Ehsan Mani, the ICC president, has said that while he is confident that match-fixing has been stamped out, he is not so sure that the all corruption has yet been eliminated.Speaking in Lahore, Mani told reporters that while widespread fixing was no longer happening, it was still possible that a few individuals were involved in skullduggery.”We have put in a lot of efforts to eliminate match-fixing and have gained success in it, but there might be chances that individuals may be involved in turning the fate of a match and the ICC was working in this direction to find ways to control it,” he explained. “No one can claim the game is 100% clean and free from corruption. Individually, some people may be involved.”He praised the efforts of the Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) and said that it was trying to address the match-fixing issue related to individuals. But, added Mani, the very existence of the ACU had proved to be a huge deterrent since 2000.

A brief history compiled by Dr. Andrew Hignell (Hon. Statistician and Historian to Glamorgan CCC)The St.Helen’s ground at Swansea has several unique features,starting with the fact that it is laid out on a reclaimed sandbank and in places the soil is barely eighteen inches thick. Thesecond feature has been that cricket and rugby have happilyco-existed at Swansea for almost 125 years, with the groundstaging International cricket, rugby union and rugby league. Thewestern half of the cricket square doubles up as the in-goal ofthe rugby pitch during the winter, adding to the charm of theground, but many would say that the finest feature of the groundis its maritime position. From the seats in the membersenclosure, there are splendid views across Swansea Bay and theSevern Estuary to the Somerset and Devon coast, as well as thepicturesque Mumbles Head. Indeed, this coastal location has madethe Swansea ground a popular venue with visiting supporters, aswell as touring teams. However, the days of cricket atSt.Helen’s appear to be numbered. This has nothing to do withGlamorgan’s recent decision to develop a headquarters at Cardiff,but instead a decision by the Swansea rugby club to develop theground as a rugby stadium. If their plans go ahead, it seemsthat the games which Glamorgan have allocated to Swansea for 1997could be the final county fixtures at the historic andpicturesque St.Helen’s ground.The ground takes its name from a convent dedicated to Saint Helenthat was built by an order of Augustinian Nuns on the foreshoreof Swansea Bay during the Medieval Period. During the 16thcentury, the land and the convent passed to the Herbert family,who in turn sold it to Colonel Llewellyn Morgan. By the 18thcentury, Swansea was a thriving port and the area along the shoreof Swansea Bay, developed into a popular and desireableresidential area. The gentlemen used the foreshore for theirhealthy recreation and there are records from the 1780’s of ballgames being staged on Crumlin Burrows to the east of the Tawe aswell as to the west on the sands near the convent. A notice inthe “Hereford Journal” for May 1785 suggests that a formal clubhad been formed, with a request for “gentlemen subscribers aredesired to meet at the bathing house early to appoint a stewardfor the day and a treasurer for the season.”It seems likely that the members of this early club justpracticised amongst themselves, similar to the modern-daymembership of a golf club. By the early 19th century, fixtureswere secured with teams from Neath, Llanelly and Merthyr, and theclub secured the use of part of a field near the former convent.Even so, the departure of leading players, and an outbreak ofcholera in the 1840’s presented a few temporary barriers to thegrowth of cricket in Swansea. The expansion of the transportnetwork in South Wales, and a further increase in trade at theport of Swansea both acted as catalysts for Swansea C.C. fromthe 1850’s onwards and by 1852 there were enough good players forthem to field two teamsThe club’s finances steadily became healthier, allowing them tohire decent professionals, such as Henry Grace and Alfred Pocock,and by the 1860’s Swansea C.C. had became one of the top sidesin South Wales. Amongst its leading members was J.T.D.Llewelyn,the influential squire of Penllegaer. The Old Etonian andOxford-educated industrialist had a wide range of sportingcontacts in South Wales and London, and as a result Swansea C.C.secured fixtures against the M.C.C. With quite an extensive andimpressive fixture list, the only worry for the club was theoften poor nature of the wicket. The rough state of the