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India to play three-day warm-up match against select County XI in Durham

The Indian Test unit has been given an opportunity to finally play some red-ball cricket prior to the Test series against hosts England. The Virat Kohli led side will be using the riverside ground in Durham as their home ground base and would play a three-day first-class game against a select County XI starting July 20. 

"The three-day game will see a number of players from the county circuit feature as they go up against the Indian national side," Durham cricket said in a press release. It also confirmed that the match would be streamed Live on Durham Cricket's YouTube channel. The match would be played behind closed doors.

Earlier, post the WTC Final loss, Indian skipper Kohli had said that they would have dearly liked a First-Class game as preparation before the Test series against England.

"We obviously wanted first-class games, which I believe have not been given to us. I don't know what the reasons for that are. But yeah, other than that, I think our preparation time will be ample for us to be ready for the first Test,” Kohli had said. 

Right now, the Indian team is on a break in England and while some players enjoyed Wimbledon and Euro Cup Final, Ravichandran Ashwin played a County game for Surrey and also picked a six-wicket haul in the second innings.

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How can one defend such a performance: Head coach Misbah perturbed by off-colour Pakistan

Pakistan head coach Misbah-Ul-Haq has been in the firing line of the critics after his team was whitewashed by a second-string England side in the three-match ODI series. The coach in a recent press conference confirmed that he was in no mood to defend himself or the team after such a poor run of form with both bat and ball. "I don't know why the team was totally off-colour in this series and lost its momentum but it is a very worrying sign for me as head coach,” Misbah said during a virtual press conference. "How can one defend such a performance. No one can defend our performance and I think as a team we are all responsible be it the players, coaches or support staff,” he added. The 47-year-old former captain, who has had quite a reputation for playing in England, said that the team couldn’t react to the conditions in the first two games. In the third game, it was fielding and poor bowling that cost the game, according to the coach. "We just couldn't handle the conditions in the first two matches and in the third match, we had a total we should have defended but overall it is very disappointing from a bowling point of view and especially our fielding standards. We dropped simple chances," lamented Misbah. Another thing that Misbah was not happy about was not being able to afford the luxury of a great pool of players as a bench strength. He said this even as Pakistan didn’t opt for even a single change in the three matches that they played even after losing the series. "First of all England has a great backup and the luxury of a strong pool of players we don't have. England had choices for this series and we have limitations at certain positions especially in the middle order spaces where no one has settled down for a while,” he said. The Pakistan team would now move to the T20I series with the first string side back after having contracted Covid and being asked to self isolate a week ago. The first match takes place on July 16 at Trentbridge in Nottingham.

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ENG vs PAK: Shahid Afridi backs Pakistan players, says they are the best talent in the country

After a humiliating outing in the three-match ODI series against England, the Pakistani side has received criticism from all corners of the cricketing world. The criticism has majorly been about the timid approach of the team while batting in the first two ODIs and then very poor fielding and bowling in the third ODI. However, Pakistan’s legendary all-rounder Shahid Afridi has come into the support of the Pakistani team. The former captain called the bunch of players on the England tour as the best talent available in the country and asked fans and former cricketers to back them. “At present, the players representing the Pakistan national team are the best we have in terms of talent and ability,” Afridi said in a video9 uploaded by the Pakistan Cricket Board on their official Twitter handle. “These players have performed consistently in recent times. These are our best players, they are the ones whose talent we have to utilise. We need to keep them motivated and hungry for success. We need to support the players in tough times, as a cricket fan and former player,” he added. Afridi, who has represented Pakistan in more than 500 international games, taking more than 500 international wickets and scoring more than 10,000 international runs in his 20-year long career, said that the team musty give a fight as more than winning and losing, it is the fight that matters. He further advised the team to play attacking cricket, instead of getting defensive. “I can accept the team losing as long as they fight it out on the field. I feel that cricket has changed a lot in recent years. Now, the attack is the best defence and there is no way to succeed other than by playing with attacking intent, especially in the white-ball formats,” said the 42-year-old. “Our players are good at either attacking or blocking. Maybe, we need to find a middle way, especially for the ODI format. All our players need to back their abilities and play on their actual strength,” added the BOOM-BOOM who has offered PCB to help the young players and work as a motivator for them. For the Pakistan team, they now move to their much-favoured format of T20Is when they take on England in another three-match series. They would, however now face the first XI English side as the ECB announced the T20I squad on Wednesday, July 14, naming Eoin Morgan as the captain and almost swapping the ODI side with the team that faced Sri Lanka before the Pakistan series. The first match takes place on July 16 at Nottingham.

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West Indies name additional spinners for final two matches, Hetmyer and McCoy rested

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Wasim Jaffer named Odisha senior team head coach

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