Bhuvneshwar Kumar slams reports claiming he isn't interested in playing Test cricket

WV Raman accuses of smear campaign against him after removal from head coach post

Outgoing India women’s cricket coach WV Raman who was not retained in the position has alleged that a smear campaign against him has hogged the limelight unneccesarily. In a letter written to BCCI President Sourav Ganguly, Raman requested him to take actions against it. He also addressed a mail to the National Cricket Academy head Rahul Dravid stating that it will be “extremely disconnecting” if his candidature was rejected based on anything order than his “incompetancy as a coach”. Raman who was handed over the coaching duties of the national team in 2018 was surprisingly not retained despite having a good time with the women’s side. Under his coaching, India reached the final of the 2020 T20 World Cup where they lost against the mighty Aussies in the final. The Cricket Advisory Committe headed by Madan Lal reappointed Ramesh Powar for the post after he was shown the door in 2018. “I presume you might have been told different views about my style of functioning and work ethic. Whether those views conveyed to the officials of the BCCI had any impact on my candidature is of no consequence now,” Raman wrote in the letter which is currently in possession of PTI. “What is important is that the smear campaign seems to have gained some unwarranted traction with some BCCI officials which needs to be halted permanently. I am prepared to give an explanation should you or any of the office bearers require it,”the letter further read. The former Indian batsman who appeared in 11 Tests and 27 ODIs for the national team between 1988 and 1997 said that if he was rejected due to his incompetence as a coach he won’t have any problems what so ever but if he was released due to some other reason then it is extremely disconcerting. “If I were to be rejected due to my incompetency as a coach, there is no argument on a judgment call at all. But what will be extremely disconcerting is if my candidature was rejected due to any other reasons,” said Raman. “Especially if it was due to allegations from people who were more focussed on achieving their personal objectives at the expense of the overall hygiene and welfare of the Indian women’s team and the pride of the country,” he further added. Raman’s letter is bound to make a few heards turn as the trend of sacking coaches having issues with players is nothing new. Fallout with players has either made coaches step aside or has been sacked from the position. The fallout between Mithali Raj and Ramesh Powar forced BCCI to remove him from the post in 2018. While no name was mentioned by Raman in his letter, it is understood that he was speaking about the star culture that prevails in the team which is perhaps doing more harm than good. “If some people in the system have been highly accommodative to the extent of being seemingly obsequious to an accomplished performers for years on end and if that performer feels constrained to adhere to the culture, then I would leave it to you to decide if the coach was asking for too much,” Raman said. “In a coaching career spanning 20 years, I have always created a culture in which the team always comes first and insisted on no individual overriding either the game or the team,” he further added.

Bowling standards are high in PSL as compared to IPL: Wahab Riaz

Pakistan pacer Wahab Riaz has praised the functioning of the Indian Premier League (IPL) in comparison to Pakistan Super League (PSL). The left-arm bowler has said that IPL is at a “different level” and certainly no league can compete with it. “You can’t compare IPL with PSL, I believe IPL is at a different level. Their commitments, the way they run things, communicate things, the way they draft the players, that is totally different. I don’t think any league can compete with the IPL, but if there is any league that stands behind it, it has to be the PSL. The League in Pakistan has proved it,” the Pakistan pacer was quoted as saying during an interview with Cricket Pakistan’s YouTube Channel. While Wahab appreciated the IPL, the Pakistan bowler hailed the bowling quality of PSL and said that the standards are really high. “The standards of bowling are quite high. The kind of bowlers you get in the PSL is not found in other leagues, not even in the IPL. This is why PSL doesn’t have many high-scoring games. The bowling attacks in PSL are the best in the world,” Riaz said. The PSL 2021 that was postponed after a rise in Covid-19 cases within the teams is slated to resume on June 1 but the venues for the matches are yet to be decided. Earlier, the remainder of the tournament was set to be held in Karachi including the final. It was later moved to UAE after the franchises had asked the PCB to reschedule the tournament citing a fresh surge in the Covid-19 cases. But it seems unlikely that the remaining fixtures would take place in the country after it had announced a ban on travellers from Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bangladesh amid the COVID-19 pandemic. On the other hand, IPL 2021 was also suspended on May 4 with immediate effect after few players and staff members had tested positive for the disease. The BCCI has received an invitation from the Sri Lanka Cricket Board to hold the remaining matches of the IPL in the island country in the month of September. But the Indian board is yet to make a call on it.

