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The government has appointed Nazmul Hassan as the Bangladesh Cricket Board president

ESPNcricinfo staff17-Oct-2012The Bangladesh government has named Nazmul Hassan, a member of parliament, as the new president of the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB). The appointment came a week after Mustafa Kamal was confirmed as the vice-president of the ICC, effectively ending his three-year tenure as the BCB president.Hassan is the son of Zillur Rahman, the president of Bangladesh. He is also the managing director of one of the country’s largest pharmaceutical companies and has been connected to cricket through Abahani, a Dhaka-based sports club, as the chairman of its cricket committee.The new president was selected according to the existing constitution, which states that the board president will be a government nominee. The board has submitted its amended constitution to the National Sports Council for approval and one of the major amendments is that the president will be elected and not picked by the government. The sports regulatory body in the country is yet to pass the amendment.Hassan will have his hands full when he begins his tenure, with a number of major issues remaining unresolved. He will have to handle the umpires’ corruption investigation and ensure the franchises who have already signed with the BCB to run first-class teams are given a separate tournament. He would also need to finalise a long-term broadcasting rights contract, as only a single-series deal has been put in place.

An all-round effort from Mahmudullah helped Bangladesh A hand Bangladesh Cricket Board Academy their second defeat in the Bangladesh Cricket Board Cup

ESPNcricinfo staff13-Sep-2011
ScorecardBangladesh allrounder Mahmudullah turned in a fine allround performance as Bangladesh A handed Bangladesh Cricket Board Academy (BCBA) their second straight defeat at the Shere Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur, this one by 56 runs. BCBA were bowled out for 76 against Bangladesh in their first game, and while their batsmen performed better this time around, it wasn’t enough to prevent another loss.Having chosen to field, BCBA’s bowlers made a bright start, reducing Bangladesh A to 48 for 3 in the 15th over. Mahmudullah then steadied the innings with 54 from 69 balls to ease them out of trouble. He shared in two partnerships of over 40 with Naeem Islam (17) and Shamshur Rahman (18) and after he fell on 160, the lower order carried the team past 200. Three other batsmen got into the 20s, but none could carry on, with Elias Sunny, who made 25, the second highest scorer. Alauddin Babu was the most successful bowler, taking 3 for 51, while Sohag Gazi took 2 for 29.BCBA made a positive start to their chase, despite losing Abdul Mazid early, but slumped from 52 for 1 in the 14th over to 60 for 4 in the 17th over. They were never in the game after that, losing wickets are regular intervals, and Mahmudullah knocked over the last two batsmen to finish with figures of 2 for 21 and earn the Man-of-the-Match award.

Glamorgan’s bid to win promotion to Division One of the County Championship will go down to the final day of the season

15-Sep-2010
Scorecard
Glamorgan’s bid to win promotion to Division One of the County Championship will go down to the final day of the season. The Welsh county will hope they can play out a draw against Derbyshire at Cardiff, and that Worcestershire, nine points behind Glamorgan at the start of
the final round of matches, do not beat Sussex at New Road.Glamorgan finished the third day 68 runs adrift after Derbyshire made 234 for 8 in their first innings in reply to the home side’s 166 all out. After 151 overs were lost on days one and two because of rain, Glamorgan resumed the third morning on 120 for 6.James Allenby, who passed 50 for the 11th time this season, and James Harris (36) took the score to 154, having put on 88 for the seventh wicket. But Glamorgan lost the prolific Allenby when he was bowled by a full-length delivery by Jon Clare before their remaining wickets fell in the space of seven overs.Left-arm spinner Robin Peterson claimed his 50th first-class victim of the season by bowling Robert Croft before Harris was trapped leg before. Huw Waters became the last man to fall when he was caught by Chris Rogers at slip off Peterson.Harris struck with the fifth ball of the Derbyshire first innings when he trapped Wayne Madsen lbw but Chris Rogers and the impressive Chesney Hughes guided the visiting side through until lunch. Hughes, who had a lifeline on 13 when he was dropped from a sharp chance by
Gareth Rees at short leg from Croft’s bowling, was eventually bowled by Jamie Dalrymple to leave Derbyshire on 42 for 2.Rogers and Wes Durston put on 56 for the third wicket. Their stand was broken when Croft struck to trap Rogers lbw for 33 to give Glamorgan their first bonus point of the match.Harris returned to claim his 60th wicket of the summer to dismiss Durston for 46 as the visitors were reduced to 116 for 4. That became 126 for 5 when Dan Redfern was caught down the leg side by wicketkeeper Mark Wallace off Dean Cosker.After tea, which Derbyshire reached at 127 for 5, Cosker picked up his second wicket when Robin Peterson edged to Allenby at slip. Captain Greg Smith and Clare put on 45 for the seventh wicket before Harris took a wicket in the first over of his spell for the third time when Smith was
caught by Ben Wright at point.Clare was dismissed for 24 when he was bowled by Cosker. But there were no more scares for Derbyshire as the eighth-wicket pair – Steffan Jones and Tom Poynton – added 45 runs for the ninth wicket by the close.

