February 12, 2001
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 West Indies fast bowler Marlon Black was viciously beaten with a wooden club in an attack outside a Melbourne night-club disclosed club team manager Ricky Skerritt. Two other players escaped but Black was knocked down by a car and attacked by four men. Black, who needed 10 stitches for a cut to the head, is expected to return to the Caribbean with his team-mates. "He is in great pain and discomfort and feels very depressed about the whole incident," Skerritt said. The three West Indian players were leaving the night club at about 4.00 am on Sunday after celebrating the end of their three-and-a-half-month tour of Australia. Black exchanged words with four men he had spotted smashing bottles on the road. It appeared the men jumped in a car to follow the cricketers who tried to run away. The car knocked down Black and the men jumped out, kicking and punching the bowler, and assaulting him with at least one wooden club.
 A new 10-year calendar outlines when all ten Test-playing countries will take each other on in home and away series during every  five-year period. "The aim of both the tours programme and the ICC Test Championship is to add interest, to Test match cricket," ICC President Malcolm Gray said. "There was a feeling that one-day internationals were taking the spotlight away from Test matches," he said. Two points will be allocated to a team for winning a series and one for a drawn rubber. The result of each new series will replace its previous equivalent in the table. "It's intended there will be a trophy and it will be handed over from one country to another when they fall off the top position," Gray said. The championship will begin with Pakistan's two-Test tour to England in May but initially the standings will be based on results over the last five years. That means Steve Waugh's Australia, who have won a record 15 successive Tests, will be officially crowned world champion of Test cricket when the ICC's new championship gets underway in May. Each Test series will be a minimum of two matches but the length of each series and dates of individual Tests will still have to be determined by individual cricket boards. "This will be the first time a co-ordinated calendar of international cricket has been adopted, giving the opportunity for long-term planning and preparation," Gray said. "It will also provide newer Test-playing nations such as Zimbabwe and Bangladesh with regular fixtures against all other teams." The ICC also announced it would conduct a review of playing conditions in May, which will include the use of television replays in umpiring decisions.
A target date of April 2002 has been set for the introduction of two panels of international umpires. One will be an elite group of up to eight full-time umpires contracted to the ICC, while the second will be termed an emerging panel, made up of between 25 to 30 umpires. Each member country will be asked to appoint an umpire's manager (six already have them). There will also be an ICC umpires manager appointed to co-ordinate international efforts to recruit high quality new entrants and raise umpiring standards across the international game. Umpires are to undergo hearing and eye tests, a move that has caused some mirth in cricketing circles. A similar approach is also to be taken with ICC match referees. A full time panel of up to eight referees will be contracted to the ICC and assigned to international series. The captains of the Test nations will seek an undertaking for greater equality in earnings between rich teams and poor teams at a special International Cricket Council meeting at Melbourne. Australian captain Steve Waugh and his West Indies counterpart Jimmy Adams have signalled their intention to use the meeting as a way of addressing the earnings gap between cricketers from different nations. Waugh says the wealth difference between some established cricketing nations, such as Australia, and those with less resources, such as Zimbabwe and Bangladesh, who only recently gained Test status, is hurting international cricket. "It's happening now already. That's why Zimbabwe lost their good players," he said. Star Zimbabwe batsman Murray Goodwin and all-rounder Neil Johnson both announced their retirement from international cricket last July in order to take up more lucrative posts in domestic cricket in Australia and South Africa respectively. "They are two quality players and they both left because they weren't getting paid enough to make a living out of the game." Adams said a more equitable pay scale would also help cricket fight off the scourge of corruption. The ICC is likely to grant India the 2002 ICC Knock-out and might also send a committee to mediate between India and Pakistan. A delegation from the ICC will soon head to India to explore the possibilities of India hosting the next ICC knock-out. The delegation will also meet the governments of India and Pakistan to convince them to try and renew cricketing ties. Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly said he is impressed with the attitude of the youngsters at the conditioning camp camp in Chennai. "They showed keen interest to learn and gave a good account of themselves." He said. Ganguly hinted that Vijay Dahiya might keep wickets in the first Test. The camp will resume on 16 February after the Challenger Trophy. The scene now shifts from the camp to stadium when the top three teams of Indian cricket fight it out in the Hero-Honda NKP Salve Challenger Trophy. In the opening match India Senior led by Sourav Ganguly meet India A led by Rahul Dravid. India Seniors have been winners of this tournament since its inception in 1994-95, except in 1998-99. Richie Benaud, the game's most famous commentator is likely to be replaced by Simon O'Donnell and Ian Healy as the captain of the Channel 9 commentary team at the end of next summer. Benaud will complete 25 years as captain of the commentary team next season. Reports say that Channel 9 is looking for a change of guard. Ian Chappell, Alan Border, Richie Benaud and Sunil Gavaskar will be among the stars to play a charity match in Chennai to raise funds for earthquake victims. The match will be played on March 23 after the last Test match of the Australian series. As most countries are busy playing elsewhere the four-nation tourney proposed by the BCCI may not be a possibility. The International Cricket Council would investigate allegations that four West Indian batsmen took money to throw their wickets away in a one-day match in Australia. The allegations were made in a 13-page document submitted to the ICC and reported by London's Observer newspaper. The report did not say when the one-day match was played, but the document included names and precise sums of money. The allegations that will be referred to the ICC's anti-corruption unit include the claim that a batsman pocketed thousands of dollars and expensive gifts for under-performing on tour in Australia. It is also alleged that an Australian woman doctor became a top West Indian bowler's mistress and paid players large fees for information that earned her a fortune, and that the director of an Australian building society doubled as a bookmaker, recruiting cricketers. West Indies star batsman Brian Lara was also to be questioned as part of the inquiry into the betting and match-fixing scandal engulfing the game. Ajay Jadeja who has moved the Delhi High Court against the ban imposed on him by the BCCI said that he is keen to play against the visiting Australians and that the ban must be kept in suspended animation. In his interim application he pleaded that the ban be stayed until the final outcome of his main writ so that he can be given a chance to play. The court has fixed hearing for the main writ on March 29. Fast bowler Darren Gough and left-arm spinner Ashley Giles shared eight wickets between them to bowl England to a comprehensive 165-run win over Sri Lanka's Board President's XI on Sunday. Set an imposing target of 326, the home side were dismissed at tea on the fourth and final day for 160. England play another four-day game against a Board President's XI at Matara from Thursday. New Zealand player co-ordinator Gilbert Enoka has returned fire at his detractors, saying that his role is largely misunderstood. Former New Zealand coaches Glenn Turner and Warren Lees last week questioned Enoka's value to the team, claiming the technical aspects of cricket coaching were taking a back seat to sports science, a concept that Turner described as "psycho-babble". However, Enoka says sports psychology isn't his primary function as player co-ordinator. The job, he said, also involved organising medical treatment and acting as a go-between for the players and New Zealand Cricket. Enoka said motivational speeches were not a part of the job description but he did assist players with pre-match mental preparation. "Criticism is part and parcel of the game, when a team is struggling everyone is under scrutiny," Enoka said.  New Zealand skipper Stephen Fleming has retained the captaincy of the side to face Pakistan in Saturday's first one-day international at Auckland. Fleming was named to lead the side after speculation he would be replaced for the five-match series after New Zealand went down to an embarrassing 1-4 series defeat to Sri Lanka. The Team: Stephen Fleming (captain), Nathan Astle, Adam Parore, Roger Twose, Craig McMillan, Chris Harris, Jacob Oram, Lou Vincent, Daniel Vettori, James Franklin, Daryl Tuffey, Chris Martin. It seems doubtful if Muthiah Muralitharan Sri Lanka's trump card, will be fit enough for the first Test against the touring England side. The spinning wizard injured his groin while fielding in the fifth one-day international against New Zealand in Christchurch on Sunday. Coach Dav Whatmore said they would not know how serious Muralitharan's groin injury was until the team arrived back in Sri Lanka this week. The injury occurred when the Sri Lankan off-spinner tried to field the ball with his feet. Muralitharan missed the latter part of the recent tour to South Africa with a groin strain. He was still under an injury cloud when the team arrived in New Zealand, but played a big part in all five one-dayers. Fast bowler Darren Gough and left-arm spinner Ashley Giles shared eight wickets between them to bowl England to a comprehensive 165-run win over Sri Lanka's Board President's XI on Sunday. Set an imposing target of 326, the home side were dismissed at tea on the fourth and final day for 160. England play another four-day game against a Board President's XI at Matara from Thursday. Sri Lanka in New Zealand at Christchurch (5th One-dayer) New Zealand: 282-9 in 50 overs (AC Parore 49, SP Fleming 40, JDP Oram 59, CZ Harris 52 not out) Sri Lanka: 269 in 49.2 overs (M Atapattu 76, M Jayawardene 46, R Arnold 51, K Dharmasena 30, N Zoysa 32; JEC Franklin 3-44, CD McMillan 3-44) Result: New Zealand won by 13 runs (Sri Lanka won the five-match series 4-1) Man of the match: JDP Oram (NZ) "Cricket is a statistical game in many ways and we would hope a lot of supporters of the game would be interested in constantly monitoring who is top of that ladder" -- ICC chief Malcolm Gray on the new Test ranking system. Yesterday's News News Roll archive
Compiled by: Mohandas Menon
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