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The allrounder tweaked his back during against West Indies and will miss the final series before the World Cup

Alex Malcolm17-Feb-2024Marcus Stoinis has been ruled out of Australia’s three-match T20I series in New Zealand due to a back issue with fellow West Australian allrounder Aaron Hardie called in for Australia’s last series before the T20 World Cup in June.Australia vice-captain and wicketkeeper Matthew Wade is also set to miss game one of the series on Wednesday in Wellington due to the impending birth of his third child but is expected to be available for the final two games in Auckland on Friday and Sunday.Stoinis tweaked his back in the warm-up of the second T20I against West Indies in Adelaide last Sunday but was still able to play. He made 16 off 15 with the bat but played a role in feeding the strike to Glenn Maxwell in an 80-run stand before picking up 3 for 36 to continue his excellent bowling form.Related

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But after the long flight to Perth, he missed Tuesday’s third match against West Indies and has subsequently been ruled out of the T20I series against New Zealand having not fully resolved the back complaint. Stoinis is expected to be fit for the IPL which begins in late March.Hardie is currently playing for Western Australia in a Sheffield Shield match against Tasmania in Hobart and did not travel with the squad on Saturday but will join the squad before the opening match.Stoinis remains a key figure in Australia’s T20I set-up despite losing his place in the ODI side for the World Cup semi and final last year. He was one of Australia’s most important players in the T20 World Cup triumph in 2021, playing match-winning hands against South Africa and then Pakistan in the semi-final. He also made a stunning half-century against Sri Lanka in the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia. His bowling has been important for Australia as well, having become a key wicket-taker over the past year in both the powerplay and middle overs.But his injury issues remain a concern for both he and Australia’s hierarchy. Australia have been reluctant to bowl him in back-to-back games due to his history and he missed games in the lead-up to and during the ODI World Cup because of several different soft tissue injuries.Australia’s other allrounders also have their bespoke injury concerns with captain Mitchell Marsh’s ankle requiring ongoing management as does Maxwell’s previously broken leg.Spin bowling allrounder Matthew Short also has an injury cloud heading to New Zealand after suffering a low-grade hamstring injury in the ODI series against West Indies which forced him to miss the T20Is.Hardie gets his chance to put forth a case for the T20 World Cup as a back-up allrounder who can bat in the middle-order if Stoinis has more injury trouble at the tournament proper. Cameron Green was not considered to be called into the New Zealand series with Australia’s selectors preferring him to remain red-ball focussed ahead of the New Zealand Test tour. Green will then play a full IPL with Royal Challengers Bangalore to push his case for the World Cup squad.Fast bowler Nathan Ellis returns from a rib injury and looms as Australia’s preferred back-up quick behind Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins, who will all play in the New Zealand series.Sean Abbott and Jason Behrendorff are on standby for the New Zealand series although Abbott is still managing a shoulder issue that ruled him out of the final two T20Is against West Indies.Steven Smith and Travis Head both return to the T20 side for the New Zealand tour after resting from the West Indies series and look likely to be given several opportunities each in the top three as Australia tries to bed down their best side for the World Cup.

George Hill steers hosts on shortened day with both dressing rooms eyeing Hampshire result