A total of 98 overs can be bowled on the final day, but only 192 have been bowled across the first four days of this Test

ESPNcricinfo staff17-Dec-2024India have given themselves a strong chance of emerging from the Gabba Test with a draw after the unbeaten last-wicket stand between Jasprit Bumrah and Akash Deep saved the follow-on with forecast for more showers on the final day.In a match that has had just 192 overs across four days, more interruptions appear likely on Wednesday with between 2mm and 25mm of rain forecast, which is similar to what was predicted for the fourth day when 58 overs were possible between the interruptions.”High chance of showers, most likely in the late morning and afternoon,” said Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology. “The chance of a thunderstorm, possibly severe.”The final day will have 98 overs scheduled and Australia will need as many as possible if they are to force a result after seeing their chance of enforcing the follow-on taken away by Bumrah and Akash Deep.If an entire day’s play was possible, which so far has only happened on the second day when Travis Head and Steven Smith dominated with centuries, Australia would need to quickly take India’s final wicket then potentially bat for around 20 overs to set a target in the region of 300 with around 70 overs remaining, depending on how generous they wanted to be.On the final day of a Test there is no cut-off time for the overs to bowled, although light in Brisbane starts to fade at around 5.30pm local time.Australia, however, are a bowler down due to the calf injury sustained by Josh Hazlewood so may need to factor that into their planning should the opportunity arise. Nathan Lyon would likely need to do a considerable amount of work although Daniel Vettori, Australia’s assistant coach, said that regular breaks had allowed the quicks to stay relatively fresh.”The weather, in terms of the breaks, allowed Mitch and Patty to come back on multiple occasions whereas if we’d played out the full 90 overs it would have been a lot tougher to manage,” he said. “We always have the luxury of Nathan and his ability to bowl a lot of overs. So that alleviated a bit of the concern but it’s always a tough one with a world class bowler being out.”KL Rahul, who top-scored for India with 84, conceded that the frequent stoppages made it difficult for all the players.”I think I got most tired running up and down from the dressing room more than being in the middle,” he joked. “But it was a challenge. It wasn’t easy for us. I’m sure it wasn’t easy for them as well to keep going on for a couple of overs, go back, sit in the dressing room, change again, come back. So, it was a frustrating day for both teams but it is what it is.”

