A late-acceleration against Pakistan in the Asia Cup, or an all-out assault against Australia?

ESPNcricinfo staff04-Nov-2023Voting for this match-up has ended. The 115* vs Australia in Nagpur moves to the semi-final round.

122* (94) vs Pakistan, Asia Cup, Colombo, 2023

Every Kohli century was beginning to acquire an air of momentousness by this point, as they followed a barren run of form and sped up the countdown towards Sachin Tendulkar’s record 49 ODI hundreds. After rain interrupted India’s innings, Kohli began the reserve day on 8. The first part of his innings focused on accumulation, as he let KL Rahul be the aggressor. But towards the end, the Colombo crowd witnessed Kohli’s pace-hitting skills. From 88 off 77 balls at the end of the 46th over he ramped up to 122 off 94, clocking Faheem Ashraf for four, four and six to finish the innings. The lasting image was a back-foot loft over long-on for six off Naseem Shah that closely resembled his straight hit off Haris Rauf in the T20 World Cup the previous year.

115*(66) vs Australia, 6th ODI, Nagpur, 2013

Kohli walked in during the 30th over of the chase, with India 178 for 1 in pursuit of 351 to level the series at 2-2. After Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan had put on a 178-run partnership, Kohli continued his rich vein of form in the series, smashing four fours and a six in the first 18 balls he faced. In the 41st over, he hit a hat-trick of fours off Mitchell Johnson, who struck twice in his next over. From 62 off 48, the equation became 35 off 18, but five fours from Kohli in the next two overs helped India win with three balls to spare. Kohli’s hundred came in the 49th over and off 61 balls, the third-fastest by an Indian in ODIs, just two weeks after he had smashed the fastest.

The Namibia allrounder plays franchise cricket all over the world and sees that the future is not fully sustainable

Matt Roller02-Apr-2024″I’m a bit of a mercenary,” David Wiese concedes in the first episode of his new podcast, . In the past 18 months, he has played for – deep breath – St Lucia Kings, Deccan Gladiators, Gulf Giants, Lahore Qalandars, Kolkata Knight Riders, Yorkshire Vikings, MI New York, Northern Superchargers, Joburg Super Kings and the Titans, as well as his second international team, Namibia.If you have ever mindlessly flicked on some T20, you have probably spotted Wiese. He is hard to miss: nearly two metres tall, wearing a top-knot and with a compression sleeve that covers his tattoos. He turns 39 in May and has no shame admitting that he is cashing in while his body allows him to. “If you’re not realistic about it, then you’re only bluffing yourself,” he tells ESPNcricinfo from his home in Pretoria.The podcast comprises regular chats between Wiese and presenter Sam Keir across last year when Wiese’s calendar was busier than ever. “People always have the perception that franchise cricket is all glitz and glamour, especially with the IPL,” he says. “But there is another side of it, the human side of it, being away from your family, not performing, and the pressures that come with playing franchise cricket.”People don’t know what goes on behind the scenes. The whole franchise league system can become a lonely place when things aren’t going well for you. Effectively, every single tournament is an audition for the next tournament. You have one, maybe two bad tournaments, and you’re gone. There’s nothing left for you to do. You’re basically retired.”Related

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Wiese could never have predicted the path that his career has taken. When he made his first-class debut in 2005, he was an internal auditing student at the University of Pretoria; England’s Twenty20 Cup was in its infancy, and there was no IPL or T20 World Cup. “I never really put that much pressure on myself,” he says. “It’s always been about the love of the game.”But that was tested at times last year, not least when leaving his young family at home. “My kids are four and two. South Africa’s not like the UK, where if you take them out of school, you get fined, so they did come away with me quite a bit last year – but it does still get tough. I’ve missed my eldest daughter’s birthday for the last three years; my wedding anniversary is almost non-existent.”I think if I’d had kids a little bit younger in my career, I probably wouldn’t still be doing this,” Wiese admits. “As they get older, it does get more difficult. My eldest daughter thinks that if she doesn’t say goodbye to me, I’m not going to leave, so she just refuses to say goodbye. Those are the small things that are tough – but they’ll also understand that it’s so I can set things up for their future.”He is considering a future in coaching, which he hopes will allow him to flip his work-life balance on its head. “I’m not delusional: I’ve probably only got one or two years left in me. If I can maximise that, it’ll mean being away from the family a little bit, but then I’ll be able to retire when my daughters are six and four and spend nine months of the year surrounded by family.”ESPNcricinfo LtdWhen he signed a Kolpak deal with Sussex in 2017, Wiese expected to spend the rest of his career playing all formats in county cricket. But when the UK left the European Union in early 2020, he became an overseas player rather than a local in county cricket, pushing him towards the T20 circuit and effectively ending his first-class career.Namibia, for whom he qualifies through his father, gave him a second international career in 2021 and have allowed him to take control of his schedule. He will play for them in a third successive T20 World Cup in June, where they will face Australia, England, Oman and Scotland in the initial group stage. “Since the opportunity first came up, Namibia have always been high on my agenda,” he says.”They actually gave me a platform again. Even though I was playing in the PSL, the CPL and other tournaments, I hadn’t been picked up in the IPL since 2016. I’d like to think that maybe having more exposure at the T20 World Cup playing for Namibia – we made the Super 12 stage [in 2021] and did well against the bigger teams – was the reason why I was picked up again last year [by Kolkata Knight Riders].”Wiese has been a beneficiary of the franchise boom, which has presented him and many other players with countless lucrative opportunities to play around the world, but he holds some reservations about the sport’s messy, unregulated landscape. “There are certain teams that dictate their own rules, bend things to suit them, and people just accept it and move on,” he says.Namibia’s run in the 2021 T20 World Cup, where they won three matches and qualified for the Super 12, possibly had a hand in Wiese making a comeback in the IPL for the first time since 2016•Francois Nel/Getty Images”There’s not one standard. There are leagues that let teams have six overseas players, some leagues have five, some four. If you can get to the stage where you kind of have an MoU [Memorandum of Understanding] that is standard across everything, that would help with it not being so confusing and guys not taking advantage of the system.”But until that happens… it’s a difficult one, because every single franchise tournament is governed by a different board and they can kind of do whatever they want to. If they want to change things to suit certain people, or if they want to do things to maximise their profits, you can’t stop that. They essentially own the league, right?”In February, Wiese’s Joburg Super Kings were knocked out of the SA20 in the second qualifier; days later, some of his team-mates were playing in the ILT20 or the Bangladesh Premier League. “I had opportunities that I turned down,” he says. “It doesn’t sit right, hoping you get knocked out of one tournament and then you can go to another. Whether the ICC can step in and try to regulate it, so that if you sign for one league you can’t play for another league that coincides with it, I don’t know… you’re opening yourself up to restraint of trade.Wiese suggests teams could consider incentivising the playoffs.”At this stage, you’ve got your contract, which you can divide across ten games, but if you make the playoffs, you’re just dividing it by 11 or 12 games; you actually get paid per game by making the finals… if you make the playoffs, the only way you’re actually going to get extra money out of it is by winning the tournament and [getting] the prize money.”The whole franchise league system can become a lonely place when things aren’t going well for you. You have one, maybe two bad tournaments, and you’re basically retired”•Getty Images”You can understand why guys would say, ‘Well, if we get knocked out early in this tournament, I can go somewhere else and make an extra $20,000-30,000 out of another tournament.’ And that is a true mercenary, right there. You’ll see it happening more often now, with teams owning more than one team in different leagues. You can’t stop it, unless you regulate by saying guys have to at least be there for a certain amount of round-robin games before they can play in the playoffs. It’s something they’re going to have to address at some stage.”It is rare to hear an active player nibbling – if not quite biting – the hand that feeds them. “Do you want to be the guy that stands up and says something and then tarnishes your reputation? You’ve got agents and players associations, and they’re the guys who should sort all those things out. If you go in and ruffle feathers somewhere, it might just cost you in the long run. It’s always been a case of keep your head down, do your job and you’ll get your rewards.”Wiese is not alone in having heard rumours about the prospect of a franchise league starting in Saudi Arabia, which he believes would be “a game-changer” for players. “We know what Saudi leagues have done for other sports and if they get involved in cricket, you could see astronomical numbers coming in.”But he is less optimistic about the prospects of other leagues. “I feel like the bubble’s got to burst at some stage. With all due respect, how much revenue can a Canada league bring in? I remember I played one year in the T20 Hong Kong Blitz [in 2018]. That only lasted for one year [the tournament was played for three seasons from 2016 to 2018], and you just don’t see [how they make] money… and I don’t know how much more it can take.”I know a lot of the numbers are not specifically about filling up stadiums. It’s more about viewership and how many ads they can sell. But for me, I feel like the bubble is going to burst at some stage, and there’s only going to be the main tournaments that are going to hold. All of these smaller tournaments, it’s going to be fly-by-night, one or two seasons – then it’s not sustainable.”I don’t know how it’s going to look in ten years, to be honest. It’s getting so condensed. I don’t know if it’s going to get to the stage where they follow football and actually have an international window, then everything else is franchise cricket; so you play your internationals, you’ve got your World Cups, and then everything else is franchise-based.”It might sound like a dystopian prediction – but there are few players more qualified than Wiese to make it.

