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The USA Cricket Association has been hit with a multi-million dollar lawsuit filed by the North American Cricket League

ESPNcricinfo staff23-Dec-2010Although Gladstone Dainty has announced an ambitious plan for a national Twenty20 tournament in the USA starting in 2012, the USA Cricket Association has been hit with a multi-million dollar lawsuit filed by the North American Cricket League (NACL).NACL, which describes itself as a “sports media and entertainment company dedicated to promoting cricket throughout the world, including so-called Twenty20 format cricket in the United States” claims that it has an existing deal with USACA which is in direct conflict with the board’s new initiative.A statement from NACL said that there were “nine causes of action” including
breach of contract, fraud, misappropriation of proprietary business information and theft of trade secrets. It accuses USACA of embarking on a “fraudulent scheme to extract money from NACL and its investors”.NACL’s case centres on an agreement it says it entered into with USACA to promote and organise an official Twenty20 league in the United States. “The parties signed an interim agreement that granted NACL an exclusive period of negotiations during which USACA was contractually bound to cease negotiations with any third parties for the same rights.”While NACL continued to negotiate a master agreement in good faith, USACA had no intention of honouring the terms of the interim agreement and engaged in a fraudulent scheme to extract money from NACL and its investors.”The complaint further alleges that while NACL was negotiating with USACA in good faith, USACA entered into additional agreements with third parties from which USACA also accepted large cash payments for the licensing of the same commercial rights.

Leicestershire continue to feel the effects of a tumultuous 2010 and have announced a loss of £404,862 for the year to September 30

ESPNcricinfo staff17-Jan-2011Leicestershire continue to feel the effects of a tumultuous 2010 and have announced a loss of £404,862 for the year to September 30. The county was beset with problems last summer, with the resignations of chief executive David Smith, senior coach Tim Boon and chairman Neil Davidson.”The results are bad but we have known for some time that costs have not been controlled and income from membership and Twenty20 was way down on budget,” said recently appointed chief executive Mike Siddall.”In almost every area costs are either over budget or income targets have not been achieved. The club needs rebuilding from the bottom and although we have a tough job on our hands it is far from an impossible task.”So far we have replaced our kit supplier, caterer, legal adviser and physiotherapy services provider and desperately need to upgrade our IT and financial systems.”The losses have had a detrimental effect on the club’s cash flow and Siddall added: “The position is serious and in order to guarantee the bank overdraft, the club needs to increase its commercial income significantly. We are continuing our discussions with Leicester City Council to see what can be done in order to relax the covenant the council has over the Grace Road ground. I am optimistic that a solution can be found to enable us to offer sufficient security to cover the facilities we require.””The board has been completely revamped and we have appointed a new company secretary,” added chairman Paul Haywood, who took over when Neil Davidson resigned in October. “Expertise has been brought in to help increase sponsorship and membership income. Costs are now under control and we have set a budget which should return the club to profit.”I am very optimistic for the future. Sponsors, including main club sponsor The Oval Group, are backing the club and sales of attractively priced membership packages have been good. We finished last season on a very positive note and skipper Matthew Hoggard and the team are really looking forward to the new season.”

The Kochi team in the fourth edition of the IPL will be called ‘Kochi Tuskers Kerala’, a name decided on through an online poll

ESPNcricinfo staff12-Mar-2011The Kochi team in the fourth edition of the IPL will be called ‘Kochi Tuskers Kerala’, a name decided on through an online poll.”The state animal of Kerala is the Asian Elephant, also known as the Indian Elephant. Therefore the appropriateness in selection of the Team Kochi IPL name, Kochi Tuskers Kerala by the fans all over India cannot be ignored. Elephants are the largest land animals alive today and their tusks are attractive, sharp and intimidating,” Mukesh Patel, the director of Kochi Cricket Pvt Ltd, a consortium of six companies that are shareholders of the franchise, said.The team, which will be led by Mahela Jayawardene, had previously decided on the name ‘Indi Commandos’. That has been now discarded in favour of ‘Kochi Tuskers Kerala.’

