Free of the media frenzy that surrounds the men’s contests, the rivalry between the women’s teams has largely been defined by camaraderie

Shashank Kishore30-Jul-2022Baby Fatima’s moment of cross-border fame was one of the more memorable images from the Women’s World Cup in New Zealand earlier this year. The infant daughter of Pakistan captain Bismah Maroof surrounded by the Indian players in the post-match afterglow spoke of the love, laughter and respect shared by the two sets of players. It was a defining image of the India-Pakistan rivalry in women’s cricket.Don’t let people from the outside tell you it’s war; the relationship between the players is cordial. Pakistan allrounder Nida Dar put it succinctly when she said, ” (The contest has its place, our friendship has its place too.)”It helps that the pressure and the win-at-all-costs mentality – which isn’t entirely absent – isn’t magnified as much by the media as it is when the men’s teams face off.The latest round of the rivalry will take place on Sunday, when the two teams meet in a crucial Group A fixture of the Commonwealth Games at Edgbaston. India and Pakistan are both coming off losses in their opening matches to Australia and Barbados respectively. That is enough pressure to contend with.Yet, what the players do know is, irrespective of how their current form may be, they are one performance away from becoming a star.Ask Nain Abidi, Pakistan’s first centurion in a women’s ODI and a member of the Asian Games gold-medal-winning team at Guangzhou in 2010. She has twice been part of teams that have beaten India at T20 World Cups. Both games were thrillers that had her chewing fingernails.In Galle in 2012, Pakistan beat India by one run, recording their first-ever win in the tournament’s history. It was also the first time any Pakistan side, men’s or women’s, had beaten India at a World Cup. Then in Delhi in 2016, in front of 7000 screaming fans and pouring rain, Pakistan clung on by a two-run margin via the DLS method.”No matter how you train your mind to think this is just another game, it’s impossible not to get sucked into the hype,” Abidi tells ESPNcricinfo. “Forget what people think. Your own family members can sometimes put pressure on you. I remember before that Delhi game, so many family members called to wish me luck.”After we won the match, the PCB announced a reward for us. The departments we used to play for announced bonuses. News channels were knocking on our doors. It was surreal, to the extent that it made us wonder if we’d actually won a World Cup. That is how big a win over India is. It can make you instant stars.”Abidi is far away from the hype now, having last played for Pakistan, incidentally against India, at the Asia Cup in 2018. Since becoming a parent, Abidi has lived in the USA, but she will unfailingly tune in at 6am on Sunday to watch the rivals play.For all the camaraderie off the field, the rivalry on it is often intense•ICC via Getty ImagesVR Vanitha, the former India batter, remembers that Delhi game for its intensity and hype, but also speaks warmly of the atmosphere and camaraderie between the players.”I remember being very bombastic in my belief that this is just another game and how my mind has been trained to think that way,” she says. “But that day, the moment I reached the stadium and took my earphones off, I was like ‘whoa, what is happening here?’ The hype, the energy, everything was so different. It hit you instantly.”The loss may have bitter to swallow for India, but two days later, both teams were special invitees for a charity event that ended with a fashion show where the players walked the ramp. The moment word spread that the Pakistan women’s team would be in attendance, they were given front-row seats. It was so different to 2013, where they had to stay within the stadium’s premises in Cuttack for security reasons during the 50-over World Cup.”The next day at the breakfast table, we sat and ate together,” Vanitha remembers. “You wouldn’t have believed they were the same side we lost to the previous day. We hardly spoke cricket. But as we parted, we wished each other for the rest of the campaign. I can’t remember any instance of there being any animosity. Yes, there was friendly banter, but it was always cordial.”At Derby during the 2017 World Cup, fast bowler Kainat Imtiaz sat motionless, soaking in every bit of advice she got from her idol Jhulan Goswami. In 2006, Imtiaz was a ball-girl during the Asia Cup in Karachi, where she watched Goswami bowl and became inspired to become a fast bowler.”I can say I have been able to motivate one girl in this world to play cricket, that too from Pakistan – that was a big thing for me,” Goswami said afterwards.When Harmanpreet Kaur left the 2019 edition of the Women’s BBL, her replacement Dar, who became the first Pakistan player to feature in the tournament, didn’t waste time seeking valuable suggestions and tips from her Punjabi friend “on the other side of the border”.Yet for all the friendly interactions off the field, the players are fierce rivals on it. You just needed to see Dar’s reaction upon getting Harmanpreet’s wicket at the World Cup earlier this year to understand it.This is, in essence, is how the biggest rivalry in cricket plays out between the women’s teams. The players are aware of the geopolitics of the region, which evokes jingoism on either side from time to time, but are determined not to let it bother them. And while India and Pakistan may not play each other in bilateral series, every occasion that pits them against each other only adds a new layer of warmth and camaraderie off the field, even as the on-field intensity simmers.Sunday will bring another chapter of this fierce yet friendly rivalry. The significance of the contest is unlikely to be lost on either side. A win could be the springboard to pitch for a historic medal, a loss could well mean an early exit from the Commonwealth Games.