wicketled to the dropping of the M.C.C. game, but even so, Llewelynwas able to arrange other exhibition games. In 1866 a XXII ofSwansea challenged the United All England Eleven, and in July1868 a game was staged against an Aboriginal Eleven fromAustralia. The success of these special fixtures led to plansbeing set in motion for the club to acquire a larger recreationground which act as a decent and proper home for the varioussporting teams representing Swansea.In 1872 an approach was made to Colonel Morgan regarding thesandbanks lining the foreshore, and by the end of the year, anagreement was reached for the creation of a new sports field.The sandbanks were levelled, turfed and rolled, and during thesummer of 1873 Swansea C.C. played their first games at theirnew and permanent home. During the winter months rugby footballwas also staged at St.Helen’s, and Col. Morgan’s land quicklybecame established as the town’s sporting centre. Llewelyncontinued to give his support to the club, and helped to financethe building of a pavilion and dressing room to serve both thesummer and winter games. Through his efforts, St.Helen’s becameone of the best equipped grounds in South Wales, and anindication of this was the staging of a three day game between aXXII of Swansea and District against a United South of England XIin May 1876, followed in 1878 by a two day game between the SouthWales C.C. and the Australian tourists.However, the western expansion of the industrial town, and thepopularity of the seafront with residents and visitors alike,meant that the Colonel’s land was viewed as prime land forbuilding. With the area near the docks and town centre becomingincreasingly congested, Swansea Town Council passed a resolutionin 1879 to acquire the sports field for building purposes. Theleading members of the Cricket and Football voiced their vehomentopposition, whilst Llewelyn offered to donate 500 pounds topreserve the field for recreational pursuits. The strongpressure and Llewelyn’s gentle persuasion forced the Council toagree that St.Helen’s should remain as a sports ground.J.T.D.Llewelyn was also the catalyst behind the formation ofGlamorgan C.C.C. in 1888, and through his influence theSt.Helen’s ground staged some of the county’s home games.Glamorgan paid their first visit to Swansea in June 1890 for amatch with the M.C.C., and the ground’s first inter-countyfixture took place in August 1891 against Devon, although theweather badly interfered with the contest. Since the early1880’s there had been a small groundsman’s cottage in thesouth-west corner of the ground, and by the turn of the centuryit was the home of Billy Bancroft, the Swansea and Glamorgancricket professional and international rugby player who acted atSt.Helen’s first caretaker-cum-groundsman.Llewelyn also oversaw a number of other improvements to theSt.Helen’s complex in the early 20th century, including a 1,200pounds donation towards the laying of grass banking around theground, the construction of decent seating and a perimeter wall.After the Great War, a new cricket pavilion was built on BrynRoad, whilst a rugby grandstand was erected along the MumblesRoad in the 1920’s. By this time Glamorgan had become afirst-class side, and on May 28th 1921, St.Helen’s staged itsfirst County Championship match as Glamorgan playedLeicestershire. The visitors won by 20 runs, and it wasn’t untilthe end of July that Glamorgan were able to celebrate their firstvictory at Swansea, defeating Worcestershire by an innings and 53runs.But victories were few and far between at Swansea in these earlyyears, as visting players often cruelly exposed the fraility ofGlamorgan’s batting and bowling attack. By the late 1920’s thecounty secured the services of several professional bowlers whocould utilise the slow, sandy wicket, and in 1927 Jack Mercer andFrank Ryan bowled Nottinghamshire out for 61 to stop the visitorsfrom winning the Championship. Indeed, there are stories of thevisting players sitting in front of the dressing rooms and on thetop of the 67 steps leading up the grass bank from the pitch,with tears streaming down their cheeks as they saw the title slipfrom their grasp.The two-storey pavilion had been extended during the previouswinter. On the lower floors were the changing rooms, umpiresroom and groundsman store, whilst on the upper floor was a bar,colonade and veranda. In 1939 this impressive building becamethe property of the Swansea Town Corporation as the Cricket andFootball Club sold the ground to the town authorities, who havebeen the owners ever since. The ground had been staging Welshrugby