Latest news with #Lord's
Hindustan Times
8 hours ago
- Sport
- Hindustan Times
Nasser Hussain laughs at Shubman Gill's ‘90 seconds late' barb at England, gets mouth-shutting reply from Dinesh Karthik
The build-up to the Manchester Test between India and England was cracking, to say the least. On the eve of the fourth Test of the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy, India captain Shubman Gill cleared the air regarding the verbal spat with England openers Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett on Day 3 of the Lord's game, saying the hosts were "90 seconds late" in arriving at the crease. Shubman Gill's comments were brought up in discussion during the first day of the Manchester Test as Nasser Hussain and Dinesh Karthik had their say on the matter. Dinesh Karthik's smashing response after Nasser Hussain laughs off Shubman Gill's '90 seconds late' barb Right before the close of play on Day 1 of the fourth Test, India batters Ravindra Jadeja and Shardul Thakur were seen hesitant to continue batting as the light went bad and floodlights had to be turned on at Old Trafford. Jadeja even approached the on-field umpires Ahsan Raza and Rod Tucker. It was then that Hussain brought up Shubman Gill's comments in the press conference, saying it 'made him laugh' as every team around the world is guilty of time wasting. However, he got a smashing response from Dinesh Karthik as the latter said Gill did not have a problem with England openers wasting time in the middle, but rather he had an issue with them arriving 90 seconds late at the crease. Speaking of the controversy, England openers Crawley and Duckett ensured India don't get a second over in right before stumps on Day 3 of the Lord's Test, leading to India captain Shubman Gill hurling a mouthful. He then explained his actions in the press conference, saying, 'Yes, most of the teams use this tactic. Even if we were in a position, we would've also liked to play fewer overs, but there's a manner to do it.' Also Read: Shubman Gill shown no mercy, gets booed by Manchester crowd; Stokes exacts perfect revenge 'And we felt, yes, if you get hit on your body, the physios are allowed to come on, and that is something that is fair. But to be able to come 90 seconds late on the crease is not something that I would think comes in the spirit of the game,' he added. Shubman Gill's reaction has generated polarising reactions, and hence it is no surprise that even Nasser Hussain and Dinesh Karthik discussed the topic during commentary for Sky Sports on Day 1 of the Manchester Test. Here is the entire exchange between Nasser Hussain and Dinesh Karthik Nasser Hussain: The umpires were concerned about the light, I think, in the last over. I haven't seen any light metres out there. Dinesh Karthik: I think that's quite clever, that's fine, to just go and put that small little seed in the umpire's mind. Is it okay to, like, especially with the new ball around the corner, and we've seen a couple of collapses for India as well. And that's cheeky. Not a bad idea. Nasser Hussain: That's what made me laugh about Shubham Gill's press conference, really, about England not being in the spirit of the game by delaying things, and England did delay it. Day three, that one over, it was ridiculous, but every side does it, and India will do it tonight. Why would they want extra overs of Jofra Archer under the lights? Who would? Dinesh Karthik: Difference being, I don't think India can take 90 seconds not wanting to bat, or rather not wanting to come down to bat. I think that's the problem that Shubham Gill said he had. It was just the fact that they came late to take the strike, that he had a problem with.
Times
15 hours ago
- Sport
- Times
Rishabh Pant injury and late Ben Stokes strike pull England back into Test
Rishabh Pant is a cricketer who, on any given day, gets tongues wagging. In this series he has scored twin hundreds; has cartwheeled in celebration; has thrown his bat skywards when attempting a slog over the leg side; was run out at a critical juncture of the Lord's Test and here in Manchester his role was of the walk-on, carried-off variety only, but still of central importance given what happened. Having made 37, Pant was in the process of gaining control for India during the final session in partnership with the willowy left-hander Sai Sudharsan. The usual whacky combination of dutiful defence and outrageous stroke play — with not much in between — had been fully in evidence when, attempting a reverse-sweep to Chris Woakes in the 68th over, he took a full toss on the outstep of his right foot and was forced to retire hurt.