Third-wicket pair add 305 from 333 balls as visitors trail Derbyshire by 79 runs

ECB Reporters Network20-Jul-2023Alex Lees won the race to become the first player to score 1,000 Championship runs this season as Durham hit back on the second day of the LV=Insurance match against Derbyshire at Derby.The England batter scored the 84 needed to reach the milestone and went on to make 171 from 210 balls and share a record-breaking stand with David Bedingham who was out for 138.The pair added 305 from 333 balls for the third wicket, Durham’s best, and at stumps on day two the visitors were 364 for 4 ,some 79 runs behind Derbyshire’s first-innings 443.Derbyshire wicketkeeper Brooke Guest was last out for 197 to Scott Borthwick, who took 4 for 25, and although Sam Conners reduced the Division Two leaders to 8 for 2, the rest of the day belonged to Lees and Bedingham.Durham had earlier been on the receiving end on a flat pitch as Guest and the tail took advantage of some poor bowling. Derbyshire added 126 runs in 25 overs with Guest and Conners doing most of the damage by plundering 71 from 48 balls.Guest reached his 150 by turning Ben Raine behind square for his 23rd four before the Durham seamer got one to straighten and knock out Alex Thomson’s off stump.Zak Chappell gloved a Brydon Carse lifter to short leg but Durham lost control once Guest and Conners engaged the turbo.Conners pulled Carse for six and after Derbyshire picked up five penalty runs when the ball struck the helmet behind wicketkeeper Ollie Robinson, he drove Matthew Parkinson over the long off boundary.Durham were looking increasingly ragged until Conners charged Scott Borthwick and was stumped for 33 off only 25 balls.Guest had a double-century in his sights but when he took on Borthwick, he failed to clear Raine at long on.It had been an outstanding innings and one that looked even better when Conners struck twice in the fourth over after lunch.Michael Jones was bowled as he shaped to play through midwicket and Borthwick was caught on the crease but Lees and Bedingham responded with a thrilling counter-attack.Bedingham lit the fuse by pulling Chappell for six before Lees straight drove Thomson for consecutive sixes.Lees drove Anuj Dal back over his head for another six and his only anxious moment came on 79 when he almost edged Chappell behind.But he drove the next ball for four and then turned Chappell for a single to reach that 1,000 milestone which was quickly followed by his fourth century in five innings when he clipped Dal to the fine leg boundary.Lees had faced only 127 balls but Bedingham reached his hundred off only 113 when he edged Luis Reece to third man for his 15th four.The runs kept coming and the pair passed Durham’s previous highest third-wicket stand of 243 which they had set at Leicester at the end of June.Lees went to his 150 with successive fours off Nic Potts but the stand was finally broken when Bedingham clipped Dal to substitute fielder Mitch Wagstaff at short midwicket.Durham sent in Migael Pretorius to take advantage of a tiring attack but Conners returned to remove Lees, who was caught behind driving at a wide ball two overs before the close.

Captain Shakib Al Hasan top-scored with 51 in visitors’ score of 103, as six batters fell for a duck

Associated Press17-Jun-2022Stumps Bangladesh gained another share of an unwanted record on Thursday when six players were out for ducks in their paltry first innings of 103 on the first day of the first Test against West Indies. Of the seven instances in which there have been six ducks in a Test innings, Bangladesh now are responsible for three, including in the first innings of their previous Test against Sri Lanka last month.Bangladesh owed almost half their first innings total to captain Shakib Al Hasan, who made 51. Veteran opener Tamim Iqbal made 29 and Litton Das made 12 as the only other players to reach double figures in a depleted batting lineup. The innings lasted only 32.5 overs.The West Indies fast bowlers were outstanding on a brown first day pitch, which occasionally provided uneven bounce. Captain Kraigg Brathwaite called for the heavy roller between innings and West Indies comfortably reached 95 for 2 by stumps. Braithwaite was 42 not out and Nkrumah Bonner was on 12.After West Indies opted to bowl at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium, Jayden Seales took 3 for 33 from 10 overs while Alzarri Joseph returned the same figures from 8.5 for a career-best haul. Kemar Roach, who passed the fitness test a day before, began the decline of the Bangladesh innings with two early wickets and finished with 2 for 21, while Kyle Mayers took 2 for 10 from five overs.”It was a pretty tough pitch to bowl on in terms of finding a length,” Roach said. “It was very slow at the beginning so obviously you want to be a bit fuller. There were some rough patches there and some ridges and such that we wanted to hit as much as we can.”I think we did that pretty well. Shakib batted well for his 50 but overall the bowling group did a pretty good job today.”Roach said the toss was “very important.””It’s always best to bowl here in Antigua with the movement, the lateral, sideways stuff. To bowl well and bowl them out after lunch is fantastic.”Bangladesh always faced an uphill task, coming into the match after a home series loss to Sri Lanka. They were in trouble from the start, when they lost Mahmudul Hasan Joy for a duck on the second ball of the day, bowled by Roach, before Najmul Hossain Shanto fell without scoring in Roach’s second over.Mominul Haque also fell for a duck when Bangladesh were on 16 in the sixth over. Tamim and Litton provided some brief resistance before Tamim was out with the total 41 for 4, having batted for just over an hour.Shakib reached his half century, with little support, from 64 balls with six fours and a six. He was out with the total 103, caught in the deep by Roach off Joseph’s bowling. The innings ended shortly after lunch.Braithwaite and John Campbell put on 44 for West Indies’ first wicket before Campbell was out for 24 and Raymon Reifer fell for 11 to leave the hosts 72 for 2. Braithwaite anchored the innings and allowed West Indies to reach stumps within sight of a first innings lead.