Internationals since December 1882, but by the end of theSecond World War, there were doubts over the future of Welshgames at St.Helen’s. In a bid to keep the Internationals, theCorporation made further ground improvements with the grassbanking being replaced by tiered concrete terraces. Furtherextensions were made to the pavilion, and in 1964 four 140 footfloodlight pylons were erected so that evening rugby matchescould be staged.These improvements further increased the capacity of St.Helen’s,and in 1948 50,000 people teemed into the Swansea ground for theone and a half days play with the Australians. Indeed, thesetourist games, often staged over the Bank Holiday periods, haveoften seen the ground packed to the rafters, and for the visitingcricketers, the games with Glamorgan have felt like unofficialTest matches against Wales, and in front of what seemed like halfof the Welsh population.Three notable victories have been recorded at St.Helen’s. InAugust 1951 the South Africans were beaten by 64 runs, with JimMcConnon taking 6-27as the Springboks collapsed from 54-0 to 83all out. In August 1964, the Australians were defeated by 36runs, with Jim Pressdee and Don Shepherd fully utilising a slow,turning wicket and thwarting the tourists attempts to score 268on the final day. Four years later ‘Shep’ was at the helm as theAustralians were beaten again, this time by 79 runs as the Welshspinners helped Glamorgan become the first county side to defeatAustralia on consecutive tours.Swansea also entered the record books in 1968 as Garry Sobersbecame the first batsman in world cricket to hit six sixes in anover. His record breaking feats came as Nottinghamshire weremoving towards a declaration, and Malcolm Nash, Glamorgan’s leftarm seamer was experimenting with left arm spin. Sobers’ featswere captured by the T.V. cameras of B.B.C. Wales, but theywere not present 9 years later when Frank Hayes of Lancashirealmost repeated the feat, hitting Nash, who was bowling in hisnormal style for 34 in an over. Many other batsmen have takenadvantage of the quite short straight boundaries. In 1976 CliveLloyd hit an unbeaten 201 in just two hours for the West Indies,whilst in 1985 Glamorgan’s Matthew Maynard hit a century on hisfirst-class debut, reaching his hundred with three successivestraight sixes off Yorkshire’s Phil Carrick.The popularity of Glamorgan’s tourists games at St.Helen’s haveled to its staging two one-day Internationals. In 1973 Englandbeat New Zealand by 7 wickets in a Prudential Trophy game, withJohn Snow taking 4-32 and Dennis Amiss making 100. In 1983 thehigh-scoring World Cup fixture between Pakistan and Sri Lanka washeld at Swansea. Pakistan won by 50 after rattling up 338-5 withMohsin Khan, Zaheer Abbas and Javed Miandad all scoring halfcenturies. During the 1980’s Glamorgan have also staged severalfloodlit games against a Rest of the World XI, and there havebeen calls for day-night internationals to be held at the ground.The last Welsh rugby union International was staged at St.Helen’sin 1954, but it is still the home of a top-class side, as SwanseaR.F.C.have become established as one of the top sides in Welshclub rugby. During the last 15 years, they have developed thefacilities for playing and hosting club rugby, with considerableextensions being made to the pavilion, with sponsors boxes and alarge V.I.P. lounge being added. New seating areas have beenadded, whilst the steep concrete terraces together with thescoreboard on the eastern side of the ground were demolishedduring the winter of 1995/96, and there is talk of further changeand realignments to the rugby pitch.But the one thing that all of these recent and lavishdevelopments in the brave new world of commercialism cannotchange is St.Helen’s maritime location and thin sandy soil. Theground may look very different to the days when Billy Bancroft,Harry Creber, Tom Gange and George Clements lovingly looked afterthe square. But old adage that wickets fall as the tide comes instill rings true, and it is not just the Glamorgan captains ofthe past such as Wilf Wooller or Maurice Turnbull who consult thetide tables in Swansea Bay before going out to toss!For further information about the history of this, and othergrounds used by Glamorgan, you may be interested in purchasing”The Cricket Grounds of Glamorgan”, written by Andrew Hignell andpublished in 1985 by the Association of Cricket Statisticians andHistorians. For further details, please consult the A.C.S.homepage on CricInfo, send e-mail to [email protected] orwrite to Peter Wynne-Thomas at 3, Radcliffe Road, Nottingham.

