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It was a moment the crowd had been waiting for. Sachin Tendulkar, six runs short of a milestone no man has ever achieved, a 35th Test century, drove at a ball from Rana Naved-ul-Hasan and got a thick outside-edge that was caught by Asim Kamal at gully. It was a measured innings, but Tendulkar had been losing that measure as he approached his century. At 86 he complained about a disturbance above the sightscreen. At 90 he tried a wild slog-sweep off Danish Kaneria and survived an lbw shout. At 94 it was over.Sunil Gavaskar was also out short of a 35th hundred once. Gavaskar made 96 then, and never played again. Tendulkar will be back.Making bad luck“Good players make their own luck,” the old cliche goes, and Pakistanhave relentlessly made their own bad luck in this Test. There theywere, having got Sehwag out and restricted India to 55 runs in 28overs after lunch. Sourav Ganguly decided to hit out. He flayed at anawaygoing ball from Mohammad Sami, edged it, and Younis Khan at sliptook a good catch. Then the umpire’s arm made its move. No-ball.The very next ball, Ganguly guided Sami to Taufeeq Umar at gully. Thiswas not a no-ball, but Umar spilt the catch. Sami looked as if hemight start crying.Reading KaneriaDanish Kaneria was the only one of Pakistan’s bowlers to get any respect from the Indians yesterday, but Virender Sehwag had figured him out today, and was reading him well. At one point, he twice made early decisions to let balls pitched just outside off stump go by, as he’d spotted that they were legbreaks. Then Kaneria bowled a googly, hoping Sehwag would let that go as well. But Sehwag read it perfectly, got into position early, and slog-swept it for four to midwicket. The batsman had set the bowler up.One, two, three, fourIt is rare that with Sachin Tendulkar at the crease, Indian crowds chant someone else’s name. That is the impact Virender Sehwag has had on Indian cricket. As Rana Naved-ul-Hasan ran in to bowl to Sehwag, the crowd chanted “Sehwag, Sehwag”. Short ball outside off, Sehwag slashed it past point for four.The crowd now began to chant:

Ek Chawkka aur maar
Ek do teen chaar(Hit one more four
One, two, three, four)

Naved ran in again, pitched short again, and Sehwag slashed him past point again. Four more.As an enraptured crowd continued chanting, Naved shifted to bowling round the wicket, and Sehwag edged him between the wicketkeeper and slip for four more. In that over, it was “Ee do teen”. Now, had it been an eight-ball over …

Ricky Ponting has called for more specialist coaches under John Buchanan after being overwhelmed by England’s list of support staff during the Ashes. “One of the big things that stood out to us was the resources they had available right through the series,” Ponting said in a lengthy interview with .”There’s no doubt they’ve sat back, had a look at us and studied what we’ve done over the last three or four years with the structure around our team and coaching staff. They had so many hands on deck with lots of specialist coaches.”One of Australia’s strengths since John Buchanan joined as coach in 1999 was their meticulous and successful planning, but Duncan Fletcher went even further and was rewarded with the 2-1 victory. “They were certainly very well managed, well planned and well skilled,” Ponting said. “If you look at the way some of our individuals struggled through the tour, it’s a pity we didn’t have any expert coaches there or available to help those guys out.”While Australia had Buchanan and Jamie Siddons, the assistant coach, England used the full-time batting and bowling coaches Troy Cooley and Matthew Maynard, the former first-class players. Buchanan’s contract expires next month and there has been much speculation about whether he will retain the position.”I’ve loved everything that Buck [Buchanan] has done as coach,” Ponting said. “He’s probably approached things a different way to some but he’s certainly taken the Australian cricket team to a place it has never been before. We can all get back there again with Buck as coach.”Ponting’s place has also been criticised, with Dennis Lillee calling for him to be sacked as captain, and he said he was hurt by the comments. “I’m doing everything right by my team-mates and by everyone concerned with Australian cricket, I will always feel I’m doing my job right,” he said. “For Dennis to sit back and say I should be sacked and be replaced by Shane Warne, it hurts to a certain degree.”Ponting predicted in the paper that there would not be many changes – if any – for next month’s Super Series Test and one-day matches, and he said they had learned lessons from the Ashes. “I and a lot of guys have found out how tough sport at the highest level can be,” he said. “We’ve had an unbelievably good run over a long period but it’s all changed fairly dramatically over the last few weeks.”

