AUS vs IND: Will Pucovski ruled out of 1st Test, Marcus Harris earns call up

Nicholls sets off to go where he belongs

Henry Nicholls is made for bigger things, and his sixth Test ton against West Indies at Basin Reserve laid down the marker in all its glory.

BBL10 | MLS vs BRH: Coulter-Nile and Cartwright shine as Heat get decimated by Stars

Melbourne Stars began their BBL 10 campaign with an emphatic victory over the Brisbane Heat, showing signs of domination very early in the tournament. Hilton Cartwright played the anchor role as other batsmen, including the captain Glenn Maxwell, chipped in to chase an easy total of 126 with 17 balls remaining. The Coulter-Nile Act Batting first after losing the toss, the Brisbane team never got the star that they badly wanted. A start-stop innings was seen going nowhere. Nathan Coulter-Nile, the prime destroyer of the Heat innings got into the act as soon as he got the ball, cleaning up the opener Max Bryant, who was looking to let loose after a cautious start. Bryant was not the only one that got trapped in the Coulter-Nile Act. Any player that looked like settling in was trapped by the Western Australian maestro. In his 3.5 overs, the 33-year-old took four prized scalps of Bryant, Heat skipper Chris Lynn, Jimmy Peirson and bowler Matthew Kuhnemann, giving away just 10 runs. for this piece of brilliance, Coulter-Nile was adjudged Man of the Match and rightfully so. Once again fielding team 'surges' past the new rules One of the new rules the ‘Power Surge’ which was supposed to be the game-changer for the batting team has turned out to be a dull affair for the team in need as it is the bowling side that has used it better. In this game too, The Heat couldn’t really get the hang of it as, at first they were not in a great position to use it, and when they did take it in the 12th over, it rather gave the opposition two wickets with only 15 runs coming from it. In the last game too, Sydney Sixers, even after winning the Bash Boost for going ahead of the Hobart Hurricanes in the first half of their chase, got the Boost horribly wrong and could only score 46 in the last six overs. Cartwright and Stars' brilliance in the field Cartwright’s fielding has been one of the best in the BBL and BBL itself is the Gold standard of fielding when it comes to leagues. While Heat were trying to rebuild the innings after a slow start, firstly losing Bryant was a setback but post that, it was really the run out of a good looking Dan Lawrence that started the downfall. A direct hit from mid-on from Cartwright got his wicket, where there seemed no chance of runout and therefore Lawrence didn’t even try to dive. Cartwright then showed another brilliance as he ran a long way back from mid on to the long-on boundary to catch Simon Milenko’s brilliant on the rise shot. Along with Cartwright, other Stars players were also brilliant in the field. As a result of this, there were a total of three run-outs in the Heat innings. A glimmer of hope for Heat When Heat took the field they entered with a lot of energy and took two quick wickets of Marcus Stoinis and Andre Fletcher to get themselves in the game. The youngster, Jack Wood playing his debut took out Ben Dunk to make it 34 for 3 in the seventh over, forcing skipper Lynn to get in a slip for him. With the pressure building via dot balls, at one point of time Heat seemed like taking one important point through the Bash Boost as they had pushed the equation to 15 from 8 balls to get past 60 in 10 overs, the score that Heat had made in their first 10 overs. The Big Show deals a big blow Maxwell, however, had other ideas. He hit Wood for a six and four and took the equation down to just 5 from the next six balls which the stars reached to with much ease. The Big Show didn’t stop here as he wanted to end the game as fast as possible. He started tearing the Heat bowling apart and in no time the Stars were near their target. From a point when they were struggling to win the Bash Boost point to sensing victory under the 17 overs, it took just 26 balls for Maxwell to bring in the difference. Cartwright and his 75 run partnership in just 51 balls. While Maxwell was eventually bowled by the 24-year-old Wood for 46 from 26 balls, Cartwright remained not out on 42. What's next? With four points, now the Stars have occupied the top of the table spot as the matches rotate between the two cities for Canberra and Hobart for the first leg. On 12th December, Saturday, there is a doubleheader, one of which involves the Stars who would face Sydney Thunder in what would be Thunder’s first game. The second game would be between Melbourne Renegades and Perth Scorchers.

