Bangladesh to host New Zealand and Australia ahead of ICC T20 WC

Root, Anderson break into top three of ICC Test rankings after demolishing India

English captain Joe Root and the highest wicket-taking fast bowler in the world James Anderson have been rewarded for their unmatchable outing against India. Both the Englishmen have broken into the top three of the International Cricket Council’s batsmen and bowlers released on 10th February. Anderson, 39, moved three places up to the third position in the ICC bowlers’ ranking. It is being seen as a reward for his efforts where he ripped through the Indian top order with the help of his devastating reverse swing in the second innings of the Chennai Test. Among other bowlers, India’s Ravichandran Ashwin and Jasprit Bumrah too moved one place each to get to the seventh and eighth place respectively. Root, on the other hand, moved two places up to get to third position after hitting a mesmerising 218 in the first innings of England, his third century on the trot, which also resulted in two double centuries in three Tests. Other batsmen to gain positions in the top 10 were Pakistan skipper Babar Azam and English all-rounder Ben Stokes. While Babar, 26, got up to the sixth position after a fifty in the second Test against South Africa, Stokes reached the 9th position after a cameo of 82 runs in the first innings.

Arjun Tendulkar sidelined for Vijay Hazare Trophy, Shreyas Iyer to lead Mumbai

After making a muted debut in the recently concluded Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy 2021, Arjun Tendulkar has been sidelined by the Mumbai Cricket Asociation for the Vijay Hazare Trophy 2021. Son of the great Sachin Tendulkar, Arjun trended on Twitter after registering for the IPL Mini-auction draft. The 22 man squad is being led by the Delhi capitals skipper in the IPL, Shreyas Iyer and Prithvi Shaw, the out form and favour Indian opener has been named as the vice-captain in a side that has the likes of Suryakumar Yadav and Aditya Tare. Tendulkar, 21, who took two wickets in the two SMAT games with an average of 33.5 and an economy rate of 9.57, was among the probables for the Mumba Vijay Hazare squad, but couldn’t make the cut. The young blood in the form of Sarfaraz Khan, Shivam Dube and Yashasvi Jaiswal have retained their place in the squad, but Siddesh Lad, an experienced middle-order batsman and a handy leg spinner has been shown the door this time around. Mumbai has been placed in Group D alongside Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Maharashtra, Puducherry and Rajasthan. All the matches of this group would take place in Jaipur at the Sawai Man Singh Stadium among others. Mumbai Squad for Vijay Hazare Trophy: Shreyas Iyer (Captain), Prithvi Shaw (Vice-Captain), Yashaswi Jaiswal, Akhil Herwadkar, Suryakumar Yadav, Sarfaraz Khan, Chinmay Sutar, Aditya Tare, Hardik Tamore, Shivam Dube, Aakash Parkar, Atif Attarwala, Shams Mulani, Atharva Ankolekar, Sairaj Patil, Sujit Nayak, Tanush Kotian, Prashant Solanki, Dhaval Kulkarni, Tushar Deshpande, Siddharth Raut, Mohit Awasthi

Sanjay Bangar appointed batting consultant of RCB

Former India player Sanjay Bangar has been appointed as the batting consultant of the Royal Challengers Bangalore for the upcoming edition of the Indian Premier League. The official Twitter handle of the RCB confirmed the news tweeting, “We are delighted to welcome Sanjay Bangar to the RCB Family as a batting consultant for #IPL2021!. Welcome aboard, Coach!” Bangar, 48 had previously served as the batting coach of the Indian national team for five years till the 2019 World Cup, eventually being replaced by Vikram Rathour. In IPL too, the former Railways man has coached Kings XI Punjab in previous editions. Bangar, a gritty all-rounder played 12 Tests and 15 ODIs for India scoring a combined of 650 runs and taking a total of 14 wickets. He will join the team of Former New Zealand Coach and currently, the director of cricket operations at RCB, Mike Hesson and Head Coach Simon Katich in the Virat Kohli led side’s support staff.

