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Up to half of the state’s staff have been made redundant

Daniel Brettig01-May-2020Up to half of Cricket Victoria’s staff have been sacrificed, with community cricket particularly hard hit, in a restructuring of the state association that has been explained away as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic but has origins stretching back nearly a decade.Two weeks after Cricket Australia staff were informed that the vast majority would be stood down, CV has gone alarmingly further, making a huge chunk of the organisation redundant while asking others to reapply for their jobs – the former AFL coach and now CV talent specialist Guy McKenna among them.Cuts to community cricket, believed to number up to 45 staff, are set to leave as few as 12 employees remaining to be the links to grassroots programs and competitions in Australia’s second most populous state, and leave a gaping hole in CA’s wider strategic plans to grow the game’s participation in every part of the country. Of those 45 positions, three are female participation officers.CA, which made a portion of its recent funding to the states conditional on its use to specifically service community cricket, is understood to be furious at the cuts and the way they have been administered, with multi-million dollar distributions to Victoria’s powerful premier clubs untouched by the changes while a host of staff have been asked to pack up their desks.Other states are also believed to be aghast at the cut backs, even as the associations and the Australian Cricketers Association (ACA) haggle with CA over adjustments to their annual grants under a financial model signed up to in 2012 alongside the move to an independent board for the central governing body. There are suspicions that CA’s alarms over the game’s finances helped smooth the ground for CV’s own, more drastic culling.Following discussions between CA, the states and the ACA on Thursday, when the CA chairman Earl Eddings and fellow director Paul Green presented their interpretations of the organisation’s finances and forecasts, there is an increasing likelihood of in-principle agreement on reduced annual grants with in-built flexibility for revenue fluctuations depending on how next summer unfolds. However, it is likely that some states at least will wait until the winter football codes get back under way before formally committing themselves.These latest cuts to CV have arrived less than a year after its board chose to disband the boards of the two Big Bash League clubs, the Stars and the Renegades, and also make their chief executives Clint Cooper and Stuart Coventry redundant. That decision also saw the removal of a selection of highly influential business and media figures, Collingwood president Eddie McGuire, Hawthorn great Jason Dunstall and Sport Australia chairman John Wylie among them, from their positions on the boards.In the wake of these changes the BBL clubs and CV as a whole faced a raft of sponsorship exits, from the likes of Mars and Optus among others, contributing to an overall weakening of the association’s financial position and the recording of an operating loss of around A$2 million for 2018-19.While that trend is believed to have continued over the 2019-20 summer, there is widespread shock at the way that CV has responded to events, outstripping the actions of the South Australian Cricket Association, which cut some 23 staff and contractors earlier this month, and then CA itself, though further cuts to the central governing body are expected in the new financial year.”We are not immune to the impacts of Coronavirus,” chief executive Andrew Ingleton said. “It has already disrupted the conclusion of the 2019-20 cricket season and is likely to continue to impact our ability to deliver cricket at community level. In addition, there are a range of potential future commercial and financial risks to Victorian cricket that we need to have contingencies for.”Faced with a projected funding cut from Cricket Australia and the need to source principal sponsors for our BBL teams in what is a challenging economic environment, it is clear we need to take appropriate action to mitigate these risks.”
Problems around the strategic direction of CV have deep roots, stretching back to moves post-2012 to make its board independent of a system of premier, sub-district and regional club delegates that has historically held sway over the game in Victoria.The former chief executive Tony Dodemaide and chairman Russell Thomas fell out with numerous clubland figures, including the Footscray chairman Geoff Collinson and Essendon chairman Simon Tobin, over governance moves and their funding implications, ultimately being replaced by Paul Barker as chairman and Ingleton as chief executive. Peter Williams, Jane Nathan and Phil Hyde, all part of a ticket that had attempted to unseat Thomas and five other directors en masse in 2017, have subsequently worked their way onto the board.Barker, a consensus choice as chairman, is facing a likely further erosion of his support on the CV board itself later this year, with longtime directors Paul Jackson and Claudia Fatone facing re-election in the face of mounting opposition from delegates. The CV board is composed of six delegate-elected directors and three independently appointed directors. At the same time the construction of the A$40 million Junction Oval training and administration hub offered Victoria some of the best facilities in the country but also added significantly to the association’s cost base.