Despite going down to Australia in the VB Series finals, Inzamam-ul-Haq, the Pakistan captain, drew several positives from the tour and was confident of putting up a better performance in the forthcoming series against India.”It is disappointing to lose the VB series finals 2-0 but I remain optimistic that the boys will show improvement in India, a tour which is very important for us,” said Inzamam. “These last couple of games, we have really worked hard and played good cricket. The India tour is crucial for us. The boys are playing well and hopefully they will continue this.”Pakistan had a poor tour of Australia, losing all three Tests and winning just three games out of eight in the VB Series, while Inzamam’s captaincy was severely criticised, most notably by Imran Khan, who called the team’s performance “spineless”. Their batting was extremely disappointing in the finals, when they failed to chase targets of 238 and 240 in the two matches, but their displays in the field were far more encouraging.Inzamam had earlier indicated that he might step down from captaincy before the Indian tour, but he has since received full backing from Shaharyar Khan, the chairman of the Pakistan board, to lead the side. “I am looking forward to leading the side against India. For the boys any match against them is special. It would be the high point of my career leading the side in the full series in India.”Inzamam’s record as a Test captain is quite ordinary. He has led in ten matches, with just three wins and five losses. He will have an opportunity to improve that statistic in the three-Test series against India, which begins next month.

The deadline for submission of the 2007 World Cup bids passed yesterday evening with two surprises. Firstly, the Trinidad and Tobago government announced that although it had complied with the requirements of the Bid Book, it was submitting itself only as being able and willing to host matches, and would not compete with territorial neighbours.Patrick Manning, the Prime Minister, said he did not want Trinidad to seem to be grabbing for everything, given its better economic standing in the region. "What T&T did not want to do was to compete against those very countries that support us, as the benefits that could accrue from these matches would be more needed in those countries than in T&T."Manning added that the government would be willing to host whatever matches were left over after the bids were sorted. The understanding is that the most costly affair, the opening, will be outside the reach of most territories, and will more likely than not end up on Trinidad’s door.Meanwhile, Barbados and St Lucia have submitted a joint bid proposal. Stephen Alleyne, head of Barbados’s World Cup programme, said that their joint effort will have "the resources of half a million people" behind them. The driving force behind the St. Lucia committee, Desmond Skeete, died while preparing for the weekend of one-dayers against England at Beausejour Stadium. In all, 12 countries have indicated their intention to bid for matches. The allocations are to be announced on July 12.

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Western Australia prevailed by 11 runs in a pulsating contest at Perth in their Ford Ranger Cup match against Victoria. Half centuries by Jon Moss and Grant Lindsay revived Victoria’s chase after a middle-order hiccup but eventually fell short, as the asking rate climbed towards the end of the innings.In pursuit of 261, Victoria didn’t get off to an ideal start, losing their first two wickets with 28 on board. Brad Hodge and David Hussey stabilised the innings, adding 60 for the third wicket, maintaining a rate of over four an over. Ben Edmundson, back into the attack after an expensive first spell, immediately accounted for Hussey, caught by Adam Voges at backward point. Hodge brought up his fifty in the next over, coming off only 52 balls. Voges was in action again, bowling the well-set Hodge.At 6 for 141, Victoria were in a spot of bother, before Moss and Lindsay then added exactly 100 for the seventh wicket, scoring at a healthy clip. Both scored 59, with Lindsay slamming three sixes in his knock which came at over a run a ball. However, Western Australia pulled things back in the 49th over, with the run out of Lindsay, still 20 runs adrift of the target.Earlier, Shane Harwood, the promising Victorian fast bowler, had a good outing with a five-wicket haul, which helped restrict the opposition to a more manageable total. Voges and Luke Ronchi both scored half centuries, threatening to push the score past 300 but were pegged back by Harwood, who bowled with good pace and bounce.Voges held the innings together once Ronchi departed with the score on 96, picking up singles regularly. His 82 included only four boundaries and he looked set for a century, but fell to Harwood’s inspired spell towards the end of the innings, in which he picked up three wickets in six balls. Harwood finished with figures of 5 for 40.