A long and difficult journey to Ranchi culminated in a memorable first day of Test cricket for the fast bowler

Karthik Krishnaswamy23-Feb-20243:14

Akash Deep: ‘I dedicate this performance to my father’

There was something weirdly familiar about this sight. Something about the bowler’s thinning crown, his energy through the crease, his follow-through. Something about the batter’s harried movements, feet going nowhere, hands going where they shouldn’t. And something about that off stump, sent spinning out of its moorings and bounce-landing halfway to where leg slip might have stood.It was – or was meant to be – the 11th ball of Akash Deep’s Test career. It could have been a ball pulled from a Mohammed Shami highlights reel.The no-ball siren cut short Akash’s celebrations, but he’d have his man soon enough, and the aesthetic appeal of Zak Crawley’s actual dismissal would be on par with that of his near-dismissal. If you’re the kind of cricket fan that prefers the inducker that flicks the off bail out of its groove to the one that punches the off pole in the gut, you might even rank it higher.Related

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Later in the day, Crawley described the feeling of facing Akash: “Skiddy bowler. More pace than what I thought he had. Ran the ball back in with variable bounce. It was tricky as he was getting it to nip. It was tough.”Skiddy. Quicker than you think. Getting it to nip.India began this fourth Test in Ranchi with one change to their combination from the third one in Rajkot, with this skiddy debutant replacing Jasprit Bumrah, their most influential player of the series and their greatest-ever fast bowler by every measure other than longevity.Within the first hour of play, the debutant had cut through England’s top three. He went round the wicket to the left-handed Ben Duckett, and nicked him off with a ball that straightened in the corridor. He went wide of the crease and speared one into the advancing Ollie Pope’s front pad, honing in on the batter’s vulnerability to the inward angle. He bowled Crawley twice.All this happened before he’d completed his sixth over in Test cricket.If it was a giddy rush for the viewer, imagine how it must have felt for Akash, all this coming at him so quickly, with no time for reflection, after he’d traversed such a long and complicated path to get to this place. Poignantly enough, this place, the venue of his Test debut, is located roughly halfway between Sasaram, where he grew up, and Durgapur, where he went to pursue his cricket, covertly at first, defying his parents’ admonishments, and then with a sense of desperate purpose after he lost both his father and his brother in the space of six months.”When you lose two family elders in one year, you don’t have anything left to lose,” Akash said at the end of the day’s play. “This was the thought I left my home with. I have nothing to lose, and everything to gain.”Like Shami, like Mukesh Kumar, Akash is not from Bengal but is very much of it. They’re part of a long tradition of successful cricketing migrants – other prominent examples include Dilip Doshi, Arun Lal and Rohan Gavaskar – but they’ve also sparked off a tradition of their own. They’ve moved to Bengal from the mighty Gangetic states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, and they all bowl nagging lines and nip it around off the seam.Mukesh, capped three times in Tests so far, and Akash were competing for one bowling slot here in Ranchi, and it was Akash India turned to. It didn’t take long to see why. The pitch at the JSCA Stadium had plenty in it for the new ball on day one, with movement and uneven bounce waiting to be extracted from its patchy grass and uneven spread of cracks. Mukesh could have got something out of it too, but Akash is just that little bit quicker and skiddier, and his lines and lengths that little bit likelier to harass the top of the stumps.Akash Deep’s sizzling spell left Zak Crawley castled•BCCIThe side-on replay that confirmed the no-ball to Crawley also revealed a possible source of Akash’s ability to rush batters. At the point where he touched down with his front foot to complete his delivery stride, his right arm had only just begun its final rotation. When bowlers look to gain a yard of pace, one tweak they often make is to change their load-up in order to delay the bowling arm’s rotation and generate greater arm speed – as Andrew Tye explains here. Mitchell Starc, who probably didn’t have to try too hard to bowl fast, is noted for his delayed bowling arm.Akash isn’t a 145kph tearaway, but on Friday showed he can consistently operate in the high 130s and occasionally slip into the low 140s, and do this while hammering away on that awkward, bail-bothering length. That combination of pace, length and skid off the pitch meant he often left batters pinned to the crease. Even the Pope dismissal was, in a weird way, an example of this. Pope walked out of his crease, but Akash’s length and inward movement left him in a position that’s often seen in batters trapped on the crease: front leg braced rather than bent, head falling over to the off side.All of Akash’s wickets could have been Shami wickets, and Akash bowls like he grew up watching and idolising Shami, but this wasn’t exactly the case.”In my childhood I didn’t even know cricket,” he said. “There was no cricket where I come from. I started playing tennis [-ball] cricket in 2007, and began to learn about the game in 2016, when I left home to play cricket. Since then, I have been watching Shami and following him, and [Kagiso] Rabada.”When he figured out what was working for him on this pitch, Akash kept things simple – another echo of Shami. He realised early on that going wider on the crease was the way to go on the day, and he stuck to it.”When I tried 2-3 balls from close to the stumps, there wasn’t much help, and it wasn’t swinging either, after the first three overs,” Akash said. “I started bowling from the edge of the crease, trying to bowl outswing, but it was pitching and seaming in. Everything was coming in.”It was notable how much uncertainty Akash kept causing even though he was moving nearly everything in one direction. It was enough, with the element of uneven bounce thrown into the mix when the ball was hard and new and there was a bit of moisture in the surface, enough for Akash’s first spell in Test cricket to end with figures of 7-0-24-3.As the moisture evaporated and the ball aged and softened, the pitch seemed to become something else entirely, slow and low and hard work for bowlers of all kinds.Akash Deep got cracking on his first day of Test cricket•BCCI”This wicket has always been slow,” Akash said. “There was help for fast bowlers when the ball was hard and new but after lunch when the seam wasn’t very prominent and the wicket had dried up, there was no pace in the surface. And even if it was seaming, the batters were getting inside edges and managing. So the option for us was to keep runs to a minimum. We know England play cricket with a different formula, so if they have made [302] runs in 90 overs, it means that we have bowled in good areas.”Akash’s new-ball efforts have also helped India take seven wickets to go with the control of the scorecard, putting them in a reasonable though by no means secure position at the end of day one. More work remains to be done, but Akash will be more than pleased with a terrific first day in Test cricket.He’ll also reflect on every step of his journey here, and every face that was part of it.”I dedicate this to my father, because it was his dream that his son achieves something in his life,” he said. “I wasn’t able to do anything when he was alive, so I dedicate this performance to him.”