ECB hopes to announce fixtures soon pending approval from both governments

Matt Roller06-Aug-2020The ECB hopes to announce fixtures for South Africa Women’s revised tour of England in the coming weeks, pending approval from both governments.England were initially due to play four ODIs and two T20Is against South Africa in September, but with India pulling out of their scheduled tour due to the worsening Covid-19 situation in the country, an additional ODI will be staged. ESPNcricinfo understands that the series will start at the end of August, with all the games staged at Derby.England’s enlarged training squad went into the bio-secure bubble at Derby earlier this week, and played the first of three 50-over warm-up games on Thursday. There will also be one T20 warm-up fixture, with the players then able to leave the site for around two weeks before re-entering soon before the series gets underway.ALSO READ: England appoint Tim Macdonald as full-time senior assistant coachIn the first warm-up match, Team Heyhoe Flint beat Team Britten by five wickets, recovering from 8 for 3 to chase down a revised target of 244 in 45 overs thanks to an unbroken partnership of 104 between Katherine Brunt and Sarah Glenn.Danni Wyatt’s 88 had underpinned Team Britten’s total of 250 all out in 49.1 overs, with Alice Davidson-Richards’ 48 providing support. Glenn was the pick of the bowlers, taking 3 for 41 with her legbreaks, while Brunt took 2 for 16 from her seven overs.Openers Bryony Smith and Lauren Winfield were both run out before Kate Cross had Amy Jones caught and bowled, but Heather Knight and Georgia Elwiss put on 68 to rebuild the innings. Brunt added 64 with Elwiss, before taking the lead in partnership with Glenn, slashing Nat Sciver over cover to seal the win with 22 balls remaining.Glenn was carded to come in at No. 11 during England’s T20 World Cup campaign, but showed her ability with the bat with 52 off 53 balls, while Brunt finished unbeaten on 68 from 61. Anya Shrubsole played no part as she continued her recovery from surgery in March, but umpired from both ends during the first innings.

Moeen Ali’s 33-ball 61 in vain as England fall short in last-ball finish

Danyal Rasool01-Sep-2020Pakistan 190 for 4 (Hafeez 86*, Haider 54, Jordan 2-29) beat England 185 for 8 (Moeen 61, Riaz 2-26) by five runsA 100-run partnership between two men two decades apart in age saw Pakistan eke out their first win of the tour on the day before they are due to return home. It denied England a sixth consecutive T20I series win, while Pakistan pick up a first away win in any format since the ODI World Cup last year. The 39-year old Mohammad Hafeez was the standout star of the win, caressing an unbeaten 52-ball 86 to power his side to 190, while a valiant fightback, spearheaded by Moeen Ali’s 33-ball 61, fell just five shy of powering England to a stunning win.It was a series that came down to the final ball, quite literally, and when Tom Curran lifted Haris Rauf for a gorgeous six over extra cover off the penultimate delivery, England needed one more such blow to seal a series win. Babar Azam panicked, while a swarm of fielders rushed to pester the fast bowler with all kinds of advice. He blocked it all out and sent down an unplayable yorker at 90mph to secure the win, the final two balls a microcosm of Pakistan on tour, and Pakistan in general. One minute down, next minute up.It was Hafeez, perhaps unfairly lumped in with Shoaib Malik as an example of the visitors’ failure to adopt modern T20 practices, who provided the ballast to get the innings back on track after a faltering start. With Moeen having removed Fakhar Zaman early, and Curran knocking Babar’s stumps back soon after, England were enjoying the perfect Powerplay. Hafeez stablised the innings while Haider Ali, with the impudence of youth, went hell for leather, but once he lofted Adil Rashid for a six over midwicket, he roared straight into top gear. Helped, at times, by England bowling to his strengths and missing their lengths, Hafeez plundered 69 off the next 34 balls to spearhead the innings, taking them to within touching distance of the total that proved just short on Sunday.Pakistan began this tour two months ago in a protective bubble, but when, on the final day, they removed the bubble-wrap off their youngest squad member, they discovered quite the player residing within. Haider began his T20I career looking like a man who knew how this format needed to be played, clearing his front leg off the second ball he faced, depositing it over cow corner. Time and again, when England appeared to set a field willing to yield a single to him in that area, he declined the deal, opting to go over the top instead. Having sat out and watched England ease to a target of 195 two days ago, he didn’t need complex statistical information to recognise a boundary would be handier than a single. Within no time, he had become the first Pakistani to score a half-century on debut, one that came in just 28 balls.Wahab Riaz gets a hug•AFP

