Capitals have won two out of three matches and seem like a settled unit with most boxes ticked
UP Warriorz seek change in fortunes against solid Capitals
Champions Trophy – Jamie Smith has ‘free hit’ as England No. 3
When the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore was rebuilt over the past few months at breakneck speed, the PCB may have envisioned it opening with cricket’s most ferociously rivalry, but cricket’s oldest rivalry will have to do instead. With Pakistan not guaranteed a game at this venue at all, there was no other game here with greater demand for tickets than England vs Australia, where the winners of the last two ODI World Cups kick off their Champions Trophy campaigns.
This, however, is not going to be a battle of two current white-ball titans. Neither side starts off this tournament a picture of ODI health, and it is how they address – or, more pertinently, conceal – their weaknesses that may be most consequential to the outcome. England have lost 16 of their last 23 ODIs in a run stretching back to the 2023 World Cup, while Australia have come up second best in six of the last eight games. They are further hampered by injuries and high-profile withdrawals: none of Pat Cummins, Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc, Mitchell Marsh or Marcus Stoinis are part of Australia’s squad.
After something of a horror ODI series against India, England’s most significant tactical move may be something of a defensive ploy masquerading as aggression. Announcing their starting XI two days out from the game, they revealed wicketkeeper Jamie Smith will bat at No. 3 for the first time in his international career.
“We just feel it’s a nice position to give him a free hit to try and really impact the game, make that that top three really dynamic,” Jos Buttler, England’s captain, said. “Jamie’s someone with incredible talent and taken to international cricket so well that we feel he’s got the game there and can place him in that position to try and have a really big impact with a number of guys behind him.”
It’s the closing bit of that statement, perhaps, that unearths a more rounded reason for what, if England’s recent history is anything to go by, is an on-brand punt. Against India, England’s more established middle order was especially vulnerable to collapses against India’s spinners in the middle overs.
While a calf injury ruled Smith out of that series, his ability against spin in Pakistan was best showcased in the longest format. October’s third Test in Rawalpindi was over on the third morning on an excessively spin-friendly wicket; Pakistan did not bowl a ball of seam and all 20 England wickets fell to the spinners.
But with England on the ropes at 118 for 6, it was Smith who launched a remarkable counter-attack, hitting five fours and six sixes in a 119-ball 89 to allow England to rack up 267. It included an astonishing takedown of Pakistan’s premier offspinner Sajid Khan, scoring 61 runs at a run a ball against him without giving away his wicket.
“He’s obviously got the game technically and tactically, but I think the head on his shoulders seems to be one of the biggest strengths,” Buttler said. “Nothing seems to faze him too much: I think you could ask him to bat anywhere in the line-up and it wouldn’t faze him. We feel it gives him a nice position to try and really impact the game, make some big runs, and put some pressure on the opposition.”
It means Joe Root, Harry Brook and Buttler himself slot down the order, spreading England’s quality through the middle overs and – theoretically at least – inoculating against the sort of collapses that characterised their white-ball tour of India. The cynical view would term this a rearranging of the deckchairs in the absence of more wholesale changes, but on these wickets against the arguably less challenging task of negotiating Australia’s spinners, Buttler had reason for guarded optimism.
“I think the conditions will be different here [to what] they were in India,” he said. “Everywhere you go around the world has its own nuances and different conditions. We’ve got lots of guys who’ve played in Pakistan before, guys who’ve played in the PSL, so [they’ll be] sharing those experiences. And then every day in a game of cricket, you’ve got to turn up and assess conditions and play accordingly and work on that.”
And unlike the febrile partisanship that can take hold of these occasions when these two sides play each other home or away, this time around, they’ll find themselves greeted by a crowd who doubted they’d see this fixture played here, and are simply glad that it is. At least, for those lucky few who managed to secure tickets.