ECB Reporters Network supported by Rothesay26-Sep-2025Yorkshire 465 for 9 (Hill 88, Raine 4-79, Ghafari 4-114) lead Durham 346 (Raine 101, White 5-69) by 119 runsYorkshire are closing in on Division One survival in the Rothesay County Championship, but Durham are not quite sure of the size of their task heading into day four at Headingley.Should Hampshire – 148 for 9 chasing 181 to beat Surrey at the Utilita Bowl – lose, seventh-placed Yorkshire would be safe no matter the result here in this season finale. Second-bottom Durham would need a draw to be safe.Should Hampshire win – they are eighth in the table – Yorkshire would need to draw here, which they are very well placed to do. But Durham would need a miracle victory to get out of trouble.Yorkshire, replying to a first-innings 346 all out, started a weather-affected day on 314 for 5 and advanced to 465 for 9 in the 51 overs possible, with George Hill compiling a skilful season’s best 88.It’s difficult to see how Durham can win, so they desperately need Surrey to do so down on the south coast.Bad light interrupted play on three occasions at Headingley, with the bulk of the evening lost. No play was possible beyond 3.25pm.Hill impressively supplemented Indian batter Mayank Agarwal’s superb 175 on day two with his fourth fifty of a season which has seen him excel with the ball. His seamers have accounted for 47 Championship wickets.He shared in half-century stands with fellow allrounders Matthew Revis and Jordan Thompson, the latter contributing an unbeaten 44.The morning session was a relatively quiet affair, with Yorkshire advancing to 365 for 7. Ben Raine, who has been excellent with 4 for 71 from 33 overs added to his first-innings century, and Matthew Potts struck for Durham.Raine broke a sixth-wicket stand of 50 between Revis, 38, and Hill. Revis, crowned Yorkshire’s members’ player of the year at the end of day two here, was trapped lbw by an in-ducker before Dom Bess pulled Potts to deep backward square-leg.Hill was a calming presence for Yorkshire as they stretched their lead. In all, he hit 14 fours in 175 balls. Thompson was more expansive, whipping Will Rhodes over deep midwicket for six.Hill moved to a fifty off 105 balls shortly before the hosts reached 400 for 7 in the early stages of the afternoon. By this stage, Yorkshire led by 54 and Durham’s need for wickets was becoming more desperate.Hill did fall short of what would have been his season’s first century when bowled trying to attack the legspin of Afghanistan’s Shafiqullah Ghafari. But Yorkshire’s lead was 97 at 443 for 8.Hill and Thompson had shared an eighth-wicket 86, the latter allrounder playing his last match before a winter move to Warwickshire.Matt Milnes edged to slip to hand Ghafari a fourth wicket before the third bad light stoppage at 3.25pm was the last. With the players off the field at that stage, Durham’s dressing room would have been buoyed by news from Southampton.Yorkshire will head into day four in a much more relaxed state given their strong performance here. Durham, on the other hand, will be on tenterhooks not quite knowing the size or shape of their task in hand.

SL scored 156 in rain-reduced game, with WI’s target revised to 195, and Sherfane Rutherford smashed 50* off 26 deliveries

Madushka Balasuriya26-Oct-2024(23 overs) After a series in which they consistently failed to get the rub of the green, the stars finally aligned for West Indies as they ended their tour of Sri Lanka with a morale-boosting win. Evin Lewis, playing his first ODI since 2021, struck an unbeaten 102 off 61 balls, as West Indies chased down a DLS-adjusted target of 195 in a rain-reduced game of 23 overs with eight wickets to spare. In fact, they got the required runs with an over to spare. It was their first ODI win in Sri Lanka following ten straight defeats, and their first win on this tour since the first T20I.Sri Lanka, for their part, had put up a valiant effort after their innings had been cut into less than half. The first 17.2 overs had come prior to the rain intervention, and upon resumption, they were given just a further 5.4 overs to set a competitive total.Enter Kusal Mendis, who bludgeoned an unbeaten 56 off 22 deliveries – he got the half-century off 19 balls – as Sri Lanka themselves struck 75 runs in those final 5.4 overs to end on 156 for 3, and gave themselves a fighting chance. In the end, though, a combination of a wet outfield, wet ball and a laser-focused Lewis proved too much to overcome.Brandon King (18 off 19 balls) and Shai Hope (22 off 27) had kept Lewis company for most of the chase, but it wasn’t until Sherfane Rutherford joined him in the middle that West Indies truly took control of proceedings.Rutherford’s brisk cameo saw him plunder 50 off just 26 deliveries, including four fours and three sixes, with his partnership with Lewis amounting to an unbeaten 88 from just 45 deliveries. It was a pivotal stand in the context of the game, as it came just as Sri Lanka might have been harbouring thoughts of a late heist.Kusal Mendis blasted a 19-ball fifty•AFP/Getty Images

With the required run rate at roughly 8.5 an over from the outset, West Indies had done well to just about keep up with it over the opening ten overs – there was at least one boundary in seven of the first 11 overs. But in such a short chase, even a couple of quiet overs can heighten the pressure – and so it proved to be.Between the 11th and 17th overs, Sri Lanka gave away just 40 runs as the required rate rose to above 11.50 runs an over. Skipper Charith Asalanka had done well in this period by shuffling his pack to sneak in some cheap overs from himself and Kamindu Mendis – both of whom made up the fifth-bowler quota after Wanindu Hasaranga had struggled with controlling a wet ball.Where Asalanka erred was in bowling himself for one over too many, which allowed Rutherford and Lewis to go after him. That 14-run over set the tone, after which the pair never looked back. The miserly Maheesh Theekshana was rinsed for 18 in the next over, while even the excellent Asitha Fernando was hounded for 26 off his final two. Dilshan Madushanka, playing his first ODI since March, went for 50 in five.Sri Lanka, though, will have positives to take away from this game, particularly in how aggressively they approached the post-rain period, knowing that they didn’t have much time to scrounge up a competitive total. The opening 17.2 overs had seen Sri Lanka stitch together a measured start, with openers Pathum Nissanka and Avishka Fernando putting on 81.That, though, owed much to West Indies dropping three chances – two of Nissanka and one of Avishka – inside the opening ten overs. This poor catching did not get much better after the five-hour rain delay, with Kusal also dropped twice on the way to becoming the third-quickest Sri Lanka batter to 4000 ODI runs.Sherfane Rutherford hit four fours and three sixes•Associated Press