Monday is final chance for series to continue as Paul Stirling admits frustrations

Matt Roller15-Jan-2021Ireland’s second ODI against the UAE in Abu Dhabi has been postponed yet again, despite no further positive Covid tests being returned.The second ODI has now been scheduled for January 10, 12, 14 and 16, but on each occasion it has been pushed back, with UAE public health directives preventing “the resumption of competitive action”, according to a Cricket Ireland statement. Four UAE players have tested positive for Covid to date, while the Ireland camp have exclusively returned negative results.The series, which UAE lead 1-0 after a six-wicket win in the first ODI, had been due to comprise four matches, but will now see, at most, two games played. The two boards are in discussions about playing a fixture on Monday, with Ireland’s three-match ODI series against Afghanistan due to start on Thursday.Related

• 2nd ODI called off again after Covid outbreak worsens

• Stirling 131* in vain as Usman, Rizwan centuries take UAE past Ireland in 1st ODI

• Two UAE players test Covid-positive ahead of Ireland ODIs

• Shane Getkate called into Ireland squad for UAE, Afghanistan ODIs

“With the Afghanistan series due to start next Thursday, the players and coaches are keen to get at least another competitive fixture in against the UAE prior to that, so we are hoping that a continued clean bill of health in both camps will allow us to play on Monday,” said Richard Holdsworth, Cricket Ireland’s performance director.Ireland have been training over the past week, but have been frustrated to lose out on the opportunity to play competitive cricket ahead of their series against Afghanistan, where World Cup Super League points are at stake.”We’ve been trying to cover both bases,” Paul Stirling, their vice-captain, said. “Usually the day before an ODI is quite light training, and quite personal as to what your preferences are as a batter or a bowler.”It’s one of those things. I don’t think anything has happened normally in the last whenever, so it’s just another obstacle. There are times when you think ‘this is crap’, but then you get a bit of perspective and think it could be a lot worse. I’m probably somewhere in the middle of the two.”For Stirling, the delay is particularly frustrating at a time when he feels in good form, having batted through the innings for 131* in the series opener. He has now made hundreds in his last two ODI innings, but the fact that one of those was his match-winning ton against England in early August illustrates the fact fixtures have been spare for Ireland since Covid hit.”That innings [against England] feels so long ago,” he said. “I feel in nick because I feel ready to play, but once you’re in that place, you want to keep playing. There’s not much rhythm at the minute.”

In his first international game this year, the offspinner was back at his best, tricking batsmen with drift, dip, and trajectory

Karthik Krishnaswamy in Visakhapatnam04-Oct-2019At most times, R Ashwin isn’t hugely expressive on the cricket field. He usually wears a frown of concentration at the top of his bowling mark, and mutters something to himself just before he begins his run-up.That in-his-own-space intensity is all you see at most times, but when he takes a wicket there’s a fleeting glimpse of elation, the flicker of a smile, just before he veers off towards extra-cover, right arm raised in triumph. By this time the smile is gone, having first given way to a scowl directed at the departing batsman, and then to that gazing-into-the-middle-distance resting face as he accepts his team-mates’ high- and low-fives.