A round-up of the third round of games

ESPNcricinfo staff11-Apr-2011UAE have all but wrapped up their place in the finals of the World Cricket League Division 2, after a third straight victory. Their 19-run victory against Hong Kong at the Global Cricket Academy puts them on six points, and with a net run-rate of +1.090 it would take a dramatic turn of events to see two sides overtake them. On Monday, Amjad Ali and Saqib Ali scored half-centuries to help UAE get to 227.Hong Kong lost early wickets in their chase, before 16-year-old Mark Chapman got them back in the match with his second half-century of the tournament. His partnership with Irfan Ahmed helped Hong Kong recover from 52 for 5 to 148 for 6, but the two were dismissed in the space of five overs and they fell short by 19 runs. Shadeep Silva caused the early damage, and finished with figures of 4 for 17 in his ten overs.Hong Kong are stuck on two points and coach Charlie Burke said the next game, against Papa New Guniea, was a must-win. “It’s the final for us,” he said. “There’s no doubt, we need to learn from today; chasing is never easy. Today, we didn’t have one of the top six batsmen in the final overs of the game. Some crucial decision making in regards to running between wickets, coupled with losing wickets at the start of the innings meant we threw it away at the end.”

Namibia completed a comprehensive eight-wicket thumping of Papua New Guinea with all of 34.4 overs to spare, on the back of an explosive half-century by Craig Williams, in the World Cricket League Division Two in Dubai.Choosing to bat, Papua New Guinea began poorly, losing half their side by the time they had 33 on the board. The right-arm/left-arm opening bowling combination of Louis Klazinga and Kola Burger caused most of the damage upfront. While the batsmen didn’t recover from the early blows, left-arm spinner Louis van der Westhuizen built on Namibia’s good start with the ball, stifling the middle order with figures of 3 for 4 off 5 overs. Jason Kila with 23 was the top scorer for Papua New Guinea, as they folded for 92.Namibia threatened to make heavy weather of the paltry chase, being reduced to 5 for 2, before an unbeaten 90-run stand between Williams and Sarel Burger took them home. While Burger was patient to the point of being over-cautious, scoring 14 off 41 balls, Williams took the opposite approach. He smashed the bowlers around, stroking 10 fours and three sixes to bring the match to an early close.PNG, who came up from Division 3 started with a win in the tournament, but after two losses, their coach Greg Campbell admitted their lack of experience was showing. “I think today they showed us how much more experienced they are than us,” he said. “We’ll go home tonight and work on what went wrong and try to come back bigger and better than before.”Namibia were the only side to win while chasing on Monday, and their coach Johan Rudolph said it ended up being a good toss to lose. “We always like to bat first but it was probably the best thing today for us to lose the toss as it meant our bowlers could do a really good job,” Rudolph said. “I’m pleased with the way Craig performed today, he is always an aggressive batsman and plays his own game out there. He had a great time with the bat during the I-Shield and has been the second highest-scoring batsman in the South African amateur league we play in; so his performance today was no surprise.”

Uganda produced a fine all-round performance to beat Bermuda by 74 runs at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium.Uganda’s top-order batsmen all got starts, after captain Davis Arinaitwe chose to bat, but none of them could go on to score big. Wicketkeeper Lawrence Sematimba top scored with an unbeaten 66, putting on a 91-run fourth-wicket stand with Benjamin Musoke to steer his side to a competitive 249. The Bermuda bowlers did not have a stand-out performer, sharing the seven wickets that fell in the innings around.Bermuda lost wickets in a hurry early on in their chase, with Charles Waiswa, Danniel Ruyange and Deusdedit Muhumuza combining to reduce them to 41 for 4 in the 13th over. Jason Anderson and Lionel Cann briefly steadied the innings with a 74-run partnership, but once the pair was dismissed by seamer Roger Mukasa, there was not much resistance on offer. Mukasa went on to pick up two more wickets, to finish with figures of 4 for 21 off seven overs, as the innings folded on 175.