Attacking approach gets Pantsed but Ben Stokes’ team will be more sure-footed in the long run

Vithushan Ehantharajah01-Jul-20222:15

Giles on Anderson: ‘He’s a genius, still a pleasure to watch him operate’

Principles don’t really become principles just like that. You don’t just get to walk into a shop and pick a principle off the shelf, plug in and press play. It needs to scoped, whittled, and honed before it is in any fit shape to be a foundation of your ethos.Above all else, it needs to be robustly tested, even knocked around a bit to see if it can withstand the harsher moments. That way you know it’s of real substance. The reason the All Blacks have a “no d***heads” policy is because, after a lot of experimenting, they realised they weren’t winning much with d***heads.This England men’s Test team are on the other end of that spectrum. In it for each other, expressive, some tactics, seemingly more vibes. Three empathic victories over New Zealand this last month has given them a renewed belief, which has been wedded to a sense they are bringing the noise to Test cricket and waking up the neighbours.Related

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Armed with a heightened faith in their ability and self-regard, they charged into the first day of this fifth Test against India, and looked good for the hype. They adhered religiously to the playbook, even if it was only drawn up a month ago: winning the toss and electing to bat last, packing the cordon, encouraging bowlers to use the open spaces to their advantage and entice misjudgements. Within 28 overs of play, they had India 98 for 5.A returning James Anderson led the way with three wickets, but missed out on picking up his all-time great sparring partner, Virat Kohli, who was one of two to fall to Matthew Potts. The Durham quick is one of the poster boys of Bazball, and having removed Kane Williamson three times in the New Zealand series, he unsettled and then unpicked the former India captain. Not since Future has someone come on to the scene and immediately found himself attached to so many high-profile names on merit.It was usually at this point that Daryl Mitchell and Tom Blundell got to work to bump up New Zealand’s scores. And while their partnership averaged 120.7 across six innings, England were always able to maintain some semblance of control, and were even able to keep focusing on taking wickets. This time, however, as 98 for 5 became 320 for 5 in 38.3 overs, they found themselves needing to reassess. Those principles, still being recited for the sake of memory as much as meditation, looked like they might have to be abandoned, even if only for a moment. To bastardise a famous Mike Tyson quote, everyone’s got five slips until you get Rishabh Pantsed in the face.As India’s one-man band of cavalier free-form jazz set about turning the day around, Ben Stokes did his best to maintain tack throughout. As much as the players truly believe in what Stokes and Brendon McCullum are pushing towards, it is only human to have a few doubts when an opposition batter is hitting you down the ground at will: sometimes for four, sometimes for six, sometimes with one hand, sometimes on one leg, sometimes even ending up flat on his back after.Jack Leach, perhaps the most emboldened in the squad, with 10 wickets at Headingley achieved through not thinking about the negative of saving runs, had to regress on occasion. Having been forbidden from pushing a man back on the fence by Stokes just a week ago, he was allowed the cover, first by two-thirds then fully back when it became apparent that it did not matter where the fielder was stood.Ben Stokes had his hands full in the field•Associated PressThe short-ball tactic also had a sense of defence about it. Stokes and Potts took on that workload in a bid to hurry Ravindra Jadeja or encourage Pant’s ego to bring him down. Such was the manner in which both lefties played – particularly Pant, who was more than happy to indulge pull shots – that the leg side was reinforced to stem the flow. Even the fielding standards dropped, with usually sharp fielders diving over the odd boundary, and a couple of unnecessary, wayward launches towards the stumps that coughed up eight runs in overthrows.Given the manner of the 222-run partnership, these moments were easy to understand. Human, in fact. A passage of play that was instigated to test your resolve and have you questioning how you’ve been doing things, especially if you’ve only been doing them like this for a month.Vindication, however, came from an unlikely source. Joe Root tossed one up above Pant’s eyes which had spotted the vacant regions down the ground like Wile E. Coyote clocking the Road Runner. Pant threw his head back and thought of the 150, only to skew an edge for Crawley’s third catch at slip. And with that, India’s charge was halted, and England were back in it.”It was a brave ball, I’ll say that,” England assistant coach Paul Collingwood said when speaking after stumps. “With two men up and having just been hit over his head, it was brave. Sometimes you need a bit of genius or bravery.”The wicket of Shardul Thakur means day two begins on 338 for 7: India, on balance, ahead but England more than able catch up if they start strongly on Saturday. “We can be happy with the day’s work,” Collingwood said. “Anything under 360, 370 would be a good result for us.”We will only know at the end of this match just how effective this late fightback was to England’s cause. They rallied from 55 for 6 to win the previous Test against New Zealand, and here, for the first time in this new era, the bowlers were in a similar state of disarray. Such is the way in sport that our conclusions from this day will be wedded to the result, which is now a binary prospect given this England side’s dislike for the draw.Perhaps, though, this first day should be regarded as a microcosm of this whole period in general: one of trial and error, where winning is less important than the performance. As that goes on, there will be some corrections, as they were here. Encouraging opposition batters to play through point by leaving it vacant is a great way to coax a questionable bat angle for an edge, but can lead to easy singles to rotate the strike and relieve pressure. Keeping mid-on and mid-off up is effective for eventually drawing loose strokes but can lead to frazzled minds in the field and dampen even the most strong-willed spinner.That being said, the thing to take away was that England did not lose sight of the bigger picture, and in turn wrestled back some initiative. There will be more times in the future when the pressure upon them will be even greater. By then, their resolve and those principles will be a little bit surer thanks to days like this.