ScorecardHosts Sri Lanka were given a scare by Scotland but were the eventual winners of their opening match in the Under-19 World Cup at the R. Premadasa Stadium .After being put into bat, Scotland gave a good account of themselves after recovering from a hopeless position of 30 for 5 to make a respectable 186. They then had Sri Lanka struggling at 98 for 5, but a lack of experience was the telling difference between the two sides.A combination of factors had Sri Lankan nerves jangling; a mix-up between openers Dimuth Karunaratne and Sameera de Zoysa, followed by some loose batting from the middle-order and lively bowling by Gordon Goudie provided a perfect start to the tournament for Scotland.However, Sri Lanka can count themselves fortunate that Scotland were let down by some poor catching and bowling. The most crucial of those misses was the catch offered by Sachithra Serasinghe, on 34 at the time, off Calum Macleod, which Moneeb Iqbal spilled at third man. At that stage, Sri Lanka were 129 for 4 in the 30th over and anything could have happened. Serasinghe was dropped again soon afterwards off a no-ball.To add to their woes Scotland also conceded 38 extras which they could ill-afford to do especially in a one-day match. In their two warm-up matches they had shipped 51 extras, so it was not a real surprise.Kasiam Farid, Scotland’s captain, admitted his team had let themselves down: “In a one-day game extras are always going to be costly,” he said. “It’s always going to take it out one way or the other. We were in a very good position to disappoint Sri Lanka and all the boys put in a big effort to do that.”Sri Lanka captain Angelo Mathews said that the game was an eye-opener for his team and added that he was not happy with their performance, although they ran out eventual winners.”We should have won more convincingly. We started off well in the morning but we threw it away in the latter stages,” he said. “We can’t afford to make such mistakes in the future games. We need to take these matches very seriously and perform better,” said Mathews.With regard to failure of the top-order batting, Mathews said: “We haven’t done very well in the recent past and we’ll need to come good soon if we are to make an impact. The batsmen are normally free scoring. They will have to concentrate more on their batting and stick it out.”Serasinghe, though, made use of the lapses of Sri Lanka’s top-order and made 64 off 91 balls, with six fours and a six, but Farid bagged the Man-of-the-Match award for his fighting knock of 76 off 89 balls (4 fours, 2 sixes) without which Scotland would have been hard pressed to come up with a competitive total.Sri Lanka’s seamers – Mathews, Tissara Perera and Shalika Karunanayake – revelled in the conditions and captured eight of the ten wickets. The Sri Lankan batting was pushed onto the back foot by Goudie who rocked them with three wickets for 10 runs in his first spell of seven overs. It was Scotland’s inexperience that allowed Sri Lanka to wriggle out of a tight situation. Both sides were guilty of being penalised for no-balls and wides which contributed to a total of 69 extras in the match.

If ever there is a good time for a crushing ODI series defeat, then now,with just over a year to go before the World Cup, is probably the besttime for it. After Pakistan suffered their fourth consecutive defeat toIndia, losing the series 4-1, Bob Woolmer, their coach, admitted thetiming was one of the only positives to come out of it. “I’ll go on recordto say it that I am glad this defeat happened now rather than later inthis year. We have to look carefully at all aspects of our game, ourbatting, bowling and fielding.”Pakistan’s fielding had been below par through the series and althoughthey dropped less catches than India, their ground fielding struggled. Asthey succumbed to Yuvraj Singh and Mahendra Singh Dhoni chasing 287, theirfielding deteriorated alarmingly. They missed run-out chances, dropped acouple of catches, conceded overthrows and fumbled alarmingly often in thefield. Woolmer, although admitting the fielding was poor, asserted itwasn’t through any lack of effort on the part of his players.”Catches win matches but our ground fielding was very poor and hasn’t beengreat through the series. The Indians have fielded superbly through theseries although they dropped a few catches as well.” He added, “Thesesmall things make a huge difference eventually but I think the guys workedand tried hard today and it just didn’t happen for us. We have fieldedwell in the past but when things go wrong, everything goes wrong.”The Pakistan Cricket Board said publicly yesterday that they were consideringhiring Jonty Rhodes as a fielding coach and Woolmer said he was open tothe idea. “If they have the money for it, I’m happy with the idea. But asit is we work hard on our fielding and we do a lot of drills in practiceon it. Like I said, everything just went wrong for us today. Basic thingswent against us like picking up balls cleanly, mistiming our dives. It gotworse under the pressure as India chased.”Woolmer had special praise for Yuvraj Singh, whose imperious hundredsettled the match today and whose performances through this series havebeen little short of spectacular. “He’s a very good player now isn’t he?When we played him last year we were able to get him out but this timeround, he hasn’t looked like getting out at all. I hope that hamstringstrain doesn’t affect his participation in the series against Englandbecause he looks an absolutely fantastic cricketer.”Pakistan lost this series in every department though, whether it was theirregular top-order collapses or their poor bowling, Mohammad Asif apart.Woolmer readily acknowledged that they had been outplayed. “Indiaregrouped and played a lot better than we did everywhere in the field.It’s difficult to put a finger on where specifically they beat us. In thethird game the toss was more important than we perhaps thought and theyhave chased brilliantly all the way through this series. But like I said,we need to look at everything about our game before the various challengeswe have ahead of us this year.”

Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is to conclude its current tour of India with a first-ever match against Afghanistan.The fixture, described by an MCC spokesman as “pioneering and historic, will take place at the Police Ground in Mumbai on Thursday. MCC will be led by the former England and Middlesex captain, Mike Gatting.”I am delighted to have the opportunity to lead MCC in this historic gameagainst Afghanistan,” said Gatting. “Cricket has developed rapidly in the country over the last few years and MCC is keen to assist this process – as it is in all emerging cricket-playing nations.”Cricket’s popularity in Afghanistan has surged since many of the refugees who fled from the country in the early 1980s, after the Soviet invasion, started to return from Pakistan – where they first saw the game and started to play and follow it.In the last decade, the membership of the Afghanistan Cricket Federation has grown more than twenty-fold – from 500 to 12,000 members. The Afghan team, whose travel is being sponsored by MCC, will be flying into Delhi before transferring to Mumbai by train. The British Embassy in Kabul and the World Cricket Academy inMumbai have also played key roles in facilitating this match.Explaining the background to the fixture, MCC’s president, Robin Marlar, said:”This match is the culmination of many months of hard work. It all started severalyears ago when an MCC Member, Mark Scrase-Dickens, raised the issue of Afghancricket at a Club AGM.”Subsequently, at the Asian Cricket Council in London last summer, I was asked to help and we have been so pleased with the contributions made by the World Cricket Academy in Mumbai and, of course, the authorities in Afghanistan who have been swift to seize the opportunity.””This is merely the beginning,” added Marlar. “Because of the intensity of interest in the game in Afghanistan, there is no reason why that country should not progress year upon year with Bangladesh – the newest of the Test-playing nations – as the example to follow.”MCC also played a key role in the development of cricket in Bangladesh in the months and years following their war of liberation in 1971, with representative sides being sent to rekindle interest in the game. In 2002, MCC joined forces with Slazenger and the RAF to equip an Afghan XI and an international peacekeepers’ team for a match in Kabul.MCC squad Mike Gatting (capt), Tony Matharu, Bryan Jones, Sam Anderson, Stephen Brogan, Paul Carroll, Matthew Friedlander (Cambridge UCCE), Chinmay Gupte, Michael Jarrett, Richard Kettleborough, Tom Leaming (Cardiff UCCE), Danny Miller (Loughborough UCCE), Sameer Patel, Tim Smith, David Snellgrove.