Ranji Trophy 2024/25, VIDAR vs MUM 2nd semi final Match Report, February 17 – 21, 2025
Vidarbha 383 (Malewar 79, Shorey 74, Dube 5-49) and 292 (Rathod 151, Wadkar 52, Mulani 6-85) beat Mumbai 270 (Anand 106, Rekhade 4-55, Dubey 2-68) and 325 (Shardul 66, Mulani 46, Dubey 5-127) by 80 runs
Shardul Thakur’s fighting half-century wasn’t enough for another Mumbai rearguard as the defending champions lost the Ranji Trophy semi-final to Vidarbha, last year’s finalists, in an absorbing contest that went into the final session of the final day in Nagpur.
Leading Vidarbha’s run to the final – they’ve won two of three Ranji finals previously – against Kerala was left-arm spin-bowling allrounder Harsh Dubey, who picked up his seventh five-wicket haul of the season to take his wickets tally to 66. He’s now just two short of Bihar left-arm spinner Ashutosh Aman’s record for most wickets in a Ranji season.
Victory on the final day seemed a mere formality when Mumbai lost Shivam Dube and Suryakumar Yadav early, as they quickly slipped to 124 for 6. Dube played outside the line of a sharp in-ducker and was bowled by Yash Thakur, while Suryakumar saw one from Dubey jump on to him to lob a catch to the slips.
But from the depths of a crisis, Shardul rose to the occasion like he has a number of times this season. Typically aggressive, and batting with a sense of freedom and purpose, he quickly whittled down the runs during the course of a century stand with Shams Mulani.
At one point, halfway into the second session, Vidarbha’s left-arm spinners even switched to a defensive line by bowling outside leg to Shardul to try and frustrate him into either slogging or stepping out against spread-out fields. Vidarbha missed a run-out opportunity to dismiss Shardul on 48 when Akshay Wadkar, their captain and wicketkeeper, failed to collect a throw cleanly from fine leg.
Vidarbha appeared to wobble briefly, but it was at that point that Mumbai gifted them a wicket in the form of the set Mulani when Shardul attempted to steal a single to square leg. Mulani, who hesitated briefly, was well short of the crease despite the dive as Danish Malewar’s one-handed pick-up and throw with one stump to aim at hit the bulls eye to break a 103-run stand.
Shardul then began to open up and look at boundary attempts, sensing the possibility of being stranded, but was out to a superb delivery from Yash. He was caught on the hop to a short-of-a-length delivery that cut back in to breach his defence and hit the stumps.
Mumbai’s last-wicket pair of Mohit Awasthi and Royston Dias had some fun in putting together a quickfire 52-run stand to bring the requirement down to less than three figures, before an audacious reverse sweep from Awasthi had him lbw as Dubey celebrated his fifth to seal victory.
Australia news – Chris Rogers questions if attacking Konstas is the real Sam
Former Test opener Chris Rogers has questioned if Sam Konstas really wants to be an all-out aggressor, as data shows how much the teen’s game has changed since December.
Konstas put himself back in the headlines this week, when bowled trying to slog-sweep Scott Boland in the third over of a Sheffield Shield match against Victoria at the SCG.
The seven-ball cameo included a reverse-scoop for four off Boland’s second ball and another boundary charging down the wicket, before he was out for 10. It prompted immediate questions over Konstas’ long-term viability at the top, and whether he will regain his spot for the World Test Championship final against South Africa.
Konstas responded by waiting 30 balls to play an attacking shot in NSW’s second innings, before being caught for 17 as the Blues went on to victory.
“Being an opening batter you probably want to be as consistent as possible with your approach,” Rogers, who played 25 Tests for Australia and is now Victoria’s coach, said. “I like the fact at times he decides to put pressure back on the bowlers and try and change the game.
“But for him it’s probably working out the calculated risks he wants to take. He’s only played 15 first-class games, the more he plays he’s going to understand what his style is and be able to deal with the pressures of first class cricket.”
Those close to Konstas insist he has not changed since his eye-catching Boxing Day Test debut, where he reverse-scooped Jasprit Bumrah and hit a quickfire 60. But what has become evident is the way the 19-year-old’s cricket has changed in recent months.
When Konstas became the youngest player to hit twin tons in a Shield match in October, he played no scoops and left or defended almost half the balls he faced.
His approach has clearly changed since, with the turning point seemingly coming when he hit 107 from 97 balls against India in a shortened non first-class two-day match for the Prime Minister’s XI.