Surrey were left to ponder another day of what might have been as their top-order batsmen squandered good conditions and a series of bright starts to end a middling 322 all out against Northamptonshire at The Oval

Sahil Dutta at the Oval08-Apr-2011Stumps
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Rory Hamilton-Brown’s powerful 74 helped Surrey reach 322•PA Photos

Surrey were left to ponder another day of what might have been as their top-order batsmen squandered good conditions and a series of bright starts to end a middling 322 all out against Northamptonshire at The Oval.Captain Rory Hamilton-Brown, so often the main culprit for wasted opportunities last year, held the innings together with a typically forceful 74 but it wasn’t until Gareth Batty dug in with 64 from No. 8 that Surrey were sure of posting a competitive score.The earliest start to a Championship season was quite possibly its sunniest too and the decent Oval crowd were given plenty of entertainment as 55 boundaries were struck and 10 wickets fell in the day. For a team desperately needing some results to match their lofty reputation it was a frustrating showing for the home fans though. Most of the Surrey batsmen came in, looked good, and got out before making a decisive contribution. With the pitch already offering spin 322 may well be sufficient but given Northamptonshire’s limited attack it was not ruthless enough.Michael Brown was the first to fall, and having missed last season with injury his comeback didn’t last long. First ball Chaminda Vaas swung one back into his pads to send him back for a duck. At 37 Vaas does little more than ‘put’ the ball on a length but displayed all the experience gained from thousands of overs on flat decks in Sri Lanka to dupe Gary Wilson into a loose drive and collect his second scalp. Wilson had looked fluent through the covers but in his fifth over Vaas steadily pushed the ball wider and wider before the pitched-up-full ball outside off found a groping outside edge.If Wilson had been out-thought there was no excuse for Zander de Bruyn. On his Surrey debut after moving from Somerset, he had looked in good order for 35 before inexplicably falling to James Middlebrook’s first over of offspin. Having taken a boundary earlier in the over de Bruyn stretched well outside off stump to paddle a dinky sweep and only succeeded in ushering it onto his leg stump.It brought the Surrey captain to the middle with the familiar feeling of his side in trouble at 88 for 3. Hamilton-Brown immediately set upon restoring order together with his deputy Steve Davies. Collecting a succession of hard-hit offside boundaries he looked untroubled as he guided his team to lunch. Two balls after the break, though, brought the worst dismissal of the day.Davies pushed a gettable single to cover, but Hamilton-Brown was unmoved and continued to ignore his partner as Davies hared down towards him. By the time Davies had made a forlorn effort to turn back the bails were off and he had been sawn short for 31.Unperturbed, Hamilton-Brown continued to counterattack and found in Tom Maynard a partner willing to match him stroke for stroke. In an entertaining stand the pair rushed Surrey back into control with Hamilton-Brown hitting eleven fours, including two in succession, to bring up his half-century.Maynard struck his second ball to the cover rope and added three more boundaries before he’d reached 20. With the pair looking set to deliver the kind significant score that eluded Surrey too often last year Maynard attempted, and missed, a needless slog-sweep to depart for 32 and give Middlebrook his second wicket.Chris Schofield fell soon after and Hamilton-Brown, alongside Batty, shut-up shop for a period after tea against some accurate bowling from Middlebrook. Desperately looking to make the three-figure statement early in the season the Surrey captain fell foul to his opposite number when one from Hall kept a touch low to trap him in front.At 247 for 7, Surrey looked in danger of subsiding quickly but Batty did what his top-order team-mates couldn’t and scrapped. Bad balls were dispatched, good ones resisted and he quietly worked his way to the 25th first-class fifty of his career. He added 26 with Yasir Arafat and 44 with Stuart Meaker before Lee Daggett took the last two wickets to finish with 3 for 63. Batty may well come into the game later and his innings ensured Surrey ‘s bowlers have something to work with.

South Africa A beat Bangladesh A by a comfortable 60-run margin at Willowmoore Park, Benoni, to take the five-match series 3-1