It all began with the four balls left in Roston Chase’s second over, as Kusal proceeded to clatter each of them for boundaries – two precise pulls, one stunning straight drive, and finally a fortunate inside edge down to fine leg. In all, Sri Lanka struck 12 boundaries in the final 34 deliveries they faced.The shortened game also had some knock-on effects on West Indies’ bowling plans, as the new provisos meant three bowlers were given a quota of five overs each, while two others were handed four apiece. Once Chase’s over, in which Kusal had struck four consecutive boundaries, was belatedly completed, and with Sri Lanka in raucous mood, West Indies were suddenly faced with the proposition of figuring out how Gudakesh Motie, Jayden Seales, and Alzarri Joseph – who had bowled four, four and three overs, respectively – would split the remains.And with the economical Matthew Forde already having bowled five overs prior to the rain break, it meant only two more bowlers could bowl five; so they needed to find one more over from somewhere.With Chase having been dispatched upon the resumption of play, it was left to Rutherford to roll his arm over, and he was duly taken for 17 runs courtesy two fours and a six. And as Kusal’s carefree innings continued in earnest, Sri Lanka eventually managed to muster up a competitive total – though it proved to be just not good enough on the day.

The visiting attack shared the wickets around while they were gifted two run outs by Tasmania

AAP and ESPNcricinfo staff08-Feb-2025Tasmania teenager Aidan O’Connor posted a half-century on debut but couldn’t prevent Victoria taking honours on day one of their Sheffield Shield clash in Hobart.O’Connor top-scored with 53 as the hosts were bowled out for 236 on Saturday after being sent in to bat. The 18-year-old allrounder struck six fours and a six in his 92-ball innings.Tasmania opener Jake Weatherald (41) and Tim Ward (45) both got starts but couldn’t go on with the job as regular wickets fell. Ward’s dismissal – run out from cover after a horrid mix-up with Jordan Silk – sparked a middle-order collapse, with Tasmania losing 4 for 31 in the space of 10 overs.Victoria’s bowlers spread the workload. Captain Will Sutherland, veteran Peter Siddle, Sam Elliott and Fergus O’Neill all claimed multiple wickets.Siddle had Silk caught at second slip shortly after he was involved in the run out of Ward. Jake Doran was bowled when he shouldered arms at Will Sutherland.O’Connor is one of two first-class debutants for last-placed Tasmania alongside 20-year-old Raf MacMillan.

This is in response to reports of a threat to the game, although the authorities have not found any evidence to corroborate it

ESPNcricinfo staff29-May-2024Security cover will be raised at the Eisenhower Park stadium in New York following reports of threats to the India vs Pakistan match on June 9 in T20 World Cup 2024. A statement released by the governor’s office said they are monitoring the situation and according to their intel “there is no credible public safety threat at this time.”Eisenhower Park stadium, which is located about 25 miles east of Manhattan, will host eight matches from June 3 to June 12 including the high-profile India-Pakistan contest. Kathy Hochul, the governor of the state of New York, indicated that her administration has been working with law enforcement authorities for months to ensure the smooth conduct of these games.”I have also directed the New York State Police to engage in elevated security measures, including an increased law enforcement presence, advanced surveillance, and thorough screening processes,” she said. “Public safety is my top priority and we are committed to ensuring the Cricket World Cup is a safe, enjoyable experience.”ESPNcricinfo has learned the authorities have not yet found any corroborative evidence to back the reported threat, but the ICC said the security would be “robust” across the tournament including at the New York venue. An ICC spokesperson said: “The safety and security of everyone at the event is our number one priority and we have a comprehensive and robust security plan in place. We work closely with authorities in our host countries and continually monitor and evaluate the global landscape to ensure appropriate plans are in place to mitigate any risks identified to our event.”Related

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India play four games in New York – their first one against Ireland (June 5), then the highly-anticipated clash with Pakistan, followed by a meeting with USA on June 12. They are also scheduled to play a warm-up game against Bangladesh there. India arrived in the US on Tuesday and have begun training, although Virat Kohli is yet to link up with the squad after being given some time off.Earlier this month, the ICC and Cricket West Indies, who will be co-hosting the World Cup along with the US, presented reassurance that they are taking every measure possible to ensure the safety of the fans and the players.