The Guardian
18 hours ago
- Sport
- The Guardian
Rishabh Pant's broken foot trips up India's solid start against England in fourth Test
After the row about time-wasting at Lord's came an unscheduled 10-minute delay on the opening day in Manchester, but this time no one was grumbling. Rishabh Pant was being driven off on a golf buggy nursing a suspected broken foot, the agony on his face as clear as the egg that had swollen up within seconds. This was a very Pant way to get injured, India's zany wicketkeeper having attempted a reverse sweep off Chris Woakes only to bottom-edge the ball on to his right boot. England burned a review for the lbw but it was as good as a wicket, Pant retiring on 37 and his further participation in this pivotal fourth Test left very much in doubt. It was the moment that changed the complexion of a hard-fought day or at the very least eased it from an English perspective. Ben Stokes had won his fourth toss in row, seen India graft their way to 212 for three, only for the touring side to reach 264 for four (potentially five) from 82 overs when bad light brought an early close. As has become an encouraging feature of this summer, Stokes was in the thick of it with the ball in hand. Having wiped out Shubman Gill in the afternoon – lbw for 12 offering no shot after arriving to a chorus of boos – England's captain followed it up with the removal of Sai Sudharsan for a well-crafted 61. There was a wicket for Liam Dawson on his Test comeback, Yashasvi Jaiswal caught at slip for 58, while Chris Woakes struck first after lunch to dismiss KL Rahul for 46. But bar that nasty blow to Pant, it was India who arguably felt the more buoyant of the two sides when a grey day in Manchester came to its early conclusion. This report will update shortly
New York Times
a day ago
- Sport
- New York Times
Meet cricket's ‘bunnies' and ‘ferrets', who have the worst job in sport
It was one of those passages of play that only cricket can provide: bowlers being asked to win a Test match with their batting. It was the final day at Lord's last week and the third Test between England and India was on the line. At one end was the tourists' Ravindra Jadeja, a 'proper' batter who took the bulk of the England bowling and attempted to score the majority of the runs as they chased a target of 193. Advertisement At the other end were a succession of 'tailenders' — the bowlers trying simply to stay in and help Jadeja inch India towards victory. Nitish Kumar Reddy, the No 9, scored 13 and faced 53 balls; No 10 Jasprit Bumrah faced 54 balls, making five; and finally No 11 Mohammed Siraj managed to keep out 30 balls and score four before he, too, fell with India still 22 runs short. It feels like perhaps the worst job in sport. There aren't too many other examples of professional sportspeople being made to do something they are simply not cut out for in their chosen discipline. Yet there is also a strange thrill in seeing a 'rabbit' — cricket parlance for a batsman so poor that bowlers want to quickly send them back to their 'hutch' — trying to fend off the best bowling an opposition can muster. Or two rabbits in the case of England's Monty Panesar and Jimmy Anderson, who contrived to deny Australia what looked like certain victory in the first 2009 Ashes Test at Cardiff with an unbeaten last-wicket stand of 19 that, more importantly, chewed up 69 balls. 'I never thought we would save the game,' Panesar tells The Athletic. 'I thought at any given moment I would just get out, Australia would win the Test match, and we'd go home. 'We just took it ball by ball. We didn't really think about the draw. We just thought, 'Let's see how long we can keep them out here' and eventually we'll get out. But it just didn't happen and we ended up staying out there much longer than we thought.' Panesar and Anderson stayed so long that Australia were driven to distraction, with captain Ricky Ponting raging at England's repeated use of a physiotherapist as the clock ticked down to the close of play. That only added to the glee of the home crowd, with the momentum generated in Wales fuelling England's 2-1 series win. 'It gave people so much joy,' says Panesar. 'It is still talked about as one of the iconic moments in English cricket. At the time, I didn't appreciate how big it was, but I've come to realise how much of an impact it made. Particularly as I wasn't known for my batting. People said, 'Oh my God, Monty has pulled off the impossible when he can't even bat'. Advertisement 'It's not even so much about the result. It's about things like temperament, patience, self-belief, character and resilience. That's what we had to show in Cardiff and we just took it step by step.' Some of the best bowlers can take inspiration from a moment of batting defiance or even inadequacy. England's Devon Malcolm produced one of the great spells of fast bowling against South Africa at the Oval in 1994, taking nine for 57 after he was riled into action by an incident when the tailender was batting. 