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ALSO READ – Krishnaswamy: Chennai super king (TCM, 2016)On Thursday, when he bowled his first ball of international cricket in 2019, most spectators – this one certainly – would have noticed little that was different about Ashwin’s body language. But people close to him who keep an eye on him not just when he has ball in hand but at other times too, may have seen something different. That’s what they told him, at any rate.”I am elated to be back,” Ashwin said after the third day’s play, after picking up his 27th five-wicket haul in Test cricket. “It is always special for India. There is nothing like picking up a five-wicket haul for your country. This place is very special for me.”But I enjoyed a five-wicket haul for Nottingham too. One is not too lesser than the other. For me, it is about playing the game. I’ve realised that the joy of the game has to be back in my heart. I’ve made sure that I can enjoy the game wherever I go and play.”That I thought to an extent was quite visible when I played also. Yesterday, most people who spoke to me said you looked really happy. I don’t know if it was guessing or if it was true, but I did feel genuinely happy to be back there and to be bowling again.”Since mid-2017, Ashwin has been a one-format player for India, and his appearances in that format have lately been sporadic too, with injuries keeping him out of four Tests in England and Australia, and with Ravindra Jadeja getting the lone spinner’s spot in two Tests in the West Indies. It took him some time to wrap his head around not being on the international treadmill day in and day out.ALSO READ – Twists and turns: Shades of Kumble v Harbhajan in the Ashwin-Jadeja tussle“To stay away from playing cricket itself is very tough for me,” he said. “In order to substitute that, I played whatever games I got. I tried and made an opportunity for myself to go and play some county cricket. I tried and played the TNPL (Tamil Nadu Premier League) as much as I could, played some league cricket in Chennai.”It was very important for me to tick those numbers off because that is essentially where I came from. Going back and playing there is probably the best thing that could have happened for me.”Playing only one format for India, Ashwin suggested, may have had some part to play in the abdominal injuries he picked up in England and Australia.”In terms of addressing injuries and why it happened, it is better left to the medical staff to do it,” he said. “For me I felt like all of a sudden I wasn’t playing all formats of the game. I was playing cricket 12 months a year [before that], and that up-and-down spike in workloads probably could have caused it.”That’s why I went back and played as much cricket [as possible], wherever I got an opportunity I played, and from my side I can only tick those boxes and see how my body coped with it. With all due respect to everyone, I enjoyed whatever I did over the last six months, wherever I played, whatever I did.”R Ashwin leaps in joy•BCCI

All that cricket certainly seems to have kept Ashwin in rhythm. There were times during the Southampton and Adelaide Tests last year – his last two overseas Tests – when it seemed like he wasn’t quite able to put the same amount of body into his action as he usually does. Here his action looked like it does when he’s at his best, with the back hip driving powerfully through the crease. The ball, as a result, came out with that familiar, bewitching trajectory, laden with drift and dip.The pitch wasn’t as flat as it had been on the first day-and-a-half, but the help it provided was conditional. When batsmen got into good positions to defend and attack, as Dean Elgar, Faf du Plessis and Quinton de Kock did while scoring 326 runs between them, there wasn’t too much the pitch could do to defeat them. But, when a batsman was new to the crease, and not yet moving his feet properly, the ball seemed to zip and fizz this way and that.ALSO READ – ‘It was me putting my stamp on my innings’ – Why Elgar went bang bang “It’s a proper Test-match pitch,” Ashwin said. “You expect two teams to bat well, don’t you? I thought they batted very well. Whenever the ball spun, it spun from very far distances [from the batsman], not from the normal length. I thought Elgar and de kock batted really well, even Faf batted really well.”We might have given them few too many runs in the morning session which probably gave them the momentum. You expect a good side to play the way they did. So credit has to be given where it needs to be given. We stuck at it pretty well and came back in the back half of the day. That is how Test cricket is ideally supposed to be.”In these conditions, Ashwin’s threat through the air made him India’s most likely wicket-taker. On the second evening, it was his drift that opened up a narrow gap between Aiden Markram’s bat and pad for the ball to sneak through, and soon after lunch on the third day it made another appearance to break a 115-run stand between du Plessis and Elgar.That wicket is worth describing in detail, since it encapsulated just what Ashwin brings to this attack.As is usually the case in Indian conditions, Ashwin bowled to a 6-3 leg-side field before lunch. It was 6-3 after the break too, but with the fielders rearranged on both sides of the wicket. There had been no one in the covers before lunch; now backward point moved to cover point.Before lunch, Ashwin had pitched the ball on off stump or thereabouts, and this remained his default line, but ever so often he dangled one up wider, with the cover-point fielder allowing him to do so. Du Plessis was taking guard on off stump right through his innings, and the odd ball on that wider line, perhaps, was a way to get him to thrust his pad a little further across, in order to bring bat-pad into play.The last ball of Ashwin’s third over after lunch was the widest one he had bowled in a while, and du Plessis played it awkwardly, shuffling across and only getting his pad to it while trying to defend.The third ball of Ashwin’s fourth over after lunch wasn’t as wide, but it was a little slower, with a bit of away-drift, and du Plessis’ front foot was drawn across to it, but the length didn’t allow him to get close to the pitch of the ball. The bat traced a wavy, imprecise arc as it tried to reach out and flick the ball, having to come around his body, and all he managed was an inside edge to leg slip.”There is a difference in the trigger moment but on good surfaces you will get away with it,” Ashwin said, when asked about du Plessis’ off-stump guard and the shift to a wider line. “And on surfaces like this you will get away with a few shots here and there. I thought he was a bit lucky to get away with a few sweeps even before lunch.”But it was about holding control of the game more than plotting a dismissal or trying to get it wider. Whatever he felt uncomfortable doing, try and gather some control and stop the momentum. Whatever was best suited, we wanted to do that. I thought that outside-the-off-stump line was a more attacking line, so I set the field that way.”R Ashwin bowls in the nets•Associated Press