While some may pose valid financial questions, there’s no doubt the PJL will provide a platform like no other for young cricketers across Pakistan

Danyal Rasool08-Sep-2022The buzz following Pakistan’s dramatic win over Afghanistan at the Asia Cup had yet to dissipate, but early the following morning in Lahore, the PCB was back at work. There was a media scramble as the event got underway just before noon local time. The board chairman, Ramiz Raja, was due to speak, with an extensive player draft to follow. The whole event was live streamed, with the PCB bombarding social media channels and WhatsApp groups with regular updates.The PSL draft, right? It’s that time of year, after all.Wrong.This is the Pakistan Junior League (PJL) draft, a first-of-its-kind league. It’s Ramiz’s brainchild, an event that sees Under-19 players from around the world compete against each other in a T20 league, one of a raft of innovations that signal Ramiz’s desire to leave his mark on the PCB.In a sense, that’s not especially unique. Every PCB chairman has tried to ensure a legacy that outlasts them, though how successful those attempts have been is another matter.Ehsan Mani and Wasim Khan, PCB chairman and chief executive, respectively, before Ramiz, enshrined constitutional changes to make complete overhauls legally more challenging. But, of course, even they only managed that by overhauling the system they had found, revamping the domestic structure despite fierce opposition, and removing board of governors members who did not support them to get the job done.

The financial picture might look bleak but watching actual young cricketers playing high-quality cricket in a world-first league will always have more cut-through with the public than numbers on an accounting sheet

Any notions those changes might survive a change in administration proved quixotic as soon as Ramiz was appointed chairman. It became quickly apparent Ramiz wasn’t the delegating kind, as Mani had been on operational affairs with Wasim. In his first press conference, amid a raft of promises that laid out his vision, Ramiz pledged to organise the world’s first junior international T20 league.Few expected it to come to fruition – other ideas, like drop-in pitches, faded away. Initially, the PCB conceived it to be a franchise-style system, with private investment funding the league; the cost of running it at the PCB’s expense was an unwelcome prospect. It was exacerbated because in the year since that announcement was made, Pakistan has seen its economy come under extreme strain, with the value of the rupee going into freefall.The most uncharitable might call it a white elephant of a vanity project, while the converted portray it as an investment into Pakistan’s future T20 talent. And there’s little doubt of the value the PJL brings to the table.For young cricketers, it represents a unique platform to showcase their skills in front of an audience they could previously only dream of, not to mention the concomitant monetary rewards. For the PSL, the PJL is likely to serve as a free audition weeks ahead of the PSL draft, ensuring any young, emerging cricketers they pick based on PJL performances has league T20 pedigree of some sort. The quality of the cricket on offer will in all likelihood be superior to much of what the players are generally accustomed to, so even if its detractors call it misguided, the tournament still provides a pathway which leaves its participants better off.Related

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But even if the PCB’s critics conceded those points, the ripostes have already been prepared. For one, it isn’t yet clear what the extent of the financial stress the PJL now places on the PCB, but it’s likely to be considerable. The PCB initially claimed there had been “an overwhelming and encouraging response from potential sponsors, partners and entrepreneurs”, but were quickly forced to abandon the franchise model after failing to find bidders willing to match base prices in the market.Miscalculating the sincerity of that interest meant the PCB had to take control of the six teams. A roadmap to the sustainability for this league is yet to be presented, which effectively tethers the PCB into taking on a similar financial burden every year this league is held. That makes the PJL vulnerable to scrapping the moment cost-cutting becomes unavoidable, because as things stand, it appears difficult for the PJL to sustain itself financially.All this attention for the PJL has left the PSL’s stakeholders feeling jilted, too. There is no indication yet of when that league’s draft – and whether it will be a draft or some draft-auction hybrid – will actually be held, never mind any public announcement about available players. That leaves the franchises less able to plan effectively for the upcoming season, or sponsors to effectively gauge the level of commercial interest. The wisdom of ignoring an established, money-making brand for an unproven one has been questioned – not least at a time when two brand new, cash-rich T20 leagues are about to start in the UAE and South Africa.Pakistan have won the Under-19 World Cup twice, in 2004 and 2006•AFP/Getty ImagesThose problems may be unavoidable, but an odd unforced error might further dampen enthusiasm. The PJL coincides with the senior team’s T20I tri-series in New Zealand and the opening stages of the T20 World Cup, naturally stripping attention away from the PJL. The national side, naturally, attracts attention whenever it plays, and while it might have been tricky to slot the PJL into a vacant window, the effort would likely have been rewarded with an increase in viewership.But, for the PCB’s charismatic current chairman, the temptation to leave something tangible by way of legacy could well have proved tempting enough to override other concerns. There might be a revolving door at the head of the PCB, but in the PJL, Ramiz can market a real, concrete project he envisioned and brought to term almost single-handedly, in spite of the concerns and drawbacks that threatened to derail it.The financial picture might look bleaker but watching actual young cricketers playing high-quality cricket in a world-first league will always have more cut-through with the public than numbers on an accounting sheet. A new chairman might come in and decide to roll back or entirely do away with the PJL, but it’s unlikely to be a choice that proves popular with anyone but the finance department. Few people in Pakistan cricket understand that better than Ramiz.There might be egos as well as visions at play here, but when, in a month’s time, young cricketers from Pakistan and around the world – 24 from nine different cricket boards including Associate players, which is progressive – take each other on in a T20 league, they’ll be watched by large numbers, and paid handsomely for it. And who, really, could begrudge that?