Pakistan 143 for 1 (Khalid 84*) beat Zimbabwe 141 (Tariq 4-33) by nine wickets
Scorecard

Pakistan’s captain Khalid Latif made 84 not out, and added an unbeaten 142 for the second wicket with Abid Ali, as Zimbabwe were over-run in their Super League fixture at Savar. Pakistan needed just 30 overs to complete a nine-wicket victory, and are already looking strong bets for a place in the semi-finals.Zimbabwe earned their place at the U19 high table by routing Australia in the Group stages, but they never looked likely to cause another upset today. They lost the toss and were asked to bat first, whereupon Ali Imran trapped Brendan Taylor lbw with his first ball of the match (1 for 1). He was one of nine batsmen who failed to reach double figures, and the only man to look at all comfortable was the opener James Cameron, who top-scored with a fluent 68.Cameron added 68 for the third wicket with his captain Tinotenda Mawoyo, but both men fell in quick succession and the innings subsided. Tariq Mahmood and Mansoor Amjad shared seven wickets between them as Zimbabwe were bowled out for 141 with 14 balls to spare. Still, it was almost twice as many as Australia (73) had managed last week.Tinashe Panyangara, the man who did the damage on that occasion, grabbed an early wicket to lift Zimbabwe’s prospects. But Pakistan were too strong and eased to victory with 20 overs to spare.

Michael Vaughan
“Throughout my short career to date this is my best Test victory. [South Africa] were 362 for 4 after the first day on a good batting pitch, and to show the character we did and come back was a fantastic team effort. Steve Harmison was fantastic and Martin Bicknell on his home ground was exceptional.”Marcus Trescothick
“It’s just been a great gig and a great game of cricket for all of us. I’ve worked hard throughout the whole series. There have been some tough wickets and things had not gone my way but I worked hard for this and will enjoy the moment. I still had to fight hard, I did not play all that well for the first hour. I needed a bit of luck but that’s the way it goes.”Graeme Smith
“I’d like to have had 700 in the first innings. The run-outs didn’t help, and one or two little things go against you, but that’s Test cricket. I don’t think we’re chokers. England played good cricket in this match. But at Headingley [where South Africa won the fourth Test by 191 runs after being 21 for 4 and 142 for 7] we fought back well. England are allowed to play good cricket but it’s obviously disappointing not pushing on from 2-1. Test cricket is about pressure and we didn’t cope with it in this match."England batted superbly on what was a good Test wicket – one big partnership up front really set the tone of the innings and then Freddie [Flintoff] came in and took the game away from us."It’s been a hard-fought series, neither side has wanted to give an inch and hasn’t given an inch. You’ve had to fight for everything you’ve gained. I thought my boys had a fantastic series. Three months away from home, they really fought hard for the whole series and put up a fantastic performance."We have to learn to be a bit more ruthless. But apart from this match, when we’ve got into trouble, someone’s got us out of it and that’s given me a lot of satisfaction.”The retiring Alec Stewart
“I said before the Test it was not all about Alec Stewart. It was the perfect sendoff and I wish the team all the best for the future. There was some good batting, some good bowling and it was an excellent wicket here.”Obviously that debut [a win over West Indies in 1989-90] is still clear in my mind. To start and end with a win is perfect. I won’t forget Barbados, the Headingley win to beat South Africa last time they were here, and the series wins in Sri Lanka and Pakistan.”I’m going to enjoy the next few weeks and finish the season with Surrey. Then I’ll put the cricket kit away and get out the golf clubs and the Chelsea shirt. I’ve had some good offers, a good one from here at The Oval. I’ve got some things in the pipeline."