Ravindra Jadeja, who has lately become India’s first-choice spinner, is perhaps just as thoughtful a bowler as Ashwin, and it is perhaps harder for the viewer to try and discern how he’s trying to work out a batsman because he seldom, if ever, talks about his bowling in any detail. On Friday he became the quickest left-arm bowler to get to 200 Test wickets, and you don’t do that simply by being a metronome, but on this particular pitch he seemed to pose less of a wicket threat than Ashwin.When asked about India preferring Jadeja to him overseas, Ashwin sidestepped the question.”It is very important to do what I do,” Ashwin said. “I’ve literally stopped reading about the game like I used to do in the past. As much as you want to know stuff, you want to watch the game, there was a phase where I actually stopped watching cricket for a brief period. I just wanted to play.”It demanded an explanation when Ashwin, one of the keenest cricket-watchers among active cricketers, confessed to no longer watching the game closely.”For starters, I have two kids who don’t sleep all that well in the nights,” he said. “Jokes apart, I felt like every time I watched the game on TV, I felt like I wanted to play the game and that I was missing out. It’s very natural, everybody goes through it, that’s not the be all and end all.”I generally try to do a few other things in my life as well. My life has been all about cricket for the last 23, 25, 24 [years], I don’t know exactly. I just played the game with utmost passion. I thought my life, my family, my friends, everybody deserved a little bit more of my time, so I tried to spend a lot more time away from the game, tried to develop other interests.”I do have quite a few other interests, which I discovered, which is also a plus. That’s that, and I really found that whenever I stepped back on the park, it was a much happier time for me. I didn’t fret too much about thinking about the game or watching the game a lot, but whenever I went into the game I prepared to the best of my abilities.”The other interests, Ashwin revealed, were “books” and, intriguingly, “a bit of archaeology work”. None of that, you can be sure, can possibly give him the feeling he gets when he’s at the top of his bowling mark, squeezing the ball into the split between his index and middle fingers, and fixing his narrowed gaze on the helmeted figure in the middle distance.

Stokes will be assessed “mentally and physically” over the two days of training at Trent Bridge before a decision is made on whether he returns to the XI