Head coach Jon Lewis challenges his players to dominate the Hundred as T20 World Cup looms

Valkerie Baynes18-Jul-2024After an undefeated home summer, England’s greatest challenge will be keeping the good thing they’ve got going during what head coach Jon Lewis describes as a “tricky” time before launching their T20 World Cup campaign.England won 13 of their 14 fixtures – with a wash-out the only exception – against Pakistan and New Zealand during a home international season which is already over in mid-July, illustrating the volume of cricket on a 2024 international schedule featuring men’s and women’s T20 World Cups.Just as England men begin – they are one match into a Test series against West Indies with Tests against Sri Lanka and two white-ball series with Australia to follow – the women have finished, their only competitive cricket left before the T20 World Cup in Bangladesh in October being the Hundred and a tour of Ireland which is unlikely to feature many, if any, tournament squad members.”My preference would be we get on the plane tomorrow,” Lewis admitted at Lord’s, after his side’s 20-run victory secured a 5-0 sweep of the T20Is against New Zealand on Wednesday. “But we don’t. We’ve got eight weeks between now and then. That’s a tricky period for us to manage.”I’ve just spoken to the players there in the dressing room and talked to them about my desire for them to go out and dominate the Hundred and actually show what brilliant players they are. Having a different captain, a different coach, a different coaching team giving different messages and then trying to make sure that they’re able to continue to do the things that we’ve been working on as well at the same time is really tricky for the players.”Related

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Lewis couldn’t put his finger on exactly what had clicked between England’s sometimes scrappy wins against Pakistan, whom they beat 2-0 and 3-0 in T20s and ODIs respectively, and their more clinical displays against the White Ferns, who also lost the ODI series 3-0.It could be a simple case of eradicating some winter rust and building confidence as individuals and as a team. There has also been marked improvement in consistency among the batting line-up and skill level in the field.England’s world-class spin attack of Sophie Ecclestone, Charlie Dean and Sarah Glenn, the player of the series with eight wickets at an average of 6.87 and economy rate of 4.34, have imposed themselves on the opposition while the seam ranks are starting to see the benefits of Lauren Bell’s remodelled action, Lauren Filer’s growing experience and Freya Kemp’s return from a back injury.Back to playing her allrounder role, Kemp also impressed with the bat, particularly during the pivotal 3rd T20I in Canterbury where she supported fellow teenager Alice Capsey’s unbeaten 67 with an eight-ball cameo of 16 not out as England took an unassailable lead in the closest match of the series.”We’ve batted 360 degrees of the ground during this series and hit boundaries all around the ground and most of our players can access all the areas of the ground, I want that to continue,” Lewis said.”Our fielding has improved. I think New Zealand came over here and when they started this, in the 50-over series, were a better fielding side than us and over the course of the last three or four weeks we’ve really improved our fielding, from probably quite unlikely places, places that you wouldn’t expect.”People like Sarah Glenn for example, when I turned up here, we were hiding her in the field and now she’s making an impact, taking diving catches and diving stops all over the place. That’s someone that really has been able to shift their game forward in the field, but also our athleticism and our physicality is getting better. That happens when you have a group of young players and they’re all developing really fast.”All our bowling attack is pretty much, with the exception of Nat [Sciver-Brunt], 25 and under. We had two teenagers finishing the game off at Canterbury the other day, which it is really exciting. I feel that English cricket is in really safe hands for a long period of time to come.”Legspinner Sarah Glenn was player of the T20I series against New Zealand•PA Photos/Getty ImagesBut Lewis has also noticed a sense of calm and growing confidence within a group that he says is playing more intelligent cricket than before. “The hardest job for now is that the players will leave us for a four-week period and they’ll go into situations that are the same but different and so at times their confidence can go up and it can go down,” he said.”What we hope is we get back a group of players that are as confident as they are now leaving us when they come back to us. That’s not guaranteed. We’re going to have to work really hard when they come back to us to try and rebuild some people, but also to keep some people level and calm.”We know that there’s bigger challenges ahead. The conditions will be the biggest challenge in Bangladesh and understanding how to play those the best. The team that plays the conditions the best over in Bangladesh will win that tournament.”To teach that sense of calm and how to deal with different conditions, Lewis told his squad he was going to try and disrupt them during New Zealand’s visit. England played around with selection, rested experienced players – including captain Heather Knight in Canterbury – and altered batting and bowling roles to keep players on their toes.But for the most part, Lewis believes it was the fear of the unknown that was most valuable. “I just told them there would be distractions: that’s a distraction in itself,” he said with a grin. “They’re waiting, ‘what’s going to happen?’ They’re not sure what’s going to happen, so that creates pressure, it creates anxiety, creates thinking.”I didn’t really do too much to be honest, apart from telling them that. If you sow the seed then people generally overthink things… We got stuck on the bus today. I didn’t plan that. That in itself is a distraction. People were talking about getting off the bus and getting the tube to get here to make sure they can get their practice in before the game.”You just try and raise the level of anxiety within the group to a place where they were able to bring themselves back into a calm place and communicate well with each other and talk their way through situations.”The Hundred, starting on July 23, looms as another distraction. How players navigate it could go some way to informing how England show up for the World Cup.