Pakistan decided to leave out Mohammad Rizwan, so often sensational behind the stumps, in favour of Sarfaraz Ahmed, for a greater perceived ability with the bat. But while he didn’t feature in the first innings, but when a key moment arose, Sarfaraz froze. Quite literally, and somewhat inexplicably, when Shadab fooled the out-of-form Moeen to leave him stranded outside his crease, Sarfaraz failed to gather properly. Time stood still as Moeen looked back and watched helplessly, waiting to see the bails whipped off, while Sarfaraz appeared to cradle the ball, unable to get it to his hands, and then to the stumps. With England so far behind in the game, it seemed like a comedic footnote. When Moeen stormed to a half-century half an hour later, no one in green was grinning.While the defeat might sting, Moeen’s return to form may yet prove the biggest positive for England. When, in the 16th over, he hit three sixes in four balls off Shadab, expending less energy than it presumably takes most people to butter bread, the idea this was a man out of form and bereft of confidence stretched credulity. When he displayed his T20 smarts with a couple of sneakily stolen boundaries off Shaheen Afridi in the 18th, to bring England within touching distance of victory, he seemed indispensable. Now, he may well be.England’s first ten overs with the bat, though, was perhaps what cost them most dearly. With the game being played on a fresh pitch and a very short boundary on one side, the hosts would have fancied a chase of 191, but that became significantly more challenging when Afridi bowled Jonny Bairstow with a perfect outswinging yorker that took the base of the off stump with it. Dawid Malan fell trying to clear the square leg boundary, only for Fakhar Zaman to pluck it out of the air on tiptoe, but Tom Banton kept the momentum going. With his captain Eoin Morgan, he struck up the sort of partnership that might have put them back on track, notably never letting the normally economical Imad Wasim settle, spanking four fours off his first seven balls.It would all end horribly, though, with Morgan, in the form of his career, dismissed in the worst possible way. Brilliant work in the circle saw Azam cut off what should have been a boundary, and Morgan, cantering towards the other end, found himself stranded mid-pitch. It put even more pressure on Banton to ensure he went deep, but he fell five balls later to Haris Rauf, trapped in front and ruled lbw on review. It meant asking a shade too much of the lower order, even if, on a tour where social distancing dominated the conversation, England got uncomfortably close.

Allrounder Sciver was England’s leading run-scorer at the T20 World Cup earlier this year