Covid-19, and the surfeit of cricket, has led to India fielding a record number of players. We have the details here

ESPNcricinfo stats team, Mathew Varghese, Illustration by Kshiraja K10-Aug-2022Forty-eight players turned out for the India men’s team in 2021. In 2022, so far, the number is 39. India have made the most of their strength in depth in the Covid-19 era, with 54 players finding a place in their first XIs across 74 international matches since the start of 2021. And there have been a fair few captains too. Who has played the most, and which format has seen the most players used? This cool graphic tells you.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Fourth List A final between these sides joins the others in providing memorable images

Paul Edwards17-Sep-2022At its heart, of course, the 2022 Royal London Cup final was a contest between Lancashire and Kent. Yet it was also a challenge to the ECB after its utterly mis-scheduled ham-fisted staging of this event last year, and also to the supporters of both teams to prove that something as 20th century as a 50-over county match could attract a decent crowd to a Test-match ground. So maybe we should say first of all that while Kent won what might become known as Joey Evison’s match, the ECB recovered some kudos and the fans turned up in good numbers.One can always tell a game is poorly attended when the TV cameras greet every dramatic moment by focusing on the same tiny group of manic supporters. This was very different. Trent Bridge was not a sell-out, nothing like it in fact, but the stands behind the bowlers’ arms were full and the 9040 spectators certainly created a sense of occasion. To a degree this was plain in the absolute quietness that descended on the ground well before the players came out for the official minute’s silence in memory of the late Queen. As at The Oval last week, the spectators’ voluntary recognition of solemnity – of life being different – was far more impressive than the orchestrated respect. Somehow one was not quite ready for it.As ever, though the vendors of alcohol were greedily rigged up for anything. Jim and Tonic were offering The Outlaw (£8.50 for a large snifter) comprising Mediterranean gin, Indian tonic, orange and rosemary. Rather more plebeian was Keeton Corner, in tribute to the old Nottinghamshire opener, Walter, or Parr’s Bar, with a nod to George. At both places a pint of IPA could be purchased for £5.50.There was even an EBar which prioritised efficient consumption above human contact by merely requiring customers to place a plastic glass and their credit cards in the right places in order to be presented with a pint of strong lager. Judged in that light, the injunction to “Drink responsibly” seemed a little hapless. One felt it could have been followed with “On the other hand…”For most of the first innings, Kent’s supporters had plenty to enjoy and heaps to toast. Most obviously, this was apparent in Evison’s 97 but there was also Joe Denly’s 78 and the general reassurance that this wasn’t going to be one of those one-day finals in which the side batting first is four down for spit inside the first ten overs. Those matches were played at Lord’s, of course, where inserting the opposition was always a favoured tactic on September Saturdays. Steve Birks’ pitch allowed no such eccentricities; Evison and Denly made that plain.Related