Head spent more than a year on top of the rankings, but last played a T20I in September 2024

ESPNcricinfo staff30-Jul-2025India batter Abhishek Sharma has overtaken his Sunrisers Hyderabad opening partner Travis Head to go top of the T20I batting rankings.Head had held on to the No. 1 position since June last year, when he toppled Suryakumar Yadav, but having last played a T20I in September 2024 and opting to sit out of Australia’s five-match series in West Indies, he slid down a slot as Abhishek became the third Indian to top the T20I batting charts after Virat Kohli and Suryakumar.Abhishek last turned out for India in the five-match T20I series against England in February, scoring a 54-ball 135 in the final game of that series.Josh Inglis, who racked up 172 runs in the five matches against West Indies and finished as the third-highest run-scorer of the series, moved up six places to ninth in the rankings. Shai Hope, despite a century helping him finish as the second on the run charts in the series, stayed tenth.

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While Tim David moved up 12 places to 18th after he scored the fastest T20I century for Australia, and Brandon King made gains by moving up nine places, Cameron Green was the biggest mover from the series, shooting up 64 spots to sit at No. 24.Among the bowlers, fast bowler Nathan Ellis jumped up nine spots to go joint-eighth.Meanwhile, England captain Ben Stokes’ century and five-wicket haul at Old Trafford saw him move up three spots to No. 3 in the Test allrounders’ charts, which is still led by India’s Ravindra Jadeja, who has been in fine form in the ongoing series between the two teams.Washington Sundar, who brought up his maiden Test century in Manchester, moved up eight places to go joint-thirteenth, with career-high ranking points of 193.

Three Australians named among Five Cricketers of the Year following compelling Ashes summer

ESPNcricinfo staff15-Apr-2024Pat Cummins and Nat Sciver-Brunt have been named as the Leading Cricketers in the World in the 2024 edition of Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack, published on Tuesday.Cummins, Australia’s fast-bowling spearhead and captain across formats, guided his side to victory over India in both the ICC World Test Championship at The Oval in June, and the 50-over World Cup in Ahmedabad in November. He also oversaw his side’s successful defence of the Ashes, in last summer’s enthralling 2-2 drawn series in England.He is the first Australian man to be named as Wisden’s Leading Cricketer since Michael Clarke in 2012, and succeeds his England counterpart Ben Stokes, who had claimed the honour three times in four years, in 2020, 2021 and 2023.Lawrence Booth, Wisden’s editor, said: “After captaining Australia to success in the World Test Championship, Pat Cummins retained the Ashes – thanks in no small part to his late-order runs in the First Test at Edgbaston – then led Australia to victory in the World Cup final in India. In 2023, no other seamer in world cricket took more than his 42 Test wickets.”Sciver-Brunt, meanwhile, has been recognised as the pre-eminent women’s cricketer of the moment, particularly in light of her starring role in the Women’s Ashes, in which she produced back-to-back ODI centuries to take the multi-format series to the wire.She followed those performances with an England-record 66-ball hundred against Sri Lanka, while her global appeal was recognised by Mumbai Indians at the inaugural Women’s Premier League auction in February, where her £320,000 price tag made her the UK’s best-paid female team athlete.The thrilling nature of both the Men’s and Women’s Ashes, which were played concurrently in June and July 2023, is reflected in the Anglo-Aussie flavour to Wisden’s Five Cricketers of the Year – an honour a player can only win once in their career and which is judged by their performance during the English home season.Nat Sciver-Brunt was the stand-out performer in women’s cricket in 2023•Getty Images