Tough love, a strong identity and an authentically Pakistani way to play – these are the things on the agenda for Pakistan’s new red-ball coach

Danyal Rasool25-Jul-2024″In Pakistan cricket,” Jason Gillespie, the side’s new Test coach, begins, weighing his words carefully even though what he’s about to say is undeniable, “I know there’s been a lot of change in all facets. Gary [Kirsten, Pakistan’s new white-ball coach] and I both get that. We’ve had some really good conversations and good discussions with the PCB about how we can put structures and systems in place so that while we’re moving in the right direction short term, in the medium and long term, Pakistan cricket is going to be healthier.”Gillespie could scarcely have described the last few years in Pakistan cricket more pithily. Since December 2022, the PCB has had five chairmen. In that period, Saqlain Mushtaq, Grant Bradburn, Mickey Arthur, Mohammad Hafeez and Azhar Mahmood all served as either team director or head coach. Batting and bowling coaches came and went, and half a dozen chief selectors picked at least one squad each.The results in Test cricket have taken the sharpest nose dive; since the start of 2022, Pakistan have won just three and lost eight of 15, with all three wins coming against Sri Lanka. They have not won a home Test in more than three years.Related

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“You want to get systems in place,” Gillespie says. “To get the right players, you need the right people around the organisation, and you need the pathway. That’s when you’re moving forward. It’s very easy when you’re coming into jobs; you’ve got a two-year contract or a one-year contract. You make short-term decisions to look after your own back. But that doesn’t help anyone, because if everyone has that approach, nothing long-term gets done.”Pakistan fans might be excused for sighing wearily at this point. That is no fault of Gillespie’s, of course, but various chairmen and coaches have attempted, with varying degrees of success, to make positive changes to the national team and its infrastructure. Under Ehsan Mani, Pakistan adopted a domestic first-class structure that did away with bloated departmental teams; those sides are now back and Mani is long gone. During Mickey Arthur’s first stint as head coach, he and Steve Rixon successfully transformed Pakistan’s fielding and fitness standards, but the days of Pakistan having suddenly emerged as an elite fielding unit now almost seem illusory.

****

Gillespie is on his way to the National Stadium, in a bulletproof van flanked by an armed police escort, charging through Karachi’s bustling evening traffic. Pakistan Shaheens are to be put through their paces for four days at a training camp in preparation for their (currently ongoing) tour of Darwin, Australia, where they play a pair of practice games against a Bangladesh A side ahead of the Bangladesh senior squad’s visit to Pakistan for two Test matches in August.Gillespie sat contemplatively in the back of the vehicle. He may not have been surprised at the security; he’d been told by fellow Australians who previously worked in Pakistan cricket that he’d be extremely well looked after.His job here is rather different from the ones he quit a year early to accept: a nine-year stint with Adelaide Strikers in the BBL, and four years with the state team, South Australia. That state’s population is over ten times smaller than the city whose roads he now speeds along, the scale and nature of media attention in a single-sport country like Pakistan rendering the two roles barely comparable.6:12

‘I’d ask the players how they want to be seen in the cricket world’