ESPNcricinfo staff30-Apr-2011
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South Africa A beat Bangladesh A by a comfortable 60-run margin at Willowmoore Park, Benoni, to take the five-match series 3-1. The win was fashioned by a blistering, unbeaten 141 by Heino Kuhn.Asked to field, Bangladesh prised out the South Africa openers early on, leaving them 40 for 2 in 8.1 overs. But a steady 136-run stand between wicketkeeper Kuhn and captain Dean Elgar followed, laying a solid base for a big total. Kuhn cut loose after getting to a century off 110 balls, tonking his last 41 runs off just 16 deliveries. He was given adequate support in the late charge that took South Africa to 320, with Vaughn van Jaarsveld getting a 40-ball fifty and Ryan Bailey clearing the ropes a couple of times in a cameo to finish 22 not out off 9.Bangladesh’s chase was steered by a solid 124-run partnership for the second wicket between Junaid Siddique and Saghir Hossain. But once run-outs claimed the pair – Siddique went four short of a ton and Saghir fell soon after completing his fifty – South Africa took control of the innings, picking up wickets at regular intervals. The bowlers shared the wickets around, but Craig Alexander was the pick of the lot with three middle order wickets.

Wahab Riaz, debuting for Kent, and Sam Northeast shared an unbeaten fifth-wicket stand of 66 in 26 balls to help Kent win their first Friends Life t20 victory with a six-wicket win over Glamorgan

11-Jun-2011
ScorecardWahab Riaz, debuting for Kent, and Sam Northeast shared an unbeaten fifth-wicket stand of 66 in 26 balls to help Kent win their first Friends Life t20 victory with a six-wicket win over Glamorgan.After being put in to bat, Glamorgan appeared in control of the contest after posting a more than competitive 154 for five in their 20 overs on a slow Cardiff pitch. Kent looked in some difficulty at 59 for two at the halfway stage, which left them needing 96 off the final 10 overs. But Riaz (32), the Pakistan seamer, and Northeast (33) held their nerve to win the game with two balls to spare.Glamorgan had got off to a rattling start with skipper Alviro Petersen, who was awarded his Glamorgan cap in the interval, and Mark Cosgrove scoring 56 from the opening six overs. Cosgrove looked in prime form as he struck Azhar Mahmood for 15 off the third over of the innings including a six over long-off. Cosgrove followed that up by stroking a straight six off Charl Langeveldt before hitting Riaz for two boundaries in his first over.But Kent fought back well to slow Glamorgan’s run rate, which was helped when Cosgrove was dismissed for 47 from 31 balls after being caught by Robert Key at extra cover off Adam Ball.Glamorgan found themselves struggling for runs against the slower Kent bowlers on a tough pitch. It was left to Petersen, who scored 65 from 56 balls, to try to bat through the innings which he nearly did until he was bowled in the final over.At the start of their reply Kent’s openers Rob Key and Joe Denly found runs hard to come by, making just 37 runs in the opening six overs. And Glamorgan appeared to be heading for their second win when the spinners Robert Croft, who went for just 21 from his four overs, and Dean Cosker tried to strangle the Kent run rate.There were signs that Kent were not going to give up when Darren Stevens hit two sixes off Cosker. When Stevens was caught at long-on off Croft, Kent were reduced to 89 for four in the 15th over.But Riaz was sent up the order and immediately had an impact by taking sixes off Croft and Will Owen. Kent were left with 33 to get off the final three overs but kept their focus as Riaz struck the winning runs.

Yorkshire’s Friends Life t20 woes continued at Headingley, as they lost by 18 runs under the Duckworth-Lewis system to Leicestershire

