval Test, and Tremlett did that, nailing both openers with short balls that bounced more than the batsmen expected – Jaffer top-edged a pull to gully while Karthik nicked a beauty which bounced and seamed away.Buoyed by those successes, Tremlett and James Anderson let rip at India’s two most experienced batsmen. Both bowlers liberally dished out short-pitched deliveries, and then mixed it with pitched-up, awayswingers. Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid played and missed a few times, before Tendulkar pushed at a short one off his hips straight to Alastair Cook at leg gully, who had been cleverly stationed for that stroke.Dravid, though, patiently swayed out of the way of every short ball that came his way, and with a target of 73, victory was only a matter of time. The winning runs came when Tremlett bowled an inswinger that beat Sourav Ganguly and Matt Prior and raced down for four byes.The victory means India have now won at least one Test in ten of their last 12 tours, but have only won two of those series against a team other than Bangladesh or Zimbabwe. With the last Test at The Oval – a venue which has traditionally produced belters – India have an excellent opportunity to go on and get that rare overseas series victory. England, on the other hand, haven’t lost a series at home since the 2001 Ashes, which sets up the last game of this series quite splendidly.

Just when the sponsorship dispute between the West Indies cricket board and the players association appeared to be nearing resolution, the saga has taken another twist. Dinanath Ramnarine, the president of the West Indies Players’ Association, has claimed that Brian Lara and six other dropped players have received death threats owing to the sponsorship dispute with the board.”[They] face overwhelming pressure including death threats, and threats from the WICB never to play again,” claimed Ramnarine. “Threats and intimidation from sponsors, and pressure from the highest political levels within the length and breadth of the Caribbean community.”Ramnarine lashed out at the board, further saying that the dispute – in which seven players were dropped from the squad for the first Test against South Africa in Guyana – had made the board “tyrannical and despotic”. The board “has suspended its discretion, jettisoned all reasoning, and is hell-bent at all costs to do the bidding of its sponsor. In fact, the board was prepared to sacrifice West Indies cricket and the development of a successful team on the altar of commercial expediency.”The board, however, has declined to comment on the allegations made by WIPA. A statement on the windiescricket.com website quotes the WICB as saying: “The WICB is concerned about the tone and content of this highly emotional and totally inaccurate statement, which is most unbecoming and unworthy of an organisation representing professional sportsmen. The WICB, therefore, is of the view that this irresponsible statement is unworthy of any further response.”

A spicy, green-tinged MCG pitch came under significant scrutiny after a 20-wicket Boxing Day blockbuster in which both Australia and England were bowled out cheaply.Matt Page, the MCG curator, said ahead of the fourth Ashes Test that he hoped to replicate the pitch he had prepared for last year’s Border-Gavaskar Trophy fixture, which Australia won in the final session of day five. But this Test looks highly unlikely to last into a fourth day, let alone a fifth, after ball dominated bat in front of a record crowd.Page left 10mm of grass on the surface, 3mm more than he had last year, and fast bowlers on both sides found substantial seam movement throughout the day. England have not picked a frontline spinner all series, but Australia’s decision to play an all-seam attack was a reflection of conditions and both captains wanted to bowl first at the toss in unseasonably cool weather.Related

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Ex-players from both sides blamed the pitch – more so than the attacking approach or technical shortcoming of both sets of batters – for the fact that 20 wickets fell on the opening day, with Stuart Broad and Glenn McGrath leading the criticism.”The pitch is doing too much, if I’m brutally honest. Test match bowlers don’t need this amount of movement to look threatening,” Broad said, commentating on SEN Radio. “Great Test matches pitches, generally, they bounce, but they don’t jag all over the place.”Glenn McGrath told the BBC: “This pitch has got far too much grass on it… That pitch has got too much life in it for Test cricket… The Australians bowled well [but] it’s hard to apply yourself on a pitch that’s doing plenty because if you’re looking to defend, one’s got your name on it. You’ve got to find that balance between somehow keeping balls out while still looking to score.”MCG pitches have been far more sporting in recent years after the batter-friendly surface was heavily criticised during the 2017-18 Ashes Test, which saw 24 wickets fall across five days. Alastair Cook, who scored 244 not out in that match, said that the balance had tipped too far the other way.”The bowlers didn’t have to work hard for their wickets,” Cook said on TNT Sports. “It was an unfair contest. I don’t know how you hit it [the ball]. If this flattens out tomorrow then fine, it’s an even contest over three or four days. But I don’t think this is particularly even.”Brett Lee, another former fast bowler, joked on Fox Cricket that Pat Cummins “was almost going to go back to the hotel to pick up his spikes” after seeing the pitch, having ruled himself out of the rest of the series as he continues his rehabilitation from a back injury.Scott Boland claimed the big wicket of Harry Brook•AFP/Getty Images