George Dobell and ESPNcricinfo staff16-Aug-20181:35

I’m sure it’s been a wake-up call for Stokes – Bayliss

England coach Trevor Bayliss has called on Ben Stokes to make a public apology following his involvement in the brawl in Bristol last September.Bayliss revealed that Stokes, who was recalled to the Test squad just hours after his acquittal for affray, had apologised to his England team-mates when he joined up with them for the New Zealand tour earlier this year.”That’ll be up to Ben and his management team, I suppose,” Bayliss said to a public apology. “But certainly, when he came out to New Zealand after the Ashes tour that he missed, he certainly addressed the players in the changing room when he first arrived. So from our point of view, his contrition was evident for the boys in the team.”I think it was important to actually apologise to the boys in the team, management of the team and management at the ECB – who had to go through a lot of extra activities to work our way through it. I’m sure something will be forthcoming.”Bayliss also said it was considered important to bring straight back into the squad following his acquittal for his own ‘wellbeing’, but he made no guarantees about his selection for the third Test against India.Stokes will be assessed “mentally and physically” over the two days of training at Trent Bridge before a decision is made on whether he returns to the XI.It was less than two hours after the verdict was handed down at Bristol Crown Court that the ECB confirmed Stokes’ recall following a conference call involving various parties including Bayliss, Joe Root and the ECB board.”It was a collective decision – myself, management, captain, the board, Ed Smith – everyone had a say,” Bayliss said. “It was basically thought that for his own wellbeing it was good to get Ben back around the cricket.”If Stokes is deemed available to return it will present a selection dilemma following the success of Sam Curran and Chris Woakes in the first two Tests.”There’s nothing automatic about selections, we’ll see how he is mentally as well as physically,” Bayliss said. “We’ll find out over the next couple of days, I haven’t actually spoken to him yet. We’ve got the next two days to assess where he’s at.”It’s a good position to be in from that [a selection] point of view. We’ve got some guys in form, in the team. It will be a difficult decision to make. Whether it’s Ben or someone else.”Following the conclusion of the court case, the attention will now turn to the Cricket Disciplinary Committee (CDC) and what sanctions they may take against Stokes and Alex Hales. The CDC are an independent body so Bayliss will not be involved in the process and he said it was “business as usual” while that takes shape.Bayliss did say, however, that there would be continued work on the team culture which began in the aftermath of the incident in Bristol. While in Australia for the Ashes series, Bayliss became angered at having to deal with the further controversies that arose involving Jonny Bairstow’s ‘headbutt’ of Cameron Bancroft and Ben Duckett’s incident in Perth, but he believes lessons have now been learnt.”Certainly since the Bristol incident there’s a lot of work been done on team culture with the two captains and that will be ongoing. We’ve had to make one or two changes – with curfews and that kind of thing – but there will be ongoing work on team culture and what it means to play for England”Since a couple of small indiscretions in Australia, I can sit here now and say the players have finally woken up and have learnt their lesson. Their behaviour and the way they go about their professional life off the field as well as on has been top class since.”

Rob Newton made his first century of the season in the Specsavers County Championship as Northamptonshire took control against Derbyshire at Wantage Road

ECB Reporters Network10-Jun-2017
ScorecardRob Newton brought more gloom for Derbyshire•Getty Images

Rob Newton made his first century of the season in the Specsavers County Championship as Northamptonshire took control against Derbyshire at Wantage Road, reaching 247 for 4 and a lead of 289 by the close of day two.Newton, who was awarded his county cap before the game, followed up a first-innings 67 with a century in 189 balls, his 12th in first-class cricket, reaching three figures by flicking Jeevan Mendis past midwicket for his tenth boundary.The second fifty was quite hard work on a fairly slow wicket against the older ball, taking 123 balls and scoring just two further fours, as the boundaries that flowed before and just after lunch dried up and Northants ground Derbyshire down with steady accumulation.Northants are not accustomed to playing in such a manner – Newton’s century was just the second they have made in the Championship this season and the century stand he shared with Alex Wakely was just the fifth of the year.Wakely was also forced to play carefully and struck just a six – heaving a Mendis full toss over midwicket – and one four in his half-century from 100 balls. He fell for 79 in the final over of the old ball, driving at Tony Palladino and getting an edge to wicketkeeper Daryn Smit who took a good low catch. And when Conor McKerr sent a full ball into the stumps of Rob Keogh Derbyshire opened a route back into the game.But until those late wickets, their hopes of a first four-day victory for two years were fading with just one wicket in the first 65 overs of the Northants second innings – that of Max Holden – pinned lbw by a McKerr yorker for 31.Their attack was very ill-disciplined in the morning session where Northants raced past 50 in just the 11th over. The regained a little control of the run-rate after lunch with Alex Hughes bowling wicket-to-wicket and a good second spell from Tom Taylor.Coming in from the Wantage Road end, Taylor provided some hope in his seven overs where he found a little movement to beat the bat several times. But it was the only period of concerted pressure Newton and Wakely faced as they grew the lead.Their second effort with the bat ensured a great day for Northamptonshire after Ben Sanderson completed his first five-wicket haul of the season in the morning session to bowl Derbyshire out for 176 and handing Northants a handy first-innings lead of 42.Sanderson struck in the eighth over of the morning to end a seventh-wicket stand of 59 that had frustrated Northants on the first evening. But Taylor, who survived 48 balls to the close of day one, added only three runs before shouldering arms and losing his off stump.And Sanderson’s five-for came when Tony Palladino tried to pull and got a thin edge to wicketkeeper Ben Duckett.Hughes, who was dropped in the gully to the second ball of the morning, was left to try and farm the bowling from No. 11 Conor McKerr but calling him back for a second run that was most certainly available, McKerr simply didn’t respond and was run-out without facing a ball. It left Hughes stranded on 62.