When the West Indies Cricket Board named Brian Lara as their captain for the third time, they were opting for experience, as their focus will undoubtedly be on preparing for the World Cup in the region in 2007.Lara’s return had been foretold after Shivnarine Chanderpaul resigned one year into the post. His third stint in the job was seen as a critical aspect of preparing this young team for the tournament that is now less than a year away. His experience and maturity will be vital elements for a team in need of nurturing, especially after the uninterrupted string of defeats they have just suffered.At the press conference in Port of Spain where the announcement was made today, Lara described himself as a “father figure” and a “leader” in the team, and said this time around for him, he would define success as producing a leader, improving the relationship between the West Indies Players’ Association and the WICB, “turning the corner” for West Indies cricket, and playing well at the World Cup. He also said he hoped that long-waited resurgence would come under his leadership.Lara added that the WICB had gone for experience instead of youth, and the names that had been bandied about prior to the announcement were all youthful, with the exception of Chris Gayle.Gayle, whose name seemed to have surfaced only to recede again, was the contender with the most experience following Lara. And although it ended up with most people narrowing it down to a choice between Ramnaresh Sarwan, the former vice-captain and Daren Ganga, the Trinidad and Tobago national captain, both lack the kind of experience needed at this juncture.For Sarwan, who has had more Test exposure than his demeanour suggests, it might be a good internship, one he would do well to take seriously as his boyish impetuosity seems to distort his learning curve too often.Ganga, who has only just recovered some of his Test form, has done a brilliant job of leading Trinidad and Tobago to two regional victories. But Ganga cannot be expected to carry the burdens of this crucifying captaincy yet. He offers great hope as a future leader, but needs to come into his own first, and to have a chance to settle in as a Test player.Gayle, on the other hand, has all the makings of a young Clive Lloyd, and it will be interesting to see if he is entrusted with a position of leadership, as it could lift his game to a more careful, consistent level, as it did for Lloyd. With Lloyd himself back within the corridors of West Indies cricket, there is no reason for them not to develop a mentoring relationship that could help Gayle to become the powerful leader this team needs.Earlier this year, at a leadership seminar held for some of the cricketers at the Cave Hill campus of the University of the West Indies, it was observed that Gayle was seen by the other players as a senior, experienced player to be heeded and respected. For a team that has been riven by internal divisions particularly over the contract disputes, which were finally ended today as well, the importance of a leader that has the respect of all is particularly crucial.What emerged from the seminar was that, despite the existence of little cliques within the team, Gayle is perceived to be above the partisan behaviour, and thus is liked by all. These attributes would be well remembered, especially for the old/new captain who has already declared it his mission to groom his potential successors.The WICB was unable to name a vice-captain today, and that alone should underscore the importance of Lara’s mission. These three are part of a group described by Lara as being under 25, but within their ranks there are one or two others with potential as well. Lara’s return should be seen as part of a moulding mission, of working to build a team that has shelf life – not on the bottom shelf, but at eye level at the very least, long after the World Cup.Squad to face Zimbabwe Chris Gayle, Runako Morton, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Brian Lara (capt), Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Dwayne Smith, Marlon Samuels, Dwayne Bravo, Denesh Ramdin (wk), Corey Collymore, Fidel Edwards, Jerome Taylor, Ian Bradshaw.

Mahela Jayawardene, the Sri Lankan captain, has been fined 20% of his match fee for knocking over his stumps after being dismissed at Trent Bridge in the final Test of the series.Jayawardene, hoping to become only the second captain from his country to win a Test in England, vented his frustration after being dismissed for 45. After chasing a wide delivery from Liam Plunkett, he got an edge and was caught by wicketkeeper Geraint Jones upon which he swished his bat and knocked over his stumps, more in frustration with himself than in annoyance with the umpire’s decision.Though he apologised immediately to square leg umpire Rudi Koertzen as he left the field, it wasn’t enough to save him from punishment following a hearing with match referee Alan Hurst, who imposed the fine in accordance with a Level One breach of the ICC’s Code of Conduct.

Mike Procter has arrived in to Kenya to inspect facilities as the country prepares to resume hosting one-day international matches with a three-game series against Bangladesh next month. More games will be hosted in the build-up to the World Cup, culminating in the inaugural ICC World Cricket League next January.During his visit, Procter, an ICC match referee, is due to tour five venues in Nairobi, including the Nairobi Gymkhana ground which staged the 2000 ICC Knockout tournament but which has fallen into relative disrepair since, and the Indian Ocean coastal town of Mombasa.”We need to have many of our facilities upgraded for official ODIs”, Samir Inamdar, the Cricket Kenya chairman told AFP. “Apart from Nairobi Gymkhana, the other existing facilities need to be upgraded as well.”Roger Harper, Kenya’s coach, recently criticised the local administration for doing little to improve the facilities, saying that the abundant cricket talent was not enough to make Kenya compete at the highest level.