Before that game, Konstas had a strike-rate of 50.72 in first-class cricket, hitting a boundary once every 17 balls and averaging 39.37. From that innings on, Konstas’ strike-rate has sat at 72 in red and pink-ball cricket, with a boundary every 11 balls while averaging 36. Konstas’ percentage of runs from boundaries has also gone from 24 to 39.
“It’s interesting because I know a couple of the boys who have been around him said he doesn’t particularly want to play like that,” Rogers said. “I wonder if it’s just he gets into the contest and his heart rate goes up and he makes these decisions a little bit on the fly. I really don’t know. He’s got such a big future. He’s so talented. Even when he was playing in the second innings he looked assured.”
Boland, who finished with 10 wickets in the match, admitted he was also surprised Konstas attacked him so early in Sydney.
“We thought with the wicket having a bit of nip if you put enough balls in the right area we had a good chance of getting his wicket when he plays like that,” Boland said. “It’s up to him how he wants to bat. We saw before Christmas the way he batted against South Australia and others when he got some big scores.
“He’s got both methods and can play really aggressive, but when he wants to play the traditional method in four-day cricket, he has the game to do it.”
Afg vs SA – Champions Trophy – Heinrich Klaasen misses Afghanistan game as precaution over left elbow injury
There was no Heinrich Klaasen or Tristan Stubbs in South Africa’s team sheet for the Champions Trophy game against Afghanistan in Karachi on Friday afternoon, and CSA confirmed that Klaasen had been ruled out “as a precautionary measure due to a left elbow soft tissue injury”. Stubbs might not have been a contender for the first-choice XI anyway.
South Africa, who won the toss and asked Afghanistan to field first, still had a formidable-looking batting line-up, with Ryan Rickelton and Tony de Zorzi up top, and Temba Bavuma, Rassie van der Dussen, Aiden Markram and David Miller in the middle, and the allrounders Wiaan Mulder and Marco Jansen at seven and eight.
But Klaasen is one of their big players, and the form player in ODIs. In the four ODIs he had played in the past few months, all against Pakistan – at home late last year and then the one in the tri-series preceding the Champions Trophy – his scores were 86 in 97 balls, 97 in 74 balls, 81 in 43 balls and, in the latest game, 87 in 56 balls.
Overall, he averages 44.12 from 54 ODI innings – in which he has scored 2074 runs – and strikes at 117.44. Crucially, keeping the venues of the Champions Trophy in mind, Klaasen has a strike rate of 125.31 against spinners in ODIs since the start of 2020, all while averaging 57 runs-per-dismissal against that kind of bowling.
Among 97 batters to have faced 500-plus balls of spin in this period, Klaasen’s strike rate is the highest and comfortably better than the next best – Rohit Sharma’s 111.59. In this game, against Afghanistan, South Africa will likely face at least 20 overs of spin, with Rashid Khan and Noor Ahmad among the frontline bowlers, and Mohammad Nabi in the mix too.
South Africa’s next Champions Trophy game is against Australia on February 25 in Rawalpindi.
Ban vs Ind – Champions Trophy – Towhid Hridoy – ‘I had to fight and find a way’ after the early wickets
Bangladesh chose to bat in their Champions Trophy opener against India in Dubai and were 35 for 5 inside nine overs – it could have been 35 for 6 if Rohit Sharma hadn’t dropped a dolly off Jaker Ali off Axar Patel’s hat-trick ball in that ninth over. Towhid Hridoy, who partnered Jaker in an impressive sixth-wicket stand of 154 and scored 100 off 118 balls to lead the way, said that the situation meant he had to “had to fight and find a way” to take the innings to a competitive place.
“We were clear what we wanted to do if we won the toss. We wanted to bat. Yes, we lost some early wickets, which set us back. But despite that, the way we came back, Jaker and I, if one of us had done a bit more, we might have got to 260-270,” Hridoy said at the press interaction afterwards. “The match scenario would have been different then. We scored 30-40 runs too few. If you see, they took 46.3 overs to finish the chase, so it wasn’t easy.