'In the first innings, I'd bowled a bouncer at Jonty Rhodes and hit him on the head, so when I came in, the South Africans were encouraging their bowler Fanie de Villiers to give it back to me,' Malcolm tells The Athletic. 'I thought it was a bluff and he would bowl me a yorker, but it was no bluff and he hit me on the head with the fiercest bouncer I'd ever faced. It hit my helmet right on the three Lions. 'It caught me by massive surprise. In those days, there was a bit of an unwritten rule that bowlers didn't bowl bouncers at fellow fast bowlers and in return, you didn't smack them to the fence. But this was different.' It led to one of the great lines in cricket history, with South Africa's Gary Kirsten subsequently claiming that Malcolm told the South African fielders, 'You guys are history,' before going out and destroying them. Or did he? 'I just said, 'You shouldn't have done that. If you want to see what fast bowling is all about, wait until you come in again',' Malcolm says. 'Then what happened was a perfect storm. I just felt in the zone from the start. Every nick was taken, every lbw was given, and I just got on a roll. All started by being hit when I batted.' If Panesar and Malcolm were rabbits, then some tail-end batters can be classified as 'ferrets' — because they go in after the rabbits. The ultimate ferret was New Zealand's Chris Martin, who belongs to a select group of cricketers who have taken more Test wickets (233) than he has scored runs (123). Advertisement Martin is rightly remembered as one of New Zealand's best seam bowlers, but he is celebrated just as much for tail-end batting that saw him fail to score a run in Test cricket for more than four years between December 2000 and March 2004 and hold the record for the most 'pairs' (two scores of nought in the same match) in Test history, with seven. He is also the only batter in Test cricket to be twice dismissed for a diamond duck (run out without facing a ball). 'I never had any real ability with the bat,' Martin tells The Athletic with no exaggeration. 'That hand-eye co-ordination thing for me was mainly around being able to run in and bowl a cricket ball pretty fast. Not so much hit one that's moving fast. 'I tried to work on it without really succeeding and it does become a bit of a mental block after a while. You realise you are there to support your partner and they generally play a few shots when you get there, so that was the entertaining bit for me, seeing someone else have a crack while watching from the other end. Not that Martin, who even had the nickname 'The Walking Wicket', enjoyed his fate. 'I wish I could have thrown the willow, I really do,' he says. 'I think it would have been a lot more fun. I definitely practised like that at times to see what I could do, but making a decision quickly, trusting it and getting everything biomechanically right in that split second was something I could only watch and admire in others rather than do myself. 'As far as standing there and facing a Mitchell Johnson, Shoaib Akhtar, Brett Lee or Dale Steyn, of course there was a bit of fear. I don't think in my everyday life I will ever get that feeling again. It's relatively addictive because you don't often get that situation where you have to make certain decisions to make sure you're not going to get your arm or ribs broken or you're going to get hit on the head. I was OK in getting out of the way of it, it was just defending my stumps that was the problem.' Martin smiles at the realisation he is remembered just as much 12 years after his last Test for what he could not do with the bat as what he could do with the ball. Advertisement 'The crowd always cheered whenever I got a run and at times that was the loudest cheer of the day,' he says. 'But you had to enjoy people rooting for you in that way because perhaps they were seeing a bit of themselves in you. 'You're struggling and they're trying to imagine what it would be like to be out there with pads on and a bat in their hands. New Zealanders like a bit of irony and we tend to celebrate someone who's out there struggling. It was always me, unfortunately.' Mark Robinson was an English equivalent of Martin, once setting a world record of 12 first-class noughts in a row and ending the 1990 season with Northants with three runs in 16 innings. But he was a good enough seam bowler to take 584 wickets for Northants, Yorkshire and Sussex before embarking on a stellar career in coaching. 'I was proud and I was brave,' Robinson tells The Athletic. 'I'd fight my corner, but it was frustrating when I got ridiculed for my batting. What was interesting was when I went to Sussex towards the end of my career, I got a lot more help with my batting and I ended up being nightwatchman (the tailender tasked with going in at the end of a day's play to protect the established batter). 