Glamorgan`s slim hopes of promotion into Division One evaporated under sunny skies in mid-afternoonat Chester-le-Street as the Welsh county slipped from 222-4 to 270 all out on the opening day of their Championshipmatch against Durham at the Riverside ground.Needing to pick up a full compliment of bonus points to remain in the promotion hunt, Glamorgan`s collapse, withthe loss of 6 wickets for 48 runs, meant that they only picked up two batting points.However, the day had begun very promisingly for Glamorgan, and after taking first use of a slow wicket, openersJimmy Maher and Mark Wallace shared an opening stand of 127 before the Australian was dismissed shortly beforelunch for 63. Wallace continued in positive mode after lunch and duly reached his second centuryof the summer, and his second against Durham, having hit 117 against them in August at Cardiff.Wallace had struck 23 fours, when he was caught behind by Phil Mustard for a career-best 121, just 25 runs short ofthe highest ever first-class score by a Glamorgan wicket-keeper, made by Eifion Jones against Sussex at Hove in 1968.Wallace`s first-class aggregate in 2003 now stands at 852 runs – this is the highest number of runs by a Glamorganwicket-keeper since the Second World War, and the most since Tom Brierley aggregated 856 in 1937. In all, his tallythis summer is the third highest in first-class cricket, with James Stone`s 959 runs in 1923 remaining as the club record.Glamorgan`s innings quickly folded after Wallace`s departure, and apart from 36 by David Hemp and a pair of sixesby Matthew Maynard, none of Glamorgan`s other batsmen got to grips with the home attack, for whom spinner GraemeBridge took 3/26 in 9 overs.Wickets continued to fall when Durham started their reply after tea, as once again Michael Kasprowicz made inroadsagainst the Durham batsmen. The Queenslander took 9/36 against Durham six weeks ago at Cardiff, and on his lastvisit to the Riverside ground he picked up 11 wickets. It didn`t take him long to add further to his tally,as with his second delivery, Jon Lewis edged Kasprowicz to Maher in the slips.David Harrison then dismissed the dangerous Martin Love, as the Australian edged to Wallace without scoring,giving the young wicket-keeper his 200th catch in first-class cricket. Wallace soon claimed another victim asin the next over Nicky Peng edged a ball from Kasprowicz as Durham slumped to 11/3.A partnership of 102 for the third wicket between Paul Collingwood and Gary Pratt saw Durhamrecover, and when bad play stopped play, the home county were 142/4, just 128 runs behind with six wickets in hand.