Buddhadev Bhattacharjee, the chief minister of West Bengal, has labelled Jagmohan Dalmiya’s re-election as Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) president as a “victory of evil over good”. Bhattacharjee, who had backed Dalmiya’s prime opposer Prasun Mukherjee, the police commissioner of Kolkata, has vowed to remove Dalmiya in the interest of cricket.”So far [as] I’m concerned I’ll not compromise with this man,” he told reporters. “The battle will continue. I want him to leave this post. I want him to leave the organization. So long [as] he is there in the CAB the future of cricket in Bengal is doomed. He has many interests … vested interests … all interests other than cricket. Unless he leaves, it will further deteriorate.”Bhattacharjee had publicly opposed Dalmiya’s campaign for the top spot well before the election date but his words had little effect on the result. Dalmiya went ahead and filed his nomination and won the highly politicised election late Sunday.Bhattacharjee backed his anti-Dalmiya campaign again and emphatically stated that this was not a battle between two individuals. “It’s a fight between good and evil forces. Evil has triumphed this time. It happens at times,” he said. “Whatever I said, I said consciously. In normal circumstances one does not take such a stand. But there are times when it is a crime not to intervene when such interventions are necessary. I said this in the interest of Bengal cricket, the cricketers and to save the Eden Gardens which has become a condemned stadium. And accordingly I had requested Sports Minister Subhas Chakraborty to persuade Dalmiya to stay away.”Bhattacharjee also felt that there were plenty in West Bengal who were apprehensive of the CAB’s management. “Cricketers, both former and current, and also budding ones, do not like it,” he said. “Some well-meaning persons wanted to bring about a change in the CAB. But unfortunately they were defeated.”However, veteran CPI(M) leader Jyoti Basu on Monday disapproved of Bhattacharjee’s statements, asserting that Dalmiya had triumphed through democratic means. “I don’t know what he has said. We will discuss it in the party,” Basu said when his comment was sought. When it was pointed out that Bhattacharjee had described Mr. Dalmiya as an “evil force,” Basu said the CAB president had won the election in a democratic way.Chakraborty, who openly sided with Dalmiya despite Bhattacharjee’s request, summed up Dalmiya’s win as a victory for democracy. “I congratulated Dalmiya on his re-election and Prasun Mukherjee whose defeat proved that political interference in cricket was wrong,” he said. “It will be a bit of an embarrassment to the chief minister as his nominee Kolkata Police Comissioner Prasun Mukherjee could not win.”Bhattacharjee refrained from comment on Chakraborty’s stance during the controversial election.

Bangladeshis 199 for 5 (Aftab 60, Javed Omar 45) beat Zimbabwe Board XI 198 for 8 (Strydom 57, Hove 50, Mortaza 5-29) by five wickets

Mashrafe Mortuza made a superb start to his African safari, taking 5 for 29 as the Bangladeshis beat a Zimbabwe Board XI by five wickets in a warm-up match at Harare’s Alexandra Sports Club.Mortuza, the only member of the squad not have played in Zimbabwe before, ripped through the home side after Habibul Bashar had put them in on a green pitch only for them to reach 107 for 2 thanks to half-centuries from Tinashe Hove and Gregory Strydom.Set a modest target of 199, Aftab Ahmed hit a breezy 60 to get the Bangladeshis off to a good start and then Javed Omar and Habibul Bashar pressed home the advantage as they eased to victory with more than four overs to spare.”Mashrafe bowled brilliantly in the match,” team manager Shafiqul Haque Hira told The Daily Star. “He not only exploited the condition but also bowled consistently on the right spot. He certainly enjoyed his bowling and looked to have carried his form he had shown during the practice matches at home.”Zimbabwe and Bangladesh start their five-ODI series at the Harare Sports Club ground on Saturday (July 29).