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And it was not only Lancashire supporters who didn’t appreciate the fluency of Kent’s batsmen. “How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child,” says King Lear when Goneril is telling him some homeless truths and Nottingham-based fans at Trent Bridge might have felt something similar as they watched their former Academy product Evison’s 111-ball innings, an effort which provided the backbone of what seemed a clearly competitive 306 for 5.Kent’s batters also had help from an improbable source. For after a season in which they had prided themselves on their performance in the field, Lancashire’s players had something of a shocker. There were overthrows and misfields, on top of which Wells and Keaton Jennings managed to drop three catches between them, the last of them of Darren Stevens in the final over, when a colossal skier more or less bisected them, Jennings chose, or was chosen by Wells, to take it and spilled the thing. The batters managed two and Danny Lamb looked more or less ready to self-combust. Mind you, Kent had their misdemeanours, too, never more so than when Ollie Robinson discarded his glove to chase a ball and Harry Finch picked up the mitt to take the return, thereby incurring a five-run penalty.At that stage Lancashire’s pursuit was going well. They were more or less up with the required run-rate and better placed than Kent after almost each over of their innings. Then Jennings, after disrupting opposing bowlers with his long-armed drives and praying mantis sweeps, chipped Hamidullah Qadri to Alex Blake at cover and Lancashire were 125 for 3 in the 22nd over.That, though, was nothing like the game’s crucial dismissal, nor was Jennings’ 71 the vital innings. As much as anything, this fine final was decided by Kent’s magnificent catching, first Alex Blake off Croft, then Evison off George Lavelle and finally Grant Stewart off Danny Lamb in front of the Kent supporters in the Fox Road standAnd at once this fourth List A final between Lancashire and Kent joined the others in its ability to provide memorable images. In 1971, of course, it was Jack Bond’s catch off Asif Iqbal; in 1974 it was Alan Knott and Bob Woolmer nudging Kent home in a low-scoring game; and in 1995, Lancashire prevailed despite a conjured century from Aravinda de Silva. In 2022, in a very different, much less confident era, it was Evison’s innings and a series of Kent fielders leaping and swooping to grab cricket balls before being submerged beneath a heap of sky-blue shirts and happiness.So a day that began with “Abide with Me” would end very fittingly, with the darkness deepening and the mid-September eventide falling very fast. Kent’s cricketers will notice neither Saturday’s dusk nor Sunday’s dawn. And quite right, too. Good luck to them.

A recent incident tells of the need for education in this area

Sidharth Monga23-Jan-2023Stump mics do cricketers a great disservice. A cricket field is no ordinary workplace. All kinds of ugly talk that would earn someone the sack in an ordinary workplace is glorified in cricket. To let viewers listen in and also judge the players for what they say is mixed messaging. As it stands, the stump mic serves no purpose other than providing voyeuristic entertainment. If it was meant to be informative, commentators wouldn’t speak over it. If it is meant purely for cricket, it would be turned down after the shot is played and you have judged how sweet the connection is.That said, without incriminating anyone or virtue-signalling, we can use a recent incident to educate and sensitise ourselves. During the second Test between India and Bangladesh last month, an India player – let’s not guess who, because the person was not visible on camera – called his team-mate a “”, presumably because the latter had misfielded. are a caste-oppressed community of people who made or mended , temporary roofs. This was the only job they were allowed to do because of their caste, which was assigned to them by the accident of birth. However, the word has in recent years become a pejorative for someone who tries hard to be flamboyant. Looking blingy and flashy has been a form of expression and assertion by historically oppressed castes when they manage to earn enough money, but upper castes have looked down on such transformations, assigning the caste name to anything that is “cringe”.Related

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Even today, in the local trains of Mumbai, on the streets, in the maidans, even in the supposedly subversive world of rap songs, people, mainly of privileged castes, use “” as a derogatory term for anything or anyone cringeworthy. For example, to someone who prefers the aesthetic of Instagram Reels, TikTok is full of . Or if people see in a local train a man with a streak of blond hair and a colourful shirt, they might call him a .Because the term is so pervasively, casually and commonly used, and now goes beyond just caste, one could probably give this young cricketer the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes people from some states can pick up on popular terms from another part of the country without knowing how the word was derived. Still, if Black rappers use the n-word, it doesn’t become okay for others to use it.It is possible this player doesn’t know the ugly history of the word, but him probably not intending harm doesn’t mean harm is not done. Serious harm of perpetuating prejudice is done.He is hardly alone. During the Covid-19 lockdown, when players started to interview each other on Instagram, Yuvraj Singh, in a chat with Rohit Sharma, referred to Yuzvendra Chahal as a for his “cringe” TikTok videos, to the sound of laughter from Rohit. Again, are a community who, by accident of birth, were and are restricted to cleaning drains and toilets.When the matter blew up, Yuvraj responded with a non-apology, saying he was “misunderstood, which was unwarranted”. He expressed regret “if” he had “unintentionally” hurt someone’s feelings.Again, this is not to suggest Yuvraj is a monster, but he clearly didn’t have any counsel at the time telling him how what was a harmless comment to him hurts a whole community. As is in Bombay, is used as a slur commonly in north India. If a child doesn’t bathe all day, it is pretty normal for their mother to tell them not to be a . Google the term and you will find Bollywood stars using it self-deprecatingly to describe times when they are “shabbily dressed”.Instead of learning something from their abuse of these words, acknowledging historical and current caste oppression, and truly apologising for their ignorance, or worse, bigotry, people often double down and take offence at “misinterpretation” of what they said. These are members of a cricket team that took the knee to support the “Black Lives Matter” movement.They protested in Australia at being racially abused themselves by people in the stands. Imagine the spectators in that instance turning around and saying they were misunderstood, and Cricket Australia doing nothing. In fact, the hurt the Indian players felt at that alleged racial abuse should enable them to empathise with those at the receiving end of caste discrimination back home. Many of them experienced unimaginable hardships in their childhood; in an ideal world, they would be the first ones to empathise.Whenever there is a debate about caste in Indian cricket, a majority of fans of the sport are angered at the mere suggestion there might be discrimination based on caste. They like to imagine the sport is untouched by what goes on in society at large. Of course at the top level there is very little discrimination, because who doesn’t value an elite performer?This is where the caste system is more insidious than racism based on skin colour. It is not easy to look at the faces of players in India’s national team and say it is not representative, though in its history India has fielded less than a handful of players from Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, who form about a fourth of India’s population. Only OBC (Other Backward Castes) players make it to the national team on a regular basis.