“The pitch was tricky. Look at their innings, they were not too comfortable either. But that’s not in our hands. Conditions are different everywhere – we have to play on the pitch we get. This is not an excuse. I am just saying that the pitch was tricky to bat on.”
Hridoy had walked out at No. 5, with Bangladesh at 26 for 3, with Mohammed Shami and Harshit Rana having picked up the wickets to fall. Then Axar took over, sending back Tanzid Hasan and Mushfiqur Rahim off back-to-back deliveries. With Jaker then, progress was slow but steady, perhaps not ideal, but Bangladesh couldn’t afford to lose more wickets at that stage. That said, it did look like the pitch had eased out and batting was comparatively easy.
“It might have looked easy, but it wasn’t, since we had lost five wickets,” Hridoy said. “We talked a lot with each other and to ourselves. We had to fight and find a way. I played a lot of dot balls at the start, but I felt I would be able to catch up. But my cramps set me back. If such a situation crops up again, I might do even better. I hope we don’t make the same mistakes again.
“If we had taken a couple more wickets at the start, the scenario could have been different”
Towhid Hridoy
“I think my cramps hampered our innings. I might have been able to score 20-30 runs more if I hadn’t cramped up.”
With just 228 to play with, against a strong India batting line-up, not many would have given Bangladesh a chance, but after a poor start with the ball – India scored 68 for 1 in the first ten compared to Bangladesh’s 39 for 5 – they kept things tight. Bangladesh were always behind, but the chase did get just a bit tricky, Shubman Gill’s 101 not out eventually the difference.
“I did think we could fight with the runs we had. We bowled well and fought well. We gave away a few boundaries at the start, which didn’t help, but we fought back well,” Hridoy said. “If we had taken a couple more wickets at the start, the scenario could have been different.”
Ranji Trophy 2024/25, GUJ vs KER 1st semi final Match Report, February 17 – 21, 2025
Kerala 457 lead Gujarat 455 (Panchal 148, Jaymeet 79, Sarwate 4-111, Saxena 4-139) by 2 runs
Sixty-eight years after playing their first match, Kerala all but secured an entry into their maiden Ranji Trophy final on a dramatic fifth morning against Gujarat in Ahmedabad.
Needing to pick up three wickets while having just 28 to defend at the start of the day’s play, left-arm spinner Aditya Sarwate rose to the occasion by picking up all the remaining wickets to fall as Kerala bowled Gujarat out for 455 to clinch a two-run first-innings lead.
Each of the three wickets had an element of drama attached to it. The prelude to the first wicket of the day, of the well-set Jaymeet Patel, was a dropped catch by Sachin Baby, the Kerala captain, at extra cover with Gujarat needing 23 to draw level. But two balls later, Baby sprung back to life as Sarwate’s slider from around the stumps accounted for Jaymeet who played for the turn when there was none.
Having played down the wrong line as he lunged forward, Jaymeet dragged his foot outside the crease as the ball passed his outside edge as Mohammed Azharuddeen effected an excellent stumping. An agonising three-minute wait and multiple replays later, Kerala celebrated as the umpire deemed Jaymeet’s foot to be on the line when the bail was knocked off its groove.
Arzan Nagwaswalla, the No. 10 batter, showed good technique and used the first opportunity to pick up a boundary, when he rocked back and punched part-time spinner Akshay Chandran to the cover boundary to bring Gujarat within 14 runs of levelling the score. That would be Chandran’s only over of the day – he was only brought on to allow a change of ends for Jalaj Saxena, with Kerala opting to go all-out with their spinners.
With Gujarat trailing by 11 came another big moment when Siddharth Desai, who had stonewalled the bowling for 163 deliveries up until then, opted for the DRS after he had been given out caught at silly point. When Ultra-Edge showed no spike as the ball passed bat, the Kerala camp threw their heads back in agony, but they were jumping in joy a few second later when ball tracking showed the ball that pitched in line would’ve gone on to hit leg stump. Desai couldn’t believe his luck as luck smiled Kerala’s way even though the appeal wasn’t made for the lbw.