06-Jul-2011
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Yorkshire’s Friends Life t20 woes continued at Headingley, as they lost by 18 runs under the Duckworth-Lewis system to Leicestershire who made sure of making it through to the quarter-finals from the North Group alongside Nottinghamshire. A slightly revised target of 193 in a match reduced to 19 overs a side by rain proved just out of the reach of a spirited Yorkshire, who slid to their seventh defeat of the season in the competition.Most of their batsmen made cameo contributions to the chase. But the best stand of the chase came courtesy a sixth-wicket assault of 42 in 3.5 overs by Gary Ballance and Jonny Bairstow, which was abruptly ended by Jigar Naik who took three wickets in four legitimate balls. The offspinner came on for the 16th over with 48 required and had Ballance stumped first ball by Paul Nixon for 25. He then bowled a wide before getting Richard Pyrah caught by Joshua Cobb. Two balls later Adil Rashid holed out to Andrew McDonald.Naik was withdrawn from the attack after his solitary over had brought him three wickets for three runs and Bairstow was dismissed by Abdul Razzak, also for 25, as Yorkshire closed on 174 for 9.Leicestershire, sent in to bat, maintained a healthy run-rate through their innings, thanks to a splendid unbeaten 96 from their Australian opener McDonald, who cracked nine fours and three sixes off the 57 balls he received on his way to his highest Twenty20 score. Rashid suffered most from the visitors’ positive approach, the legspinner taking the new ball and finishing with no wicket for 58 runs off his four overs.Cobb and McDonald got Leicestershire off to an explosive start with a six apiece off Rashid’s first over, which cost 18, and the pair repeated the pattern in the following over from Ryan Sidebottom that also leaked 18 runs. The openers rushed to 50 off 23 balls, but at 58 in the sixth over, Cobb skied Pyrah to mid-off where he was held by Sidebottom for 26 from 15 deliveries.A heavy burst of rain caused a 45-minute interruption at 88 for 1 in 9.3 overs, but on resumption Will Jefferson drove Pyrah for six and four before falling to another well-judged catch by Sidebottom off David Wainwright. The left-arm spinner, who would have been on a month’s loan to Derbyshire but for a hamstring injury to Azeem Rafiq, was easily the pick of the Yorkshire attack with 1 for 24 from his four overs.McDonald lost partners in Razzaq and Jacques du Toit, but was assisted in a late flourish by Wayne White, the pair adding 28 in the final two overs. McDonald would almost certainly have completed his century, but for the over lost to rain.

United Arab Emirates bowled Kenya out for 167 in their second innings to register a comprehensive 266-run win at Gymkhana Club Ground in Nairobi

ESPNcricinfo staff31-Jul-2011
Scorecard
United Arab Emirates bowled Kenya out for 167 in their second innings to register a comprehensive 266-run win at Gymkhana Club Ground in Nairobi and complete their turnaround after conceding a first-innings lead in their Intercontinental Cup match.Kenya began the day on 76 for 4 chasing 433 but victory was never a realistic option for the hosts, who lasted just 36.1 overs on the final day. New captain Collins Obuya made a determined 63 but he received little support, with only Ramesh Mepani, who managed 37 before being run out, going past 20.UAE struck in the second over of the day to remove Mansukh Jasani for a duck before Obuya and Mepani eked out a 37-run stand that was the second highest of the innings, highlighting their failure to build partnerships. Obuya’s fall with the score on 125 effectively ended Kenya’s chances of saving the game, and the last four wickets fell for 42 runs.The wickets were shared between five bowlers, with Mohammad Tauqir, Amjad Javed and Shoaib Sarwar picking up two each.

Sri Lanka and Australia are likely to have the DRS only for the Test-leg of the upcoming tour because of a shortage of cameras required for the minimum technology standards

Sa'adi Thawfeeq24-Jul-2011Sri Lanka and Australia are likely to have the DRS only for the Test-leg of the upcoming tour because of a shortage of cameras required for the minimum technology standards. Only one of five necessary cameras are available as the other four are being used in the ongoing Test series between England and India.”We are in touch with the ICC and the Australian company that is handling the equipment to try and make the technology available from the Twenty20 International, but the hitch is that they don’t have sufficient cameras,” said Upali Dharmadasa, Sri Lanka Cricket’s interim chairman.It was initially reported that SLC were not going to use the DRS because of financial constraints but Dharmadasa cleared up that confusion. “We were made to understand that the DRS became mandatory from October 1, 2011, but when I spoke to ICC CEO Haroon Lorgat, he told me that the DRS was mandatory at the end of the ICC meeting in Hong Kong on June 30. So we decided to go ahead with it.”We told him that SLC had not budgeted for the use of DRS for the series, and if the ICC could help us in some way to cut down the costs, it would be helpful. Mr Lorgat promised to assist us in whatever way he could.”Dharmadasa said Sri Lanka were keen to have ball-tracking technology also included in the DRS, a technology that is not being used in the ongoing England-India Test series.Australia begin their tour of Sri Lanka with a Twenty20 international in Pallekele on August 6.
The Test series between England and India ends on August 22, when the Sri Lanka-Australia five-ODI series also concludes. The three-Test series starts in Galle on August 31.