The description of some white South African players’ childhoods is not too different to those of Indians growing up ignorant of a more deeply entrenched system of discrimination that has endured for hundreds more years than apartheid

Scheduled Castes are the most caste-oppressed people of India. Scheduled Tribes are among those who have inhabited India the longest, preceding the Indus Valley civilisation and the Aryan invasion. They retain their distinct culture and live in separation from other communities, are geographically isolated and socio-economically disadvantaged. Both groups are protected under the constitution of the country.Young Indians are kept away from being educated about caste. When they grow up to be privileged adults, they keep themselves and their offspring shielded from this inconvenient topic.I have spoken to quite a few white South African cricketers who were kids during apartheid. They say they were never informed of what was going on in the country. Whether it is just an attempt to be on the right side of history now that apartheid is unequivocally accepted as an evil system, the description of these white players’ childhoods is not too different to those of Indians growing up ignorant of a more deeply entrenched system of discrimination that has endured for hundreds more years than apartheid. This is not to compare the horrors – apartheid was shorter but actually written in the law – but the “ignorance” of the beneficiaries of the two systems.To say that there is no player of a caste-oppressed background who has been denied opportunities at the highest level is disingenuous because the villages and small towns that Indian cricketers increasingly come from don’t even allow people of these backgrounds to use playgrounds; being able to afford all the facilities and equipment required to become an elite cricketer is a whole different leap altogether.If even at the top, players – officially representing India – can use casteist slurs and not even feel apologetic about it, can you imagine what the attitude of the caste-privileged system is towards caste-oppressed communities? Slurs do not endure if there is no deeper prejudice.Make no mistake, it is a caste-privileged system. I have spoken to a few people in the BCCI to find out if a caste-oppressed person has ever made it to a position of power in the board. Nobody remembers clearly. If such a person had indeed made it and it was such a non-event that it is not remembered, it would be the equivalent of India appointing a Muslim man or a tribal woman or a Dalit man as the president of the country, as they have done in recent years, and not shouting about it from the rooftops.A state official told me there was a time when a couple of officials from the so-called lower castes rose to positions of power in their state association. A superstar cricketer, he said, was quoted in the papers the next day saying something to the effect of: “Now will we have to be controlled by [washermen] and [cobblers]?”The BCCI does a great – sometimes underappreciated – job of conducting the number of matches it does, the academies it sets up, and the systems it has set in place, but it is dipping its feet in a talent pool too shallow for a vast country. There is much more to be done. Educating its players about the ugly history of these seemingly harmless putdowns will be just a start.

Six England players pick up deals while sealing the deal against Ireland in Paarl