Around the end of the first millennium of the modern era, there was this place in the middle of the desert in Central Asia that was the hub of all land-based Old World trade from the Far East to the European West. Reaching it meant thousands of miles of travel by camel caravan, whether from Eastern Europe or North India, from Persia or Peking. Yet many intrepid traders would make the trip, lured by the appeal of exotic commodities which were in high demand at home. Glimpsing the “lamps of Samarqand” even once in one’s lifetime was the goal of many an adventurer as well – Marco Polo was only the best-known of this ilk, although it was his trip that that made the place famous.Fast forward to the end of the second millennium and to world cricket, and we have a new Samarqand. It is far away from the major cricketing centres of world population, and is an oasis in its own cultural desert– created out of the quixotic mind of a cricket-loving Arab sheikh, as a way to indulge his royal eccentricity. And yet, over the past few decades, it has grown into a place to which many of the best cricketers in the world have made their pilgrimages, and played each other far from the madding crowds and jingoistic cheers of “home”– a very pure kind of “cricket for cricket’s sake”, with little at stake except pride and prize money.Playing at Sharjah is the secret desire of many international cricketers, especially those who are trying to make an impression on the world cricket stage–to them, it is a sort of cricketing Mecca, without the religious connotations.It appears that the USA, through a combination of serendipitous circumstances, is to be allowed a fleeting glimpse of the “lamps of Samarqand” – and thus make its own kind of history.It started with ICC’s plans for holding the second Six Nations Challenge Tournament at Sharjah.The first Six Nations Challenge Tournament had been held in Namibia, and had included “A” teams from a few major countries to flesh out the field. The second Six Nations Challenge tournament to take place in Sharjah from February 29 to March 6, 2004, has meant a drastic change in format as well as location. This time, the focus was to be on the top six non-Test playing countries– Kenya, Holland, Namibia, Scotland, UAE and Canada. The winner of the Six Nations Challenge tournament was guaranteed a place in the Champions Trophy Tournament between the major countries in England in late 2004 – an incentive that did not exist the first time the Six Nations tournament had been held.However, a problem arose with Kenya. It appears that Kenya (which had won the inaugural Six Nations Tournament in 2002 in Namibia), had chosen not to participate– it was to be touring West Indies at the time, and had already been pencilled into the Champions Trophy along with the Test-playing nations. Since one of the avowed aims of the Six Nations Challenge was to identify a team to play in the Challenger Trophy, Kenya’s participation would have been superfluous – and redundant.It seems that the ICC had thought of USA or Ireland to plug the hole in the Six Nations Tournament. The USA had defeated Ireland in the 2001 ICC Trophy in Toronto in an unexpectedly exciting match, and would have to be given the nod if performance alone was to count. So, giving less than a month’s notice, the ICC invited USACA to send a US team to Sharjah, making it clear that Ireland was to be given the nod if USA could not participate. The USACA accepted promptly, and the USA found itself facing its stiffest international challenge in years, in Sharjah in 2004.How the news got out to the US public is a story in itself, and says a lot about US cricket politics.It all started with a rumour floated anonymously in the USCRICKET open forum, that the USA might be invited to play in Sharjah. The first reaction was scepticism; it was opined that there had been many such rumours in recent months, some even involving fraud and subterfuge, and this was more of the same. Then, a copy of a private e-mail from ICC to USACA extending the invitation to Sharjah showed up in (of all places) a Caribbean Web site, was copied to the USCRICKET Forum, and was greeted by a second crescendo of comment alleging that the letter was a hoax.I took the liberty of contacting ICC directly, and was assured that the letter was not a hoax. The word was duly passed on to the cognoscenti. It was only at this ultimate stage, faced with a barrage of inquiries, that the USACA acknowledged that, yes, it had received an invitation and yes, it had accepted. Why the USACA did not reveal the invitation sooner, and thereby avoided much of the fuss and paranoia, is a question for the ages – could it just be that the USACA enjoys Byzantine intrigue, or is it too afraid to let people know what it is doing? Who knows.And now, a controversy has developed over what kind of USA team to send to Sharjah.On one side are advocates of a promising team of youngsters who could be “blooded” by the Sharjah experience and gain the maturity and practice needed for the 2005 ICC Trophy. If the idea was to develop a team for the 2007 and the 2011 World Cups, it was argued, the players selected would need to be under 25 to last the course – anyone older would simply not be playing that long.On the other, it is argued that USA needs to go with the “veterans”, most in their late 30s or 40s, who have played first-class cricket and could better deal with the challenges and rigours of competitive international cricket. These are the people who have given the USA whatever credibilty it now enjoys after winning the Americas 2002 Championship and defeating its arch-rivals, the Cayman Islanders, and they are in the best position to add to those accomplishments.There are also centrists who argue for a blend of youth and experience, the proportions depending on which way they lean between the two extremes. One thing no one speaks of is of inviting mainstream Americans – the “true-blue all-American yokels”, as one person put it on the lively, sometimes scurrilous, USCRICKET “open” bulletin board – to play on a USA Sharjah team. It is recognized that the sport has to appeal to born-and-bred Americans to secure a long-term foothold in this country, but it is universally accepted that Sharjah 2003 is neither the place nor the time to try.Complicating the picture is a general distrust of the USACA Selection Committee, which has been accused in the past (fairly or unfairly) of bias, parochialism, and ineptitude – a lot will depend on how fairly and efficiently it performs this immediate task of selecting the sojourners for the pilgrimage for Sharjah.Deb K Das is cricket coordinator of Wisden Cricinfo’s USA site

There is live online ball-by-ball commentary of the Wales-England one-day international taking place today at Sophia Gardens (June 14th). The commentary is available via the BBC Radio Wales website. To listen in, click here