'I did OK and it just shows that if you invest in people, give them a game plan and some confidence, they can achieve more. But there were plenty of times when I thought I was in an unequal battle.' That greater help tailenders receive with their batting in a far more professional era means that the rabbit — and certainly the ferret — is in danger of extinction. The England team under Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum even did away with the nightwatchman when they launched their Bazball era. Instead, they dispatched 'Nighthawks', where hard-hitting but limited batters such as Stuart Broad and Rehan Ahmed would try to score quickly at the end of a day to disrupt the opposition. Advertisement Now the team reflect the modern game where there are few genuine No 11s and will go into the fourth Test against India on Wednesday with a tail so strong that Brydon Carse, who made a half-century in the last match at Lord's, will be at No 10, and Jofra Archer, another bowler with decent ability with the bat, will be at 11. 'It is nice looking at the team sheet and knowing you bat all the way to the end,' said Stokes at Old Trafford. 'You don't pick your team thinking about having a strong No 11, but we are blessed with some very good all-round cricketers.' Malcolm would have welcomed that level of support. 'I genuinely loved my batting, but it was made clear to me I was there to bowl,' he says of his time in the England team. And Robinson admits he would not have put up with a batter like himself in a coaching career that saw him lead Sussex and Warwickshire to the County Championship title and England women to the 2017 World Cup. 'There are far fewer rabbits in the game now because you're not allowed to be one,' says Robinson. 'As a head coach, I refused to have anyone like that. The game now demands that you can't just be a walking wicket, you have to fight your corner and put time into it.' As Bumrah and Siraj showed at Lord's, there is still room for tail-end resistance against a far superior bowling opponent. And Test cricket is a richer game for it. Click here to read more cricket stories on The Athletic, and follow Global Sports on The Athletic app via the Discover tab.
News.com.au
2 days ago
- Sport
- News.com.au
Shubman Gill accuses England of ignoring the spirit of cricket at Lord's with time wasting tactics
India captain Shubman Gill accused England of ignoring the 'spirit of cricket' after the hosts' time-wasting tactics in the third Test at Lord's sparked an angry flare-up between the teams. The tourists ought to have been able to bowl two overs late on the third day's play of the third Test after being dismissed for 387 -- exactly level with England's first-innings total. Crawley, however, ensured there were only six deliveries from Jasprit Bumrah before stumps by twice withdrawing from his stance and then calling for the physio after the fifth ball appeared to make only minimal contact with his glove. Passions flared as it became evident India would not be able to bowl another over before the close, with host broadcaster Sky Sports issuing an on-air apology after a stump microphone picked up Gill swearing angrily at Crawley. England went on to win a thrilling, if increasingly ill-tempered, match by 22 runs to go 2-1 up in the five-match series. Gill, in his first campaign as India captain, addressed the issue on the eve of the fourth Test at Old Trafford. 'A lot of people have been talking about it so let me just clear the air once and for all,' the 25-year-old said on Tuesday. 'The English batsmen on that day had seven minutes of play left, they were 90 seconds late to come to the crease, not 10, not 20, 90 seconds late. 'Yes, most of the teams use this (delaying tactic). Even if we were in this position we would have liked to play fewer overs but there's a manner to do it. 'If you get hit on your body, the physios are allowed to come on and that is something that is fair. But to be able to come 90 seconds late to the crease is not something that comes in the spirit of the game.' Gill admitted he was not proud of swearing at Crawley but said it took place in the context of rising tensions. 'We had no intention of doing that whatsoever but you're playing a game, you're playing to win and there are a lot of emotions,' said the India skipper. 'When you see there are things happening that should not happen, sometimes emotions come out of nowhere.' England batsman Harry Brook said the flare-up had paved the way for the hosts 'to not be the nice guys'. Paceman Jofra Archer gave an aggressive send-off to Rishabh Pant after dismissing the India danger man on the final day. England captain Ben Stokes, speaking before Gill on Tuesday, insisted his side had no deliberate plan to rile India, but nor would they shirk from confrontation. 'It's not something we're going to go out and purposefully look to start (an argument) because that will take our focus off what we need to do out in the middle,' said Stokes. 'But by no means, we are not going to take a backward step and let any opposition try and be confrontational towards us and not try to give a bit back.'