Valkerie Baynes13-Feb-2023England and Ireland entered their World Cup contest on Monday in the most bizarre circumstances of any side at the tournament, with many of its participants walking onto the field with virtual price tags hanging over their heads like thought bubbles – some stamped “sold” and others not.The WPL auction had been the “elephant in the room”, according to Sophie Devine, the New Zealand captain who was eventually sold to Royal Challengers Bangalore for her base price of 50 lakh (£50,000). But all of a sudden it was adding weight to every shot, every wicket, and every catch at the picturesque Boland Park in Paarl, even while playing out 8,000km away in Mumbai.Sophie Ecclestone duly wore her price tag as a badge of honour, striding onto the pitch as a marquee spinner for UP Warriorz after being picked up for the equivalent of £180,000, before taking two wickets in two balls among her 3 for 13. Leg-spinner Sarah Glenn’s 3 for 19, however, couldn’t sway the buyers, as she went unsold for her asking price of 30 lakh.What about the six Alice Capsey heaved onto the grass banks beyond backward square leg to bring up a 21-ball fifty, the equal fastest at a World Cup and equal third-highest in all Women’s T20Is? Delhi Capitals would like more of that please – for 75 lakh (£75,000), thank you – although Capsey herself might have earned a fair bit more had she been able to produce that innings before the hammer went down.Then there was Nat Sciver-Brunt, who took the field knowing that she had fetched a cool £320,000 from Mumbai Indians, the equal second-highest price alongside Australian allrounder Ashleigh Gardner (Gujarat Giants), and behind only Smriti Mandhana, who went to Royal Challengers Bangalore for about £20,000 more.Heather Knight, England’s captain, could not deny that the auction had been on the players’ minds. She had even had to move a team meeting because the India squad are staying at the same hotel in Stellenbosch and, because they aren’t due to play until Tuesday, were able to enjoy the occasion accordingly.And such was the game-face that England had to wear – particularly in light of Ireland’s remarkable victory over Australia in last week’s warm-ups – Knight herself was given no inkling that she’d picked up a deal with RCB midway through the run-chase, not even when she was greeted by her coach, Jon Lewis, at the top of the pavilion steps after the match.”No not at all. It’s probably a good thing the way I batted,” Knight said, after an uncharacteristically scratchy 14 from 22 balls. “If they’d seen that I don’t think I would have got picked up at all, it made it a little bit hard work out there, but no, when we were at the ground it was all about just focusing on the game, and I just got told afterwards and obviously who’d been picked up and who’s missed out.”The England camp left it up to individuals to decide when they wanted to find out the results of the auction, with 10 of their playing XI having put their names forward. Six of them, plus reserve Issy Wong, secured deals worth nearly £800,000 combined.Sophie Ecclestone was one of England’s big winners at the WPL auction•AFP/Getty Images”It was strange, it’s something we’ve never experienced and you don’t often get it in the men’s game, I don’t think, when it’s on match day,” Knight said. “It was all about trying to manage it as best we could, trying to do what individuals wanted and also trying to, when we got here, our main focus obviously was on the game.”Some of the girls would have known going into it, the ones picked up early. I think Soph knew and she’s someone that really thrives on that pressure. A few of the girls would have known arriving but, during the game, our self-focus was on trying to obviously get the two points.”Knight wasn’t the least bit surprised that Sciver-Brunt had fetched such a high price, and she was conscious of ensuring that her vice-captain was as comfortable as possible with being in the limelight again, after taking a mental health break last year.”I think she’s one of the best, if not the best, cricketer in the world and Nat probably won’t like all the attention,” Knight said. “She’s very humble and she’s just very, very good at cricket. I’m super glad she’s on our team.”I think also it’s about making sure that Nat’s able to deal with that, because it’s not potentially just a positive, the pressure that comes with that. But also I think hopefully it’ll be something that she thrives on and she’s at the top of her game at the moment, so yeah, it’s not a surprise at all.”Sciver-Brunt’s wife, veteran seamer Katherine, went unsold, as did wicketkeeper Amy Jones and Danni Wyatt, while fellow opener Sophia Dunkley was a bargain for Giants at £60,000, given her recent form. Quicks Lauren Bell and Wong went to Warriorz and Mumbai Indians respectively for £37,000 each, while Knight’s 40 lakh (£40,000) base-price deal came after being overlooked in the initial draw.Related

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Knight said it was also important to make sure those who hadn’t secured a place in the competition, beginning on March 4, were doing okay too.”I think the whole team will make sure individuals are looked after, that’s really important and what we’re about as a side,” she said. “The value of players to the England team doesn’t change because they haven’t been picked up, they’re still very valuable, everyone in the squad is hugely valuable to us trying to win a World Cup, so that doesn’t change.”They’ll certainly be looked after and given space if needed, to deal with anything and try and refocus and get back on it. Every individual will be given that support and ultimately we want to get the best out of every player, however we do that. The main thing is making sure they’re okay and then trying to refocus on cricket and get the best out of all the individuals in our team.”In the end, England managed to retain their focus to secure a comfortable win, after bowling Ireland out for 105 with 1.5 overs to spare, even if they made their run-chase a little harder than it might have been, with only Capsey passing 16 thanks to Cara Murray’s 3 for 15 on a golden day for spinners. Auction-wise, no Ireland players were chosen, despite expectations that Gaby Lewis – their top-scorer with 36 off 37 – might spark some interest.For 18-year-old Capsey, a fine (pay)day was made sweeter by the fact that she only recently returned from a broken collarbone suffered in December.”We were expecting to not have her available, so to see her come back and overcome that sort of injury – and mentally it can be quite tricky as well – so the fact that she’s worked her way through that and come back is brilliant,” Knight said. “She fits with exactly how I want to play the game, that fearlessness, she goes out and plays in one way and really takes on the powerplay, which is what we want from our top three players.”At least by the time South Africa and New Zealand lined up for a crunch match in the evening, with both sides looking to avoid a second straight – and potentially tournament-ending – defeat, there was no auction hanging over them, just a stunning Paarl sunset.

