India to tour Sri Lanka for three ODIs & as many T20Is in July

After Ollie Robinson, another historic tweet of England player surfaces, ECB 'looking into it'

The issue of ‘racist’ tweets done by the players when in teenage does not seem to be stopping any soon as a tweet from another player has emerged on social media. Wisden.com published a snapshot of a tweet done by a player, which it said would have been under 16-17 years of age at the time of tweeting. However, the publication chose to hide the identity of the player who tweeted. The ECB has taken cognisance of this emerging issue as well while the investigation for Ollie Robinson’s historic tweets is still underway. “It has been brought to our attention that an England player has posted historic offensive material on their social media account. We are looking into it and will make a further comment in due course,” an ECB spokesperson said. England coach Chris Silverwood emphasized the need for education to bring an end to discrimination in the game. He said that the England team is striving to make the sport ‘inclusive’ for everyone involved. “The big thing for us all is education,” he said. “We are all striving to be better, none of us are perfect, and we all need to make sure we are learning all the time. We can make sure the world is a better place. Most importantly, we can work hard to ensure that this great game is inclusive for everybody and there’s no form of discrimination whatsoever. The issue first popped up in the public eye on the first day of the first Test between England and New Zealand when Ollie Robinson made his Test debut.

Mushifiqur Rahim opts out of Zimbabwe T20Is due to bubble fatigue

Experienced Bangladesh wicket-keeper batsman Mushfiqur Rahim has opted to not take part in the t20i leg of the team’s tour to Zimbabwe in July this year. Rahim, who is currently taking part in the Dhaka Premier Division T20 tournament for the Abahani Dhaka franchise, said that too much bubble fatigue is not good for him and he wants to remain fresh for the bigger series at home against England, Australi and New Zealand later in the autumn. "Mushfiqur called me today and wanted to opt-out from the T20 series against Zimbabwe. We are yet to take a decision in this regard but we must respect their decisions in such cases,” Bangladesh's chief selector Minhajul Abedin was quoted as saying to Cricbuzz. Bangladesh’ Zimbabwe tour would involve a one-off Test, three ODIs and three T20Is. Originally it was to have two Tests and two T20Is, but due to the World T20 approaching, BCB and Zimbabwe Cricket agreed to increase extra T20I and cut off one Test. The series begins on July 7 with the Test match. The ODIs are scheduled to be played on July 16, 18 and 20 at the Harare Sports Club, while the three T20Is will be played on July 23, 25 and 27 at the same venue.

After SLC heeds to certain demands Sri Lanka players agree to tour England without signing contracts

A truce seemed to be have been brokered between Sri Lankan cricket players and the cricket governing body in the country, Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) as the players, earlier adamant at not touring England, have decided to pursue the tour. The reason for their change in action is supposedly SLC’s formal promise of making player evaluation marks available to each player when they return from the tour of England. “This is the transparency the players had been requesting from the outset. They will play this tour without signing any contract. They have signed a voluntary declaration, but there's nothing there about player remuneration,” Players’ representative attorney Nishan Premathiratne was quoted as saying to ESPNcricinfo. They have always been committed to playing for Sri Lanka,” he added. Another of the players’ main request is that they be judged only on performance and fitness. However, the technical committee which prepared the contracts judged all players on these two criteria but also included other criteria such as professionalism, leadership and future potential/ adaptability. The Sri Lankan team will leave for England on Tuesday, June 8 and after the quarantine regime, will play the ODI and T20I series of three matches each, starting with the first T20I on June 23 at Sophia Gardens in Cardiff.

NED vs IRE: Stephan Myburgh, bowlers shine as the Netherlands win historic series against Ireland

It was a historic day in the history of Dutch cricket as the Netherlands defeated an ICC full member and Test status holder Ireland in the third ODI at Utrecht by six wickets, to not only win their first-ever ODI series against a full member but also earn crucial 10 points for the ICC Cricket World Cup Super League. Stephan Myburgh, the Dutch opener was the hero of the game, who stood in all adversities and anchored the innings and the Netherlands’ tricky chase of 164. The left-handed batter made a composed 74 off 111 deliveries in an innings which included six fours and three huge sixes. It was in an attempt to go anti to what his inning had been till then, Mybugh missed a straight ball trying to slog-sweep the winning six. The scorecard read 158, only six runs away from the victory. It was Myburgh’s best-ever performance with the bat in ODI cricket, surpassing his previous best of 60 that came against Kenya in 2011 in The Hague. However, his wicket triggered a mini-collapse as in the span of the next four runs the orange brigade lost two more wickets that included their skipper Pieter Seelaar and Myburgh’s partner during the much needed 62 run partnership for the fifth wicket, Bas de Leede. de Leede got out for 66 balls 18 while Seelaar was removed for four runs. It took Logan Van Beek, who was also the key component with the ball earlier in the day, to hit the winning four. Andrew Balbirnie, the Irish captain won his first toss on the tour in the morning today and decided to bat first. His decision was not supported by the batsmen as the Netherlands struck thrice in the first 10 overs removing the heart and soul of the Irish batting with wickets of Paul Stirling, Kevin O’Brien and of the skipper Balbirnie himself. Vivian Kingma, who was playing his first game of the series was the chief destructor alongside Fred Klaassen. George Dockrell united with Harry Tector to steady the sheep and they did with their 89 runs stand for the fifth wicket, which came off 138 balls. But just when they thought of accelerating the run rate, van Beek struck twice in the span of 23 balls to remove both Dockrell and Tector. Post these two wickets, Simi Singh tried as much as he could but wasn’t really able to resurrect the men in green’s innings which ended at 163 in the 49th over. Tector was the top scorer with 58 off 100 balls. For the Netherlands, both Klaassen and van Beek took three wickets apiece while Timm van der Gugten took two wickets. While the 30-year-old van Beek was chosen Man of the Series for his all-around show with 55 runs and six wickets in the series, Myburgh was named Man of the Match. With this win, Netherlands have gained 20 points from three games and have reached the ninth position in the CWC Super League ahead of countries like South Africa, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe and Ireland. The CWC Super League acts as the qualifying tournament for the 2023 World Cup in India as the top seven nations in its standing plus hosts India would qualify directly for the World Cup, while the remaining five times would undergo a qualifying tournament to decide the last two teams for the 10 team show pice ODI event.