Nagwaswalla and Priyajitsinh Jadeja, the No 11, then brought the equation down to eight runs needed when Kerala had another half-chance. Nagwaswalla whipped one into the leg side with the ball lodging between Salman Nizar’s legs before slipping out as he attempted a reflex action catch.
Then, Saxena was agonising close to his fifth wicket when he deceived Nagwaswalla in flight as he lunged at one that spun back in from the rough to take the inside edge and brush past leg-stump towards the fine leg fielder. It meant Gujarat needed just two to level the scores, which would’ve been enough to see them through in case of a draw because of having more points in the group stages.
The big moment arrived for Kerala when Sarwate tossed one up. Nagwaswalla attempted a hoick as the ball flew off a thick inside edge to short leg, where it hit Nizar flush on the helmet before lobbing up to Baby who took the deflection at slip. Initially pumped by adrenaline, Nizar celebrated wildly with the rest of the Kerala team as they celebrated the prospect of making their first-ever Ranji final as a crest-fallen Nagwaswalla trudged back slowly up the long flight of stairs into the dressing room.
After the ecstasy of their achievement sunk in and players made their way off the field, Nizar was duly stretchered off for a concussion check, even as Kerala’s batters quickly regrouped to play out the remainder of the match on the final day.
Saxena wheeled away for 71 overs in the second innings for his four wickets, three of which turned the game around on its head on the fourth morning. Sarwate, who had figures of 1 for 101 coming into the day, ended with 4 for 111 as the prospect of playing against his home state, Vidarbha, at his home ground in Nagpur loomed.
Champions Trophy 2025 – India – Shubman Gill in for the long haul in ODIs unlike Shreyas Iyer, says Sanjay Manjrekar
Shubman Gill is a “lambi race ka ghoda [one for the long haul]” and batting at just 60% is enough for him to score a century like he did in India’s Champions Trophy opener against Bangladesh. This is the assessment of Sanjay Manjrekar, who also feels that Gill gives the impression of being someone who will be around for a further 10-15 years while Shreyas Iyer doesn’t.
“He [Gill] is batting at the right position to make a huge impact. When he gets a hundred, like today, it seems like there is plenty left in the tank,” Manjrekar said on ESPNcricinfo Match Day. “It was like 60% of Shubman Gill is enough to get a hundred like this and he stays till the end. That is the difference between Shreyas Iyer and Shubman Gill that Gill will take you right till the end. He is somebody who you think is going to be around for 10-15 years. Shreyas Iyer, despite his obvious talent, doesn’t give you that impression.”
Gill finished unbeaten on 101 against Bangladesh and guided India in their chase of 229 in Dubai. He faced 129 balls and hit nine fours and two sixes in his knock and ensured India got home with six wickets and 21 balls to spare. One of his two sixes – a front-foot pull off Tanzim Hasan in the ninth over – went into the second tier of the stands at deep-midwicket.
“Some of the shots he played, the good-length ball he hit and it went into second tier… the big game is at his beck and call,” Manjrekar said. “Can he be better in 50-over cricket as a batter? I don’t think so, what can be better than this?”
In the company of Rohit Sharma, Gill started off quickly and raced to 26 off just 23 balls with four fours and a six by the time the first powerplay ended. But he slowed down when Bangladesh employed spin on a slowish track and kept an in-and-out field. He scored his slowest ODI fifty, off 69 balls, and then got to his hundred in 125 balls, the slowest for an India batter in ODIs since the 2019 World Cup. His ability to change gears impressed Manjrekar.
“He’s got the class to do it [change gears],” he said. India are blessed with [a top three] who are also Test batters, so they can play different gears. Yashasvi Jaiswal, when he comes in eventually, is also a Test batter. So if the ball is swinging around in overseas conditions, they have the ability to see the new ball through and then handle the various situations. Shubman Gill is that kind of a player, he is not one-dimensional, he has all the gears and we saw him do that today as well. He is a guy at the top of his 50-over-cricket prowess and he does it very calmly. There is an air of dominance and surety with the way he bats and finishes games.”