Opener adamant that his game can come good for the Ashes after latest lean spell

Vithushan Ehantharajah24-Mar-2023It was in the aftermath of England’s one-run defeat in the second Test against New Zealand in February that Brendon McCullum sat with the travelling press pack to once again back Zak Crawley.The 25-year-old opener had struggled in that fortnight, returning just 58 runs from four innings at an average of 14.50. Off the back of a Pakistan series that began with scores of 122 and 50 in the first of those three Tests, the questions around his place in an otherwise barnstorming XI were a redux of those that were had after a tough 2022 summer.The answers were the same as well, with McCullum unequivocally stating Crawley was his man: talk of high ceilings and a knack of putting opposition attacks under pressure. There was, however, one important piece of advice from the head coach: “You have to suck up the low scores. But the thing he can’t do is tweak and alter things too much because then you are trying to catch form.”McCullum went on: “That is the challenge for Zak and we have had those conversations. He is fully on board and he has to trust in the game he has. His attacking game is much stronger than his defensive game, so he needs to start from a position from attack rather than looking to defend and, if he does that, who knows what he can achieve. We will find out, I guess.”Fast forward almost exactly a month, on the last Friday in March at a wet Spitfire Ground in Canterbury, it seems Crawley is taking that advice. The first ball of the 2023 season, which contains the huge carrot of an Ashes series, is still two weeks away from being sent down. But the Kent batter is in defiant move to prove his coach and his captain, Ben Stokes, right. And in turn, his doubters wrong.”It gets talked about like it’s very easy, opening the batting, which makes me smile,” Crawley said on Friday morning. “I take it in my stride and try to score runs every time I go out to bat.”Most notably, when asked about his defensive technique and whether that needed honing before Australia come to town, armed with a new and potentially improved batch of red Dukes balls, he was keen to set something straight.Crawley’s 77 at Sydney was one of England’s batting highlights of a grim Ashes in 2021-22•Getty Images”I have got a good defensive technique,” Crawley said. “When you are playing against the best sides in the world it might look like it’s not. It’s not something I need to work on. It’s something I need to keep backing. The same as my aggressive game.”There are two things to take from that. The first is that he is probably right. In terms of Crawley’s defences being literally breached, he’s been bowled nine times out of 60 innings, or 15 percent, with the same number of lbws. His main downfall – not that McCullum and Stokes regard batters getting out in that term – has been caught, behind or otherwise, which makes up 40 of those dismissals.The second is that Crawley has never seemed more determined to do things his own way. Already 33 caps into his Test career this period since the beginning of last summer – averaging 25.86 in 12 Tests – has seen him develop a hardness as the struggler in an otherwise successful batting line-up.”It’s nice when people back you and think you’re a good player,” he replied, when McCullum’s words from Wellington were relayed back to him. “I’ve had a lot of support from a lot of people about my game but, most importantly, you’ve got to back yourself or it’s not going to work.”I certainly do. It hasn’t gone perfectly the last year but I’ve had some good knocks. I’ve got two hundreds last year [against West Indies in March and Pakistan in December]. I was in the top 10 run-scorers. But that probably wasn’t portrayed in how I was spoken about in the press. But there’s ups and downs in anyone’s career, and especially opening the batting, and I back myself and keep batting every time.”What talk there has been of replacements has come almost entirely from outside the camp. The looming return of Jonny Bairstow poses various different scenarios, such as Harry Brook taking his stellar form to the top of the order or even the wildcard choice of Ben Stokes assuming the role. And yet, while the numbers don’t suggest it, Crawley continues to be heralded as the totem of a side who are breaking records, winning the battle for eyes and on a run of 10 victories from 12 matches.There does, though, have to be a solution to this lean trot. And even amid the fighting talk, Crawley admits that, perhaps, his issues have come from doubling-down too far – not so much losing his sense of self, but almost trying to adhere to a caricature of what he is about when he is at his best: a domineering shotmaker.Related

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“I feel like I’ve made the mistake of taking it too far at times and so have some of the other batsman,” he said. “The thing that England are doing so well batting-wise, in terms of Brook at the moment and Joe [Root], they’re very smart about it, how aggressive they are.”But they’re not seeing the work that they do between those periods of aggression, where they’re seeing out good spells. That doesn’t get talked about, but that’s where the balance is key and that’s where you feel your best.”Everyone concentrates on their own game, I concentrate on my own game. We all chat cricket but I’m not going to score any runs trying to bat like Harry Brook or trying to bat like Joe Root. The only way I’m going to score runs is to bat how I’ve done at my best throughout my career, and that’s what I try and do.”As for the Ashes, Crawley wants to resume the spot as opener that, so far, has been cordoned off for him. He knows runs for Kent will be required to secure it outright if he is to make it to “the pinnacle” of playing in “the biggest rivalry in Test cricket”. He had a healthy taste of it in 2021-22, being drafted in for the last three Tests with a highlight of 77 in the second innings at Sydney – the only one of the five matches England did not lose. That experience showed him just how big a deal it is.”I certainly felt in in the Ashes Down Under, there was a lot more hype around it and it was just bigger and there seemed to be more media,” he said. “I got more nervous for it, it almost felt like my debut again, so I suppose that answers it, there is just a bigger hype around it and rightly so.”More media and bigger hype means greater scrutiny, something he is evidently ready to meet head-on. Even at the age of 25, with time to come again in the future, we are entering into a make-or-break summer for England and this iteration of Crawley. For a person regarded as something of a gentle giant, his demeanour right now is of a cricketer who is sick of the barbs and more motivated than ever to get it right.