Bullish Kohli justifies overlooking Kuldeep Yadav, backs Rahane as 'important Test batsman'

India were handed out a massive drubbing in the opening Test of the four-match Test series against England in Chennai, but for the skipper Virat Kohli, it was just a game where they failed to execute their plans. He downplayed the magnitude of their first loss at home in four years and appeared bullish on the prospect of a comeback in the series from his side which he said has been doing great things in the recent past. The team selection, especially picking the left-arm spinner Shahbaz Nadeem in the place of Kuldeep Yadav who has been warming the bench for a very long period of time raised many questions about the consistency in decisions over team selection. Kuldeep last played a Test match against Australia in 2019 where he picked up a five-wicket haul at the SCG and his performance earned high praise from the head coach Ravi Shastri who called him the number one spinner in overseas conditions. Two years later, Kuldeep can’t find a place in the team even in the absence of Ravindra Jadeja or both Jadeja and Ashwin (in Brisbane). Kohli was asked whether he considered in the hindsight, playing Nadeem who could not provide control to him and leaked too many runs from one end over Kuldeep who could have been more lethal in terms of wicket-taking options was a mistake. Kohli freed himself and the team management from any regret of preferring Naddem over Kuldeep and he asserted that the team always knew the combination it wants to play with and that the result of the first Test won’t make much difference in the thought process of the team. "Not really, not at all. When you playing two off-spinners, Kuldeep becomes more or less same kind of spinner taking the ball away. We were quite clear on what we wanted to play, what combination we wanted to play. There are no regrets whatsoever on that decision. Moving forward, we will think of combinations, which brings us variety as a bowling attack. And not one dimensional, turning away from the bat. These things are very important,” Kohli said in the post-match press conference. The onus of saving the game was on the Indian batsmen on the fifth day but the lack of runs from the senior players such as Rahane, and Rohit along with a rare failure for Pujara in terms of staying st the crease made the case very weak for the hosts on the fifth-day pitch. His deputy Rahane got a lot of flakes for getting out cheaply on the fifth day and failing in yet another home Test match. Rahane was bowled neck and crop by James Anderson for a two-ball-duck and social media was flooded with people questioning his place in the Indian Test team, especially at home. Kohli was belligerent in his defence of Rahane and rated him along with Pujara as the mainstays of the Indian Test team. He said that the team has trusted the qualities of Rahane and he has been an impact player for the side in the past in tough conditions. Kohli was unapologetic about the infinite backings Rahane has received from the team management over the last three-four years even while the Rahane has not been able to put brilliant performances on a consistent basis. "Ajinkya Rahane is, I have said this many times in the past as well, along with Cheteshwar Pujara is our most important Test batsman and he is going to continue to be. We believe in his abilities, we have believed in his abilities for a long time now. He is an impact player,” Kohli added. He reminded that Rahane stood up tall to lead the Indian batting order in the Boxing Day Test against Australia with a fighting hundred which eventually turned out to be a turning point of the series. "In the MCG Test, he stood up and scored a hundred for his team when we wanted it the most. You can look at the number of innings and what happens from there on, the reality of the situation is we won the series in Australia,” Kohli further said. “And here, there is just one test, two innings. Today, yes, you can put that innings aside. In the first innings, he wanted to score a boundary. It was a brilliant catch by Joe Root that got rid of him. If that had gone for a boundary and he had scored runs, we are not having this conversation.” Kohli was asked how he could manage to bat so confidently and comfortably against the English bowlers in the second innings when his teammates struggled to cope up with the pitch conditions. He picked up a comment about Gill’s batting where it was said that the batsman from Punjab struggled in the second innings. Kohli has always been appreciative of Gill’s batting abilities and he did not let the opportunity of appreciating the class of Gill go by this time either. He asserted that the right-hander was the best batsman for Indian in this Test match. The second Test of the series is slated to be played at the MA Chidambaram stadium in Chennai only and will begin on February 13. Kohli will be looking to bounce back strongly from this defeat and he has expressed full confidence in his team on doing so.