Cricket Australia hints reopening 'Sandpaper Gate' investigation after Bancroft's sensational revelations

Australian batsman Cameron Bancroft’s indirect revelation of the involvement of the fast bowlers in the infamous sandpaper gate scandal has sparked a new debate. In a statement to Fox Cricket on Saturday night, May 15, a Cricket Australia spokesperson has confirmed that they might reopen the investigations on the scandal after Bancroft's sensational claims about the Cape Town Test match. A blot in the Australian cricket history, the Cape Town Test match between South Africa and Australia found three members of the Australia team - captain Steve Smith, vice-captain David Warner and Cameron Bancroft using sandpaper to rough up one side of the ball - a process considered illegal by the International Cricket Council. After the visuals of the incident were caught on TV, Bancroft and Smith accepted the allegations on the post-day presser and the tainted trio was stripped of their status by the cricket board. Soon after Bancroft was handed a nine-month ban while the other two were ordered to stay away from all forms of the game for 12 months. Further CA barred David Warner forever from any leadership role from the Australian team and handed Smith a ban from captaincy for two years. Just when conversations started opening about Smith being reelected as the Australian captain, Bancroft's revelations have sprung out of nowhere to put a huge dent on those aspirations. "The investigation conducted at the time was detailed and comprehensive. Since then, no one has presented new information to CA that casts doubt on the investigation’s findings,” a CA spokesperson was quoted as saying by Fox Sports. “CA has maintained all along that if anyone is in possession of new information in regards to the Cape Town Test of 2018, they should come forward and present it,” he further added. Bancroft who is currently in the UK plying his trade in the County Championship said that the tampering was done to benefit the bowlers so they must have been aware that the ball was tampered with during an interview with The Guardian. Despite not taking any names, he indirectly took jibes at the likes of Pat Cummins, Josh Hazlewood, and Mitchell Starc. “Yeah, look, all I wanted to do was to be responsible and accountable for my own actions and part. Yeah, obviously what I did benefits bowlers and the awareness around that, probably, is self-explanatory. I guess I learned through the journey and being responsible that’s where the buck stops [with Bancroft himself]. Had I had better awareness I would have made a much better decision,” Bancroft said. When asked further he added that it’s pretty much self-explanatory. Without saying much he has forced Cricket Australia to reconsider the stance which they took three years back. “Uh … yeah, look, I think, yeah, I think it’s pretty probably self-explanatory,” he said.

Lisa Sthalekar slams BCCI on giving cold shoulder to Veda Krishnamurthy

Former India spinner Ramesh Powar returned as the coach of the women’s team and his appointment was followed by the squad selection for England tour which saw a couple of players getting maiden India call-ups while some prominent names were omitted and among these was Veda Krishnamurthy. The decision certainly didn’t go really well with former Australia women’s cricketer Lisa Sthalekar and she took a dig at the BCCI on the cold shoulder given to Veda by the board. Sthalekar in a social media post said that as a BCCI contracted player, Veda should have at least received a communication from the BCCI. “Whilst not selecting Veda for the upcoming series maybe justified from their point of view, what angers me the most is that as a contracted player she has not received a communication from the BCCI, just to even check how she is coping,” she wrote on Twitter. The Indian cricketer is facing a tough time at the personal front as well. Two weeks after her mother’s demise due to Covid-19, Veda lost her sister due to complications related to the disease. Squad for Test & ODI: Mithali Raj (Captain), Smriti Mandhana, Harmanpreet Kaur (vice-captain), Punam Raut, Priya Punia, Deepti Sharma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Shafali Verma, Sneh Rana, Taniya Bhatia (wicket-keeper), Indrani Roy (wicket-keeper), Jhulan Goswami, Shikha Pandey, Pooja Vastrakar, Arundhati Reddy, Poonam Yadav, Ekta Bisht, Radha Yadav. Squad for T20I: Harmanpreet Kaur (Captain) Smriti Mandhana (vice-captain), Deepti Sharma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Shafali Verma, Richa Ghosh, Harleen Deol, Sneh Rana, Taniya Bhatia (wicket-keeper), Indrani Roy (wicket-keeper), Shikha Pandey, Pooja Vastrakar, Arundhati Reddy, Poonam Yadav, Ekta Bisht, Radha Yadav, Simaran Dil Bahadur.