Jasprit Bumrah stars with the bat against Australia A on 20-wicket day

Jasprit Bumrah was the star of day 1 in Indian team's second practice match in Australia - against Australia A at Sydney. However, on a day where 20 wickets fell, the Indian pacer stole the show not with his bowling but, surprisingly, with his batting. Bumrah, a regular no. 11 in the Indian team, scored the only half-century in the entire day, remaining not out on 55. It was a 71-run partnership for the last wicket between Bumrah and Mohammad Siraj which got India to a score of 194 in their first-innings. This may have seemed a highly disappointing result for the Indian team, until the opposition starting batting on the same wicket. Thanks to a collective bowling effort from Indian pacers, with Mohammad Shami leading the way by picking up three wickets, India bundled out their opponents for just 108. Navdeep Saini also picked up three scalps in the innings while Bumrah got two. Siraj got one wicket while a run-out completed the innings. The 86-run lead for India should be enough on this wicket to provide them safety and push them towards a positive result. At the start of the day, Indian team had reason to be happy as the two up and coming stars in the line-up, Shubman Gill and Prithvi Shaw, looked in terrific form. Gill came in to bat after the fall of the first wicket - Mayank Agarwal for a personal score of just 2. Shaw batted with great aggression and scored 40 off just 29 balls while Gill managed 43 in 58. Their 63-run partnership took India to 72/1, but then a collapse ensued. The tourists were 123/9 when Bumrah and Siraj lifted their team up to a challenging score. Sean Abbot and Jack Wildermuth starrted for Australia A team with three wickets each. Cameron Green, centurious from the last match, picked up one wicket before having to go off the ground due to a blow to the head, from a drive by Bumrah. Due to him suffering concussion, he was substituted by Patrick Rowe. Gill, Shaw, and Agarwal would all look to make a mark tomorrow. These two are not just competing against each other for a spot in the team but also, with Rohit Sharma declared fit for the last two games, with the latter also.

Henry Nicholls stars for New Zealand on Day 1 of Second Test against West Indies

On another extremely green wicket, West Indies captain Jason Holder decided to put the opposition in to bat. New Zealand decided to use their existing opening pair of Tom Latham and Tom Blundell. With Kemar Roach out of the team, West Indies gave a Test debut to one of their stars from the 2016 Under-19 World Cup-winning side, Chemar Holder. But it was the senior Holder who opened the bowling with Shannon Gabriel, the latter playing in his 50th Test. It was Gabriel who got the first breakthrough with a magnificent in-swinging delivery that castled Blundell. When Chemar Holder was introduced into the attack, he immediately started bowling a positive full length and reaped the reward by getting Latham to nick one to debutante keeper Joshua Da Silva. West Indies were in the game and their chances improved when Ross Taylor was dismissed by Gabriel cheaply. At the other end, Will Young, playing only his second Test, looked impressive and was heading for a half-century. But his innings was also cut short by Gabriel who was his team's best bowler. Then, the home side were rescued by Henry Nicholls with a brilliant hundred. He was ably assisted, first by BJ Watling, with whom Nicholls added 55, and then Daryll Mitchell who had an 83-run stand with the centurion. At the end of day's play, New Zealand looked in a relatively comfortable condition, at 294/6. Nicholls is unbeaten on 117 and Kyle Jamieson is batting on 1. For West Indies, Gabriel was the leading bowler, finishing the day with figures of 3/57 while the debutante Chemar Holder got two wickets for 65 runs. The only positive for West Indies is the fact that the pitch at Wellington can get better for batting with time. A score of less than 350 by the home side may not be completely unreachable for Windies.