“It was a pretty simple decision in the end,” Gillespie says. We meet at the Marriott, where he is staying. He only got back to Karachi from Lahore in the small hours of the morning, after an unscheduled emergency meeting with PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi necessitated a last-minute hop over to Lahore. Having taken the flight over from Lahore myself the previous day, I note we could have met in Lahore after all. He appreciates making the effort to conduct the interview in person. “It’s so much better than Zoom,” he says.His family was excited when he was offered the role – his kids were “just in wonder”, he says. His 18-year-old son Jackson, a 6’6″ fast bowler for the South Australia Under-19 side and a “mad cricketer”, thought it was brilliant. There was a more measured conversation with his wife and the rest of his family, who are back in Australia. Though Gillespie won’t be in Pakistan full time, the busy upcoming schedule means he will be away from home for long stretches. But his heart was set on this assignment.”Pakistan is an exciting cricket team and has a passionate fan base,” he says. “And this is an opportunity to be involved in international cricket and work with the best players. Having not been on the international circuit for a while since I finished playing, it’s going to be a new experience and a new challenge, which I’m really excited about.”It wasn’t as straightforward a decision for Pakistan, though. Having agonised and deliberated over coaching appointments, they sounded out Shane Watson and Daren Sammy, among others, before finally agreeing terms with Gillespie and Kirsten. This is the first time Pakistan have trialled split-format coaching.Gillespie has never coached an international side full-time before. He’s from the right country, of course – Pakistan’s predilection for Australians in leadership positions is legendary by now. And he has only ever spent extended periods of time with a side – he has never served as a full-time coach of a team for fewer than two seasons; that appears to have shaped his views on how coaching success is defined.According to Gillespie, while infrastructure and coaching diktats are reversible, identity cannot so easily be dispensed with. He suggests England’s mentality shift in white-ball cricket in 2015, and eventually Test cricket with the arrival of Brendon McCullum, are not as dependent on individual talents, and therefore stand a chance of surviving long after their original architects have moved on. While he might in part have the job because Pakistan long for that fabled Australian winning mentality, he wants to find out how to play a style of cricket that is “authentic to Pakistan”.”I’m happy to admit I don’t have the answer to what that is,” he says. “I just got here. I want to engage the players and the coaches around and get as much information as I can. We see other countries around the world and it’s very clear how they want to go about their play. Whether they’re successful or not, at least you know their identity exists.”If being honest is telling a player something they might not want to hear, well, then I’m willing to do that”•AFP via Getty Images”So that’s what I want us to ask – how do you want to play and how does it fit in with our squad and our team – and go from there. Then, if you have buy-in from all the players and if players and coaches and the PCB are on the same page and moving together as one, surely that will give us more chance of having progression and success.”I want both the Pakistan public and the media to be able to watch us play and go, ‘Yes, this is the style of cricket Pakistan are playing.'”The simple example is England. No one’s left in any doubt how England will play. Everyone’s pretty clear how Australia go about their work. That’s all I’m looking for from our team. I think it’s really important that, as a coach, I don’t just come in and say, ‘This is how we are going to play.’ It’s got to come from the players. My role is to support that and how I can help us go about that in the best and most effective way.”Famously his own man in what was viewed as a fiercely tribal Australian team, Gillespie makes no secret of his wish to prioritise identity and style over context-free win-loss records as a catch-all measure for success.He cultivates a wide range of interests that extend beyond the game of cricket, and – as a practising vegan – could just as easily have a nuanced discussion on the ethics of industrial meat and dairy consumption as on the intricacies of what makes a Dukes cricket ball move sideways. It’s a outlook that has marked the course of his coaching career.Gillespie’s stint with Yorkshire remains his biggest success, when he took over a second-division side and coached them to two successive first-division titles, in 2014 and 2015. He was, at the time, a leading candidate for the England head coach job. But even in times of relative famine, like in his recent stint with South Australia – he termed it his “dream job” – where the side finished in the bottom half during each of his four seasons in charge, he feels comfortable he left the team “in a much better place” than he found it.Gillespie coached Yorkshire to two successive County Championship trophies, and was instrumental in their promotion to Division One•Sarah Ansell/Getty ImagesHe takes particular pride in having helped groom elite players for the Australian national side – Travis Head, Alex Carey and Jake Fraser-McGurk were all nurtured at South Australia and have seen their international fortunes soar over the past four years.”We played some really good cricket [at South Australia],” Gillespie says. “Last year we played ten first-class games and had nine results. More results didn’t go our way [three wins, six losses], but if you actually looked at the games, there were some very close contests. There were games within a couple of wickets or a couple of runs. The numbers could have been the exact opposite; it was just those key moments in games. The positives were that we were playing result [oriented] cricket.”While there was disappointment in one sense, there was a lot of pride because we got opportunities at the highest level for some players. I’m not sure you can judge a domestic coach on just the win-losses.”Gillespie feels confident the PCB chairman and the board share his and Kirsten’s vision for the team, and there are already signs of a shift in tone and substance. When told Shaheen Shah Afridi was slated to play the Global T20 in Canada just days before the two-Test match series in Bangladesh started, his response was suggestive: “Is he? Are you sure about that?”A few days later it was announced the PCB had decided against issuing NOCs to Naseem Shah for the Hundred, and to Shaheen, Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan for the GT20. It is a process he admits needs careful navigation, but Gillespie is crystal clear on the primacy of the international side.”Players are centrally contracted and getting compensated really well. We have the right to be able to say, ‘Look, in this situation, we need you to rest or have some downtime to give your body and mind a break, be ready for the next challenge for Pakistan.’In his time with South Australia, Gillespie oversaw the development of future Australia stalwarts like Travis Head•Cricket Australia/Getty Images”We want players to go and play in these leagues and have these great experiences. But if we believe it’s going to be to the detriment of representing Pakistan in an upcoming series, then we’ll have a discussion and have a decision to make.”These are honest and difficult conversations. Ultimately, we’re tasked with doing what’s right by Pakistan cricket.”In times such as these, when the bond between the national team and its supporters appears to be fraying, the idea that the team needs a hard-nosed strongman to control the players with an iron fist often gains traction in Pakistan. And while Arthur, Pakistan’s longest-serving overseas head coach over the past decade, managed to form a particularly close bond with the core of the side, he also possessed a schoolmasterly streak he could always draw on. It played well in front of the television cameras, which appeared to take an almost prurient interest in his emotions when Pakistan were struggling.Gillespie, though, is far removed from that style of coaching, emphasising the need to build relationships that enable tough, honest conversations. “If being honest is telling a player something they might not want to hear, well, then I’m willing to do that. I want to help them be the best player and person they can be.”Gillespie recalls the days he played against Pakistan, and the sense of joy and fun he felt Pakistan took in their cricket. “I remember this training kit the Pakistan boys had. They had all the logos on, and on the back, it said ‘Proud to be Pakistani’. Do you remember those shirts? That stuck in my head. That was 20 years ago! And for me, that really resonated. I thought, ‘That’s cool.'”That pride is how I felt representing my country, putting on that cap and wearing the shirt with the Australian coat of arms. It meant the world to me. Playing for your country is the best thing in the world – it’s awesome.”It’s an honour and a privilege for me to coach Pakistan, and it’s an honour and a privilege for each and every player to represent Pakistan. That for me, is something that’s always stood out. I know when I played against Pakistan, that came through.”