Former India legspinner Anil Kumble was impressed by the restraint Gill showed against spin. Bangladesh had offspinner Mehidy Hasan Miraz and legspinner Rishad Hossain, and Gill scored only 34 off the 56 balls he faces against them, hitting just the one four. But he took 28 singles that helped him tick along.
“The other thing that was noticeable today was generally when he sees the offspinner he steps out and launches it over long-on, midwicket,” Kumble said. “He didn’t want to take the risk perhaps because of the pitch. He felt that that was the riskier option. Although Miraz is someone he would take on – we have seen it even in Test match cricket. He was constantly looking to just ease through and ensure he was there till the end. That was very noticeable even when the [required] run rate dropped a little bit.”
Manjrekar agreed: “And also the ability to nick off singles, keep that scoreboard ticking. It is not that he plays the sweep shot a lot or the dab. He goes very traditional and loves to keep the bat straight. Even when he is playing the pull shot, the bat comes down very straight. A lot of his singles would be back-foot punches to long-on instead of playing just with soft hands. A guy who can get singles at will, can hit a six at will, has got a reasonably good defence for 50-over cricket, he’s the complete player at the moment.”
There would have been slight jitters in the Indian camp when they slipped from 112 for 1 to 144 for 4 in under eight overs but Gill kept his calm and saw the chase through, which earned plaudits from Kumble.
“He’s been brilliant, especially in this format. The elegance and the ease with which he got that hundred on a difficult pitch,” he said. “I don’t think it was a true pitch where the ball was coming on nicely. It was on the slower side and you had to make adjustments, yet he was middling the ball and timing it so well.
“The best part about Shubman Gill was he ensured he saw the game through. It was not like he wanted to get going, get runs [and get out], we have seen that before. That is the maturity he has brought into the game. Hope this is the start of a fantastic season for him and India, because when you play the first match in a tournament and you get a hundred not out and you are there till the end, it augurs well.”
Champions Trophy 2025 – Virat Kohli putting lot of pressure on himself, needs to relax a little, says Anil Kumble
Former India captain and coach Anil Kumble feels that Virat Kohli is “trying too hard” and that’s making it tougher for him to find form amid a lean patch.
Kohli has managed just 137 runs in the six ODI innings he has played after the 2023 World Cup, with a single half-century. In India’s first game in Champions Trophy 2025, Kohli made 22 off 38 before falling to Bangladesh legspinner Rishad Hossain in Dubai.
“Having been through a lean patch, so to speak, especially in white-ball cricket – he hasn’t had that kind of run for a long period of time – I feel he’s trying a bit too hard,” Kumble said on ESPNcricinfo Match Day.
“You have that in players who have been there and done that before and everyone sort of looks up to you saying he’s the guy who’s going to take the game away and he’s the one guy who is the important man in the team,” Kumble said. “When you have that kind of pressure and you have that kind of expectation, you suddenly start putting undue importance to all of that and then try hard to do well. When you do that, you’re not really relaxed.
“The best innings that I am sure he’s played, he’s not even thinking about all of that. The best bowling performances, you’re not even thinking about all of that.
“I think he’s trying a bit too hard. You can see that in the way he is going about his innings. He just needs to not worry about it. Rohit [Sharma] comes in there, has the freedom because there is plenty of batting and all of them are in great form. Similarly for Virat, he just needs to come in and not worry about anything else.”
Kohli’s last six dismissals have come to spin – five of them to legspinners. It is down to trying too hard to score runs than just working the ball around, Kumble said.
“To start off against spin, on surfaces like that, you need a lot of confidence. He’s certainly trying too hard to maneuver that,” Kumble said. “He’s a good player of spin when he’s in form, when he’s wanting to just knock singles off and keep rotating the strike. Now he’s trying too hard to score runs rather than just maneuver, and that’s been his game plan.
“All players go through tough moments in their career, but I get a feeling watching him bat, I think he is putting a lot more pressure on himself. he just needs to relax a little bit and not worry too much about the outcome of what happens on the field rather than just go out there and have the freedom to just go and play naturally what he does really well.”
Former India batter Sanjay Manjrekar said that Kohli does not have the big-hitting game any more and his lack of form since the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Australia has pushed him into a corner.