ESPNcricinfo staff17-Sep-2020England duo Katherine Brunt and Nat Sciver have joined the Melbourne Stars for the WBBLSciver previously played for the Stars in the first two seasons of the WBBL before switching to the Perth Scorchers while Brunt also has past experience with the Scorchers.Sciver has scored 952 runs at 24.41 with a strike-rate of 112.52 across 52 WBBL matches alongside claiming 36 wickets. Brunt, who didn’t play in last year’s tournament, has taken 49 wickets at 17.71 and an economy rate of just 5.15 in 44 games.At the T20 World Cup earlier this year Sciver was England’s leading run-scorer with 202 in four innings including three half-centuries.”In Nat and Katherine we’ve got two of England’s most successful cricketers who have been part of the WBBL since the tournament began,” Stars head coach Trent Woodhill said. “We’re pleased to have Nat coming back into green again after a couple of seasons in Perth and Katherine’s experience and bowling pedigree need no introduction. It really enhances what is already a good team coming together.”The England pair will be part of a Stars line-up that includes Australia captain Meg Lanning as she made the journey back from the Scorchers. There is one spot left in the 15-player squad with the Stars due to announce a final signing next week.The WBBL, which will start on October 25, will be played entirely in Sydney this season due to Covid-19 travel restrictions.Current squad Meg Lanning, Katherine Brunt, Nat Sciver, Elyse Villani, Mignon du Preez, Annabel Sutherland, Lucy Cripps, Alana King, Holly Ferling, Erin Osborne, Tess Flintoff, Georgia Gall, Sophie Day, Nicole Faltum.

Gloucestershire, Lancashire refuse to blame conditions and accept they were beaten by better teams

Matt Roller04-Oct-2020Beaten T20 Blast semi-finalists Gloucestershire and Lancashire held their hands up and offered no excuses after 11-over defeats, refusing to blame conditions for their exits and instead accepting that they were beaten by better teams.Both sides were defeated convincingly batting first after a day and a half of persistent rain in Birmingham, Gloucestershire losing to Surrey with eight balls to spare after posting a below-par 73 for 7, before Lancashire’s 94 for 4 proved to be too few against Nottinghamshire, who chased that target with 16 balls left.Instead, both teams’ captains pointed to their missing overseas players and hoped that the addition of international stars next season would propel them into the final.Gloucestershire had signed Afghanistan legspinner Qais Ahmed and Australian seamer AJ Tye for the Blast, but cancelled their contracts due to the impact of the pandemic on both club finances and international travel. In previous seasons, they have been led by the talismanic Michael Klinger, who has been the linchpin at the top of their batting order.”We’ve used our squad and guys have stepped up and chipped in at different times,” said Jack Taylor. “We’ve got such a competitive squad, and we’re having to leave guys out who want places in the team and that’s without having overseas players.””I’ve no doubt we’ll come back next year and put in another strong showing like we have done in the group stages in the past four or five years. I don’t think there are any excuses: we all wanted to play and prepared to play and were very excited to get out there but we weren’t quite good enough. We didn’t quite sum up the conditions – I reckon we only needed 15 more runs.”Lancashire, meanwhile, had planned to add Glenn Maxwell and James Faulkner to their squad for the second year in a row, but again had to cancel their contracts. As a result, they lacked power in the middle order with the bat, and added only 20 runs in the final 2.5 overs of their innings.For Nottinghamshire, Imad Wasim bowled his three overs for just 20, while Dan Christian finished the game with four sixes in as many balls off Liam Livingstone after bowling a tight final over.”Tonight wasn’t our night,” Lancashire captain Dane Vilas said. “Their overseas stepped up and did the business, with overseas players maybe being the difference tonight.”I think momentum was with us: we were pretty confident at the halfway stage getting near that competitive 100 mark and then we squeezed with our spinners. But unfortunately, in any game Dan Christian hitting those sixes takes it away from you.”For the second year in a row, Vilas was left to rue his decision to bowl Livingstone at a crucial time. In last year’s quarter-final, he bowled the 19th over against Essex and disappeared for three sixes; this evening, Christian managed one more off the eighth to effectively end the game as a contest.”Credit to Livi,” Vilas said. “He stuck his hand up and he wants to be that sort of guy who does well for us and has done it in the past. I was confident, and I was backing him tonight. I thought we had a chance when he was going with the bat, but it wasn’t to be.”

ESPNcricinfo’s updates from the 40th game of IPL 2020

Alagappan Muthu22-Oct-2020