Amid a babble of storylines emerges the narrative of Archer playing his first international game in Barbados

Melinda Farrell04-Jun-2024Yes, this is the start of the defending champions’ campaign. Yes, this is the first time England and Scotland will meet in a T20I. Yes, the last time these two sides met, in an ODI, Scotland humbled England with a six-run victory. Yes, the fact that it was six years ago, when they share a common border, is both astonishing and pretty sad.A babble of storylines demands attention in the Barbados fixture and yet the narrative of Jofra Archer’s first international match in the country where he was born and raised will surely be front and centre at the Kensington Oval.Sport loves personal connections, whether a curious coincidence or deeper links, and a homecoming tale has always captured attention, from Lassie to E.T.Related

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In Archer’s case, the connection is pronounced; a child of Barbados who took England to the top of the world in a Super Over in 2019. A Bajan export who bowled one of Test cricket’s most memorable and thrilling spells in an Ashes series, the contest that looms largest in English cricket lore.His story has been oft told, his English father, his Barbadian mother, his move across the Atlantic after drifting out of the local system, his accelerated rise through the ranks of Sussex to the glories of the summer of 2019.The interest in Archer is not purely inspired by the romance of his tale. It’s always been about what he is rather than where he is from; a sleek and mesmerising human catapult equally capable of felling the best batters in the world or zeroing in on their stumps.For a while, his plot veered into the what-could-have-been genre, as the injuries mounted and kept him off the field for lengthy periods; the elbow stress-fracture chapter of 2020, its recurrence in 2021 along with a bio-bubble breach and a freak fish-tank-cleaning hand injury, the lower-back stress fracture that struck the following year, more elbow woes in 2023.His latest comeback had checkpoints in the two countries that have moulded him: a match-winning performance for the Wildey Club in Barbados in early April followed by a six-over spell in a Sussex second XI match in May. The subsequent series against Pakistan was merely an appetiser; this T20 World Cup 2024 is the highly-anticipated main course.Beach bums: Both Jofra Archer and Chris Jordan were born in Barbados•Getty ImagesBut while the focus has often been on his past, Archer’s future path is far fuzzier. He chose a two-year deal over a three-year central contract. His reasonings remain as enigmatic as the man himself; might he feel his value will increase, as Ben Stokes does? Perhaps, more likely is the suspicion that next summer, with India’s tour of England, and a shot at the Ashes in Australia might prove to be his last Test hurrahs before the troublesome elbow claims him as its victim. A world of lucrative T20 offers awaits. Perhaps Archer already knows where he is heading. Perhaps he doesn’t.Archer’s past and future may be background noise for England’s opening match, but his importance to the present campaign will take the spotlight as soon as he takes the ball. His breathtaking pace and ability to create uncertainty for the batter and break sides apart will be key to England’s chances.Throughout Barbados, there are metaphors for his attributes. The brooding intensity of the oppressive humidity echoes the menace he builds with each delivery. The storms that strike suddenly trigger relief and dismay as sweaty tourists find respite from the clammy heat but have their sunbathing sessions ruined; whether you are overjoyed or disconsolate by an Archer blow depends on which side you’re supporting.The morning traffic that snakes along the azure coastline summons the frustration of those lengthy layoffs; the chill of the locals in dealing with them reflects Archer’s own laid-back demeanour.And one wonders if a young Archer honed his skills at any of the nondescript cricket grounds passed on the way to the Kensington Oval, where he will run in from the top of his mark in England colours for the very first time.The occasion will undoubtedly be poignant for Archer and those who are there to support him; many here still claim him as one of their own. His past will be present but the present is everything in England’s mission.His own future? It remains a mystery.

CSK have won five of the seven matches in which the allrounder has bowled his allotment of overs

Sidharth Monga05-May-20242:15

Jaffer: Jadeja kept piling up pressure from an end

A barometer of how Chennai Super Kings (CSK) are doing in IPL 2024 is Ravindra Jadeja’s performance. More specifically, his bowling. Even more specifically, if he has bowled four overs. Or, rather, if the conditions are suited enough for him to bowl four overs. Jadeja has bowled his allotment seven times out of 12 this IPL. CSK have won five of those matches.With the depth in their squad and with the Impact Player rules, CSK have the luxury of not bowling Jadeja out should the pitch be not helpful or should there be too much dew. Or if there are two left-hand batters around or if he is being attacked. There are always options for such times, but this is also true: CSK have won only one match out of five in which Jadeja hasn’t been able to bowl his four overs.Jadeja is a critical player in this CSK squad. He is not the perfect T20 player, but he does more than enough things right to warrant some protection. CSK don’t bowl him in the powerplay, for example. Then he almost always gets done before the death overs. Similarly, with the bat, if you protect him from spin, he can be brutal against pace at the death. That is a lesson CSK have hopefully learnt after the brief experiment with sending him up at No. 4.Related

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It is with the ball, though, that Jadeja indicates CSK’s health the best, especially from the time the Impact Player came in and bowling Jadeja out stopped being mandatory. ESPNcricinfo’s Shiva Jayaraman has worked out the link between Jadeja’s bowling and CSK’s fortunes even better: since the start of IPL 2023, CSK have won 68.42% of full 20-over matches in which Jadeja has at least started his fourth over; no other bowler bowling out has coincided with such a high percentage of wins.And it is not like Jadeja is called upon to bowl only on turners. He has bowled out in 70.37% of the matches, which is a decent ratio. It is not quite Rashid Khan-R Ashwin territory – they bowl out in 90% of their teams’ matches – but Jadeja still does so more often than Ravi Bishnoi, Piyush Chawla and Mohit Sharma, to name a few frontline bowlers.Take one look at Jadeja’s figures, and you will know why he is so central to CSK’s plans. It is not in taking wickets that Jadeja’s importance lies – he has taken only eight of them this year, but has gone at just 7.26 an over. On four separate occasions this IPL, he has bowled his four overs for less than a run a ball. You can adjust that economy rate for the absence of powerplay and death overs, but at a time when even the middle overs are being targeted, a banker of a bowler in seven out of ten matches is a luxury.1:32

Jaffer: Punjab’s batters messed up big time

To not let Jadeja bowl is precisely why Prabhsimran Singh and Shashank Singh took risks against him early on. They had staged a comeback from the two early wickets, were going at a decent rate, were not chasing a huge total; they could have taken a moment once the field spread, but they knew the pitfalls of letting Jadeja settle. Shashank took a massive swipe at the first ball Jadeja bowled, and was lucky to survive. At the end of the over, Prabhsimran gave away his stumps and took a risk to score a boundary.Jadeja, though, kept plugging away: turn the ball hard, attack the stumps, don’t bowl half-volleys or long hops. When Prabhsimran tried the inside-out drive the second time, he ended up hitting Jadeja straight to long-on. By now, Jadeja was hurrying the batters and the asking rate was jumping big time with every dot and single. Wickets are incidental in this format, but they came today, to go with his runs and earning him the Player-of-the-Match award.With the bat, Jadeja is back in the lower-middle order, which is more suited to him. He had to come in early thanks to a Rahul Chahar double-strike, but Punjab Kings (PBKS) perhaps missed a trick there by not bowling an extra over of spin at Jadeja. They were perhaps looking to save Chahar for later when MS Dhoni would be batting, but as a result, Jadeja faced only three balls of spin early on in his innings. By the time Chahar came back, Jadeja was set.If you are a CSK opponent and there is no dew, try to keep a left-hand batter in the middle overs if you can. Try to take Jadeja down early but it might not always come off. But do just try to push CSK to try other bowlers in the middle overs because if you let Jadeja run through the middle overs, he ends up creating enough impact to help CSK win.