“He’s in a tight corner, Virat Kohli. His confidence is still down,” Manjrekar said. “He wants to still show that he’s up there for a fight, and I am starting to see maybe there’s a little bit of bravado as well, and why not? You can’t be revealing what’s inside you.
“Now Rohit Sharma still has the big game. He can step out and hit a guy over extra cover and play the short-arm pull and willing to take chances. Virat Kohli doesn’t have the big game anymore. We’ve seen on occasion him playing the big shot but he can’t hit at will hit like a Shubman Gill does.
“What happened is, after that hundred in Australia, had he just carried on that form… you know it’s a confidence thing as well – when you’re out of form and you don’t have confidence you suddenly don’t quite get that power and the courage to hit the big shots.”
Kohli made an unbeaten 100 in the second innings in the first Test in Australia in Perth, but managed just 90 runs in the eight other innings he played in the series.
“That slip after Australia where he really struggled… I saw when he got a fifty against England in the one-day series, it was actually more of an insight into how Virat Kohli is batting,” Manjrekar said. “I thought he batted superbly in South Africa when India were there, in Australia that hundred came when already 300 runs were on the board. At this stage, I’m looking at him down on confidence.
“The batting mechanism is not staying with him. And you know what? There was somebody who said many years back to us that as you start ageing your luck also starts running out. And look at Virat Kohli, you’ve got to feel for him.
“What kind of a surface is he going to get for the next two matches? Surfaces that you would hate batting on. Slow, turning pitches. So it’s not helping his cause either.”
Manjrekar suggested that spinners are more confident trying to bowl aggressively to Kohli, knowing that he isn’t going to punish them with big shots.
“When he comes in to bat, the spinners come on. And once the spinners know that you’re not going to be hitting them for three sixes straight down the pitch or over midwicket – Rohit Sharma can still do it, KL Rahul can do it, Shubman Gill can do it – so the spinners also are bowling the kind of deliveries they’ll get wickets off because they don’t fear backlash from the batter.
“So he’s cornered in a way. What he needed in this tournament are flat pitches like the ones in Pakistan. But if he finds a way out of this and he finds another peak of Virat Kohli, that will tell you a lot more about the man and how he’s built.”
Lloyd Pope spins South Australia to within touching distance of Sheffield Shield final
South Australia 93 (Elliott 6-23) and 388 (Sangha 75, Scott 69*, McInerney 61) beat Tasmania 101 (Doggett 6-40) and 293 (Radhakrishnan 68, Doran 65, Webster 53, Pope 4-76) by 87 runs
Lloyd Pope missed out on a hat-trick but played a crucial role as South Australia continued their quest for a drought-breaking Sheffield Shield title with an 87-run win over Tasmania.
Set 381 runs for victory, Tasmania moved past 200 for the loss of three wickets as they sought to pull off an improbable run chase on Friday’s final day of play at Adelaide Oval.
But legspinner Pope claimed three of the last seven wickets to steer table-topping SA to their fifth win of the season from eight matches. SA now have one foot in the door of the final as they chase their first Shield title since 1996.
Webster belted five fours and a six in his 59-ball innings but was the last man out when he skied a catch to Jake Lehman off Nathan McAndrew.
Lehman had dropped a couple of catches earlier in the match and almost spilled the last chance, before grabbing it at the second attempt.
It brought down the curtain on a remarkable match, after 20 wickets fell on day one. It was the first time SA have won a Shield match after batting first and posting fewer than 100 runs in the first innings.
They were skittled for 93 but responded by knocking over Tasmania for 101 on Tuesday, thanks largely to 6 for 40 from player of the match Brendan Doggett.
Ben Manenti made the crucial breakthrough on the final day when he removed Radhakrishnan, and was busy in the field with four catches.
Radhakrishnan, an Indian-born 22-year-old who can bowl spinners with right and left arms, put on 79 runs for the fourth wicket with Doran as Tasmania briefly eyed victory.
Pope was on a hat-trick when he removed tailenders Kieran Elliott and Gabe Bell – both out for ducks and caught by Manenti.