“I think there’s a bit too much in it,” Lee said. “I wouldn’t be complaining at the end of the day if I was a [current] fast bowler. It’s a different surface: it’s that furry feeling. I rubbed my hand on the side of the wicket this morning, and you can feel the grass lift up.”This is the second time in the series that all 22 players have batted on the opening day of a Test match, after 19 wickets fell in Perth on a pitch that was ultimately rated “very good” by the ICC – though was described as a “piece of s***” by Australia’s Usman Khawaja.The ball appeared to deviate more off the seam at the MCG than in Perth, with several balls moving sharply after pitching – including Josh Tongue’s delivery to clean up Steven Smith, and Scott Boland’s nip-backers to Harry Brook (pinned lbw) and Jamie Smith (bowled through the gate).Michael Neser was Australia’s outstanding performer on the opening day, top-scoring with a counter-attacking 35 from No. 8 before taking 4 for 45 to help bowl England out inside 30 overs. He suggested that the pitch might yet flatten out, and defended the attacking approach that both sets of batters took.”The ball definitely nipped around a bit there with the new rock, so it was just a matter of trying to find ways to put pressure back on their bowlers – and knowing that, when we bowled, we had to just be patient and let the wicket do the work,” Neser said.”Going into it, you knew it was going to nip around with the amount of grass there, but traditionally it can flatten out here, so we’ll see how it pans out… I don’t want to go into tomorrow with the preconception of ‘the wicket’s going to be doing a lot’ because it can flatten, and we’ve just got to stick to our processes.”I think you have to change the way you approach it because bowlers are so good at just holding their length nowadays, so you have to actually put pressure back on them as a batter. I know it can look streaky at times, but at times that’s the only way to score: be brave and come at them.”

When your batsmen score nearly 400 runs in 50 overs and your bowlers and fielders then lead you to a comprehensive win, it’s only understandable that the coach is pleased.Mickey Arthur, South Africa’s coach, praised his side’s ODI batting line-up, fresh from mauling Pakistan to the tune of 392 runs, and added that they would not relent for the rest of the series.Arthur was particularly happy that the batsmen built on good starts and added, “Add Herschelle Gibbs to that batting line-up and you have something special.”Gibbs, having served his suspension for referring in improper language to Pakistan supporters, will be available when the second ODI is played in Durban on Wednesday. Loots Bosman is expected to drop out to make room for Gibbs, who will bat number four while Jacques Kallis will move to one-down.Arthur said his team had batted, bowled and fielded well. “We showed we had taken our fielding, in particular, to new heights. Now we plan to provide our best players with as much match practice as possible ahead of the World Cup tournament. Therefore, we won’t easily change the winning combination.Despite beating them by ten wickets and 164 runs over the weekend, Arthur warned against not taking Pakistan seriously. “We also realise Pakistan can regain their best form at any time and we are not taking them lightly.”We have to maintain that momentum and put Pakistan under even more pressure.”

Sri Lanka may look the better side on paper ahead of the first Test at Christchurch – with New Zealand missing bowlers Kyle Mills, Michael Mason and allrounder Scott Styris to injury – but their poor away record may go against them.Since May 2004, Sri Lanka have won six Tests out of the 16 they have played away from home – two each against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe, while one each against Pakistan and England. They lost 1-0 to New Zealand when they visited the country in 2004-05 – an innings defeat at Wellington where Lou Vincent made 224, his highest score in Test cricket.”Our record in that area isn’t as good as we’d like it to be in that area,” the Sri Lanka coach Tom Moody told the . “But we did pretty well in England and we’re looking forward to making more progress in New Zealand.”Kumar Sangakkara, Sri Lanka’s wicketkeeper-batsman, said what the team had to do was quickly adapt to the conditions that they were to play in. “With the volume of cricket we’ve played [England, South Africa and the Champions Trophy] and the conditions we’ve been through, we’ve adapted very well. Right now the guys have no complaints. The thing is to stay positive, choose the right ball in the right zones and commit 100 per cent to scoring off them.”Sangakkara did not keep wickets in Sri Lanka’s tour match against Otago, the gloves instead being handed over to Prasanna Jayawardene, who had stood behind the stumps for the two Tests against South Africa at home in July this year. While Upul Tharanga, the Sri Lankan opening batsman, got a century against Otago, Sanath Jayasuriya, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Mahela Jayawardene and Sangakkara managed half-centuries in the drawn match. Muttiah Muralitharan and Chaminda Vaas sat out the game.New Zealand are certainly not taking the two-Test series easily. “We beat them quite comprehensively [in 2004-05] but it’s probably not a true reflection of the side they are at the moment,” said Daniel Vettori, the New Zealand left-arm spinner. “The last time we saw them they were probably at the start of an upward curve.”Chris Lewis, the turf manager of Jade Stadium, said that the pitch will favour batsmen. “If the seamers get to bowl first on it they’ll like it but after a couple of days it will flatten out and keep going and going,” Lewis told the Stuff website. But Shane Bond, the New Zealand fast bowler, was sceptical that the pitch would offer assistance to the bowlers on the first two days. “The Waikari [soil] can be deceiving,” said Bond. “I’ve turned up to games here where it’s green and you’ve won the toss and its done nothing.”With Mills and Mason out, Bond is likely to partner with Iain O’Brien for the new ball.