Instant gratification is all that matters to success-starved team, as spinners seal first win in seven

Danyal Rasool18-Oct-2024The food in Pakistani press boxes can vary, both in cuisine and quality, but as the media lined up after lunch on the first day, it was clear a dessert popularity contest would be rather one-sided. One journalist piled his plate high with , ping-pong ball-sized impossibly sweet milk and dough balls, before contentedly sitting down at the nearest table. Pakistan is the land of the sugar hit.Looking across the glass window and onto the field, Pakistan cricket had decided they wanted in on the action, too. Sticking to a long-term plan, putting themselves through pain, never quite knowing if their goals would be realised had begun to take its toll. Pakistan had lost six Test matches in a row, and the benefits of consistency in selection and a long-term plan appeared increasingly illusory. They had slipped to the bottom of the World Test Championship table, and their impassioned supporters were merely feeding off scraps. They didn’t need a lecture on caloric restriction; they wanted a session of comfort eating.And so they delivered (Pakistan’s version). They had the ingredients already in the pantry for whatever they were trying to rustle up, even if they had to recycle and reheat. The pitch had already been prepared, with four-and-a-half days of cricket under its belt. The spinners had been assumed to be past their sell-by date, but they’d had a look at the packaging, and they were just about usable. Pakistan would need to go shopping again, soon, but crucially, not today.Related

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It was time to start cooking. They glanced at the time; it was already getting a bit late. No one quite knows what time the gas supply cuts out in Pakistan these days; the only surefire way to know is to turn the knob and see what happens. They flipped that coin; it landed correctly, and the stove burned up. Pakistan knew much of their work was already done.Perhaps it’s churlish to belittle the rest of the game at the expense of that moment, but even captain Shan Masood acknowledged the value of that toss. It was the moment they were handed the key to unlock a style of play they had deliberately locked away, almost because they believed it was somehow morally wrong to win a game this way. They had spent the last year looking for success in a manner they felt did justice to the legacy of their charismatic fast-bowling forebears. They invested in young quicks Shaheen Afridi and Naseem Shah and their perfect hairlines, while older, balding spinners sat willing to do the job at a fraction of the price.In football, such pragmatism has made devoted heroes out of Jose Mourinho and Thomas Tuchel, whose laser focus on results override any concessions to style. Pakistan, particularly in its current, dysfunctional set-up should theoretically make the strongest case for a similar approach, if perhaps at Sam Allardyce or Sean Dyche’s level instead. Most journalists in this country have, after all, rolled their eyes as they sit through the unveiling of the latest chairman or coach as they talk about their long-term vision, and the structural long-term changes they are going to make, knowing they’ll be sitting there in a few months or years hearing the same talking points from another recycled face. None of those grand plans will come to fruition, and any progress made will be discarded as the loop repeats.The day four pitch in Multan … on day nine, if truth be told•Getty ImagesIn a brief moment of lucidity last week, this is an epiphany the PCB seems to have had. Masood had gone 0 in 6, and his job was under threat. The captain and the coach, having talked up consistency in selection, were omitted from the selection committee altogether. A new selection committee, one that took the selector count over the last three years to 26, had just been announced. Some of the players they had invested in over the Test summer weren’t that keen to play, others needed a rest for their own sake. Pakistan didn’t need a long-term plan; they needed a win.The culmination of no long-term plan is 20 wickets for two spinners who haven’t held a red-ball since January. This Test – that final innings in particular – tells us no more or less than we already knew about Masood’s captaincy. There were no bowling changes at all, and fielding changes were generally limited to switches for a left-handed batter, or the addition of an extra fielder to a close catching position. No one quite knows what Pakistan are thinking of come December when they go to South Africa; indeed Masood already understood what they’d just managed would be difficult enough to replicate as early as Rawalpindi next week.But the selectors have already arrived in Rawalpindi; the curators were there a few days earlier to work out a bespoke plan for a ground that has never traditionally taken spin. The cricket team finally appears to be on the same page as everyone within the cricket board, entirely focused on surviving the next day, and worrying about the distant future later.As the morning unfolded, it became immediately clear the 297 England needed to win was academic. Sajid and Noman romped through an opposition with a ruthlessness Pakistan had believed they were no longer unable to muster. A warm, fuzzy feeling spread around the sparsely populated ground. With every ball threatening, many in the press boxes got carried away, exclaiming “out!” every time a ball hit a pad or whizzed past an edge. When Ben Stokes danced down to Noman, losing control of his bat as it flew high behind fine leg, there were delighted cackles.When Noman got Shoaib Bashir to take his eighth and finally complete the web Pakistan had spun around England, several loudly applauded, and had to be sternly shushed by the others.Perhaps it was the.

Vote for the best individual Border-Gavaskar Trophy performance by an Indian in Australia since 2000

ESPNcricinfo staff21-Oct-2024Update: This poll has ended. Cheteshwar Pujara’s performance goes into the quarter-finals. Check the other polls here.ESPNcricinfo LtdCheteshwar Pujara was the rock Australia could not budge in Adelaide•Getty Images and Cricket Australia

Cheteshwar Pujara – 123 and 71 in Adelaide, 2018

India won by 31 runs, lead series 1-0Mitchell Starc was swinging the ball again. At 145 kph. Some of the quickest bowling ever seen in Australia in 2018 had India 127 for 6 on the first day of a long tour. But it still wasn’t enough to dislodge Cheteshwar Pujara. It barely even made a dent. In an age where batting is nothing if it doesn’t look sexy, one man stood up to show the world that “when you defend confidently you know you are in command, you are on top of the bowler, and he doesn’t have a chance to get you out.”Pujara batted for more than six hours to contribute 123 to India’s first-innings total of 250 in Adelaide. He then wore Australia down for nearly another five hours in the second innings; his 71 putting India on course to set a target of over 300. They won by 31 runs, and went on to take the series 2-1, their first ever triumph on Australian soil.
By Alagappan MuthuWatch the highlights of these performances on the Star Sports network at 10am, 1pm, 4pm and 7pm IST, from October 22 onwards.Shardul Thakur delivered with runs and wickets to keep India in the Brisbane Test•Getty Images and Cricket Australia

Shardul Thakur – 67, 3-94 & 4-61 in Brisbane, 2021

India win by three wickets & win series 2-1Shardul Thakur had played one Test match before Brisbane 2021, but he may as well have not played that game, with a groin strain restricting him to delivering just 10 balls against West Indies in Hyderabad in 2018. Thakur wasn’t part of India’s original squad in Australia, and it’s hard to say exactly where he stood in their pecking order of bowlers, because when he did get his chance at the Gabba, India were without their entire first-choice attack: over the course of the tour, injury had ruled out Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja.Miraculously, the series was still alive at 1-1. And miraculously, an India XI that included Thakur and five players who made their debuts on this tour kept trading punches with Australia’s first-choice star cast. Thakur was in the middle of it all, with ball and bat. First, he picked up three wickets with his outswing and attacking lengths to help restrict Australia to 369 in their first innings. Then he walked in with India 186 for 6, and hooked Pat Cummins for six off his third ball to score his first runs in Test cricket. The shots kept flowing in an audacious 123-run stand with Washington Sundar, as India narrowed Australia’s lead to a mere 33 runs.Then India kept finding a breakthrough every time Australia threatened to pull too far from their reach in the second innings. Thakur was in the middle of it all again, getting the ball to kick awkwardly from just short of a length to pick up four wickets. All this left India with 328 to get, 324 of them on day five. All they needed now, after four miraculous days, was one final miracle.By Karthik Krishnaswamy

In the four Tests played at this stadium, the offspinner has outperformed his fast-bowling team-mates

Alex Malcolm20-Nov-20244:38

Australia SWOT analysis: Formidable attack, but top-order questions

Every overseas batter that plays in Perth prepares for the same threat. Fast bowlers steaming in at them. The extra pace. The steep bounce. The keeper standing a mile behind them. The ball flying past their chest and thudding into his gloves above his head. Three slips and a gully also halfway to the fence. A short leg breathing into their ribcage.They spend days in the equally quick nets out the back of Perth Stadium facing fast bowling. Getting used to fuller length balls flying past the shoulder of the bat. Getting bombarded with short-pitched throwdowns.It causes nightmares for some players. Even Travis Head admits this surface makes him uncomfortable at times. He was clocked on the helmet at training on Wednesday during a barrage of short-pitched throwdowns from Australia coach Andrew McDonald.Related

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But the leading threat in four Tests played at this venue is not Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins or Josh Hazlewood.It is Nathan Lyon. Australia’s offspinner has more wickets here (27) at a better average (18.00) with more five-wicket hauls (2) than any of his fast-bowling colleagues.It seems counterintuitive, but Lyon’s record in Perth is remarkable. Opponents prepare fastidiously for the fast-bowling exam and end up flunking the spin-bowling questions.The reasons for Lyon’s success are obvious. His stock offspinner has more overspin and creates steeper bounce than anyone else’s in world cricket. That ball, combined with relentless accuracy, on this Perth pitch is a problem not many players have solved.”It’s a place I love bowling,” Lyon said last month. “There’s some nice bounce, nice pace and with the breeze there as well you are able to get the ball with a little bit of drift. All the usual stuff but I just thoroughly enjoy playing cricket there.”Lyon’s success in Australia overall compared to his spin-bowling contemporaries is also extraordinary. Australia has been a graveyard for spinners over the years, especially conventional finger spinners.Nathan Lyon ‘can’t wait for this summer to start’•Getty ImagesThe gap between Lyon and R Ashwin’s bowling averages in Australia is larger than the inverse gap between their respective records in India.But when you isolate the last two Border-Gavaskar series in Australia, the picture is very different. India’s spinners, including Ashwin, have out-performed Lyon. He has averaged 37.83 per wicket compared to 30.88 across his career at home.It has been a big part of India’s two series victories in Australia. India’s batters have played Lyon better than Australia’s batters have played Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja and Kuldeep Yadav. They have actually used his consistency against him and heaped more pressure on Australia’s quicks as a result.And while India’s batters might be fearful of the pace barrage they are about to receive down under, especially given their recent form, the way they plan for Lyon might be a pivotal part of the series once more. His battles with Virat Kohli have been riveting down the years.”I’ve got nothing but respect for Virat,” Lyon said on Monday. “I want to get him out. There’s no point in hiding behind that. But it’s challenging. Him and Smithy [Steven Smith] are the two guys, if you ask me, they’re probably the best two batters of this last decade. So it’s been pretty amazing competing against him so many times, and I’m looking forward to the challenge over the next five Test matches.”But the match-up with India’s two main left-handers’ looms as the most fascinating in this series. One is a known quantity in Rishabh Pant and Lyon knows what he’s in for.”He’s an incredible player, isn’t he,” Lyon said. “Am I expecting him to try and hit me for six every ball? Yeah. That’s what I love. That’s a big challenge but it’s what I thrive on.”The other is an unknown. Lyon has never bowled to Yashasvi Jaiswal. Australia’s Test quicks have at least seen him in the IPL.Nathan Lyon gained some intel on bowling to India from Tom Hartley during his County stint•Getty ImagesLyon has turned to an unlikely source for some reconnaissance. Lyon spent the first half of the winter playing county cricket with Lancashire. It was an eight-game stint that was unpopular with the England team and their coach Brendon McCullum because England left-arm spinner Tom Hartley, fresh off a promising tour of India, only played three games in the first half of Lancashire’s season and hardly bowled in two of them while playing alongside Australia’s offspinner.Lyon, though, found the experience incredibly fruitful, which will only add to McCullum’s frustrations. He mined Hartley for every piece of detail he could give on bowling to Jaiswal and India’s batters earlier this year in India.”I know that those guys are attacking and talking to Tommy Hartley was really brilliant insight,” Lyon said.”I wasn’t there. I didn’t watch every ball but talking to Tommy in the nets about not just Jaiswal but the whole team, just getting the understanding on how they played him even though he’s a different finger spinner, I feel like there’s so much for me to learn as well.”It’s going to be a massive challenge, but you want to play against best players in the world don’t you, and you want to go up against that challenge. So that’s what I’m pretty excited about and I can’t wait for this summer to start. I’m sick of talking about it.”