Three Australians are named among the Five, including the allrounder Ashleigh Gardner, whose 12 wickets in the one-off Women’s Test at Trent Bridge were instrumental in her team’s retention of the Ashes. She is the tenth female recipient of an honour that dates back to 1889, and the first Australian woman to be named as a Cricketer of the Year since Ellyse Perry in 2020.The other Australians in the Five are Usman Khawaja, the leading run-scorer in the Men’s Ashes with 496 runs at 49.60 including a series-defining hundred at Edgbaston, and Mitchell Starc, the leading bowler with 23 wickets at 27.08, who also claimed 16 wickets in the World Cup triumph.Harry Brook, England’s break-out star of the 2022-23 winter, is also named alongside Mark Wood, whose selection for the third Test at Headingley last summer was the catalyst for England’s stirring fightback in the series.”Wood turned the Ashes on its head,” Booth said. “He topped 96mph, took five for 34, and pushed Australia on the back foot, literally and figuratively. In all, he claimed 14 wickets at just 20 apiece as England came from 2-0 down to square the series.”Travis Head, meanwhile, has been awarded the Wisden Trophy for the year’s best Test performance, following his match-seizing innings of 163 from 174 balls in the World Test Championship final. He succeeds Jonny Bairstow as the second winner of Wisden’s newest award, with the trophy having previously been contested during England-West Indies Test series from 1963 to 2020, until it was succeeded by the Richards-Botham Trophy.The other notable award in this year’s publication goes to the West Indian Hayley Matthews, who is the first female to be named the Leading Twenty20 Cricketer, after a run of eight consecutive T20I match awards, in which period she averaged 88 with the bat, at a strike-rate of 144, and 12 with the ball.The compelling nature of the Ashes battle is an enduring theme of this year’s Almanack, with Booth making the point in his Notes by the Editor that England’s ultra-attacking “Bazball” approach to the series has already ramped up demand for this summer’s Test series against West Indies.”Amid the gloomy outlook for Test cricket, here was a glimmer of hope: proof that if you put on a show, bums will fill seats,” he wrote. “And the 2023 Ashes were a show all right, up there with 1981 and 2005. But for rain in Manchester, it might even have rivalled Australia’s Don Bradman-inspired 1936-37 victory, still the only series in Test history won by a team who had trailed 2-0.Ashleigh Gardner became only the second woman to pick eight wickets in a Test innings•Getty Images

“The scoreline was almost secondary. For the first time since English cricket vanished behind a paywall, it felt like the people’s sport: Bazball was on their lips and, before long, in the Collins Dictionary.”Fittingly, the series was capped by the last hurrah of one of the most enduring Ashes competitors of modern times, Stuart Broad, who claimed his 604th and final Test wicket with the last ball of the series to bow out on a high. In his Notes, Booth salutes him as “England’s maker of memories”.”The best players don’t simply rack up the numbers (though his final tally made you tired just thinking of it),” Booth wrote. “They leave an impression. Even more than [James] Anderson, Broad was England’s maker of memories, the curator of the family album. A rule of thumb emerged: if Broad’s knees were pumping, so was England’s blood.”Elsewhere in his Notes, Booth appeals for a reappraisal of the so-called Spirit of Cricket, a concept that came under intense scrutiny following Bairstow’s controversial stumping during the Lord’s Test, and criticises the game’s administrators for undermining the competitive nature of international cricket with an increasingly inequitable split of the ICC’s revenues.”In the era of global television, the West Indians have been hardest hit among the major Test teams,” Booth wrote. “India’s slice of the pie had grown from less than 25% to 38.5%, or close to $230m a year … West Indies receive 4.58%, or $27.5m.”Yet this is where cricket finds itself, in dreary thrall to the notion that market forces must be obeyed, while patronising the West Indian game with back-handed compliments, when what it needs is hard cash. There’s plenty of that in cricket’s central pot. Is it really beyond the wit of the administrators to distribute it according to need, not greed?”

She joins spinners Priyadharshani, Kumari and Dilhari, who may all play a role throughout the campaign

Andrew Fidel Fernando20-Sep-2024Left-arm spinner Inoka Ranaweera, 38, has been named in Sri Lanka’s women’s T20 World Cup 2024 squad, with 21-year-old seamer Kawya Kavindi making way. Ranaweera had been left out of the squad for the women’s Asia Cup, which Sri Lanka won, in July. She had also been omitted from Sri Lanka’s squads to Ireland, more recently.But with the T20 World Cup likely to be played on pitches that favour spin in the UAE, the experienced Ranaweera has been recalled. Although her bowling has not been especially penetrative in the shortest format this year, she does have 91 T20I wickets from 82 appearances for Sri Lanka, with an economy rate of 5.86.Kavindi’s omission, however, means Sri Lanka have just three main seam-bowling options in their World Cup squad: Udeshika Prabodhani, Achini Kulasuriya, and Ama Kanchana.Related

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Their spin cupboard is fuller. Ranaweera joins Inoshi Priyadharshani, Sugandika Kumari, and Kavisha Dilhari, who may all play a role throughout the campaign. There is also always the offspin of captain Chamari Athapaththu.On the batting front, a Sri Lanka squad has never looked stronger. In addition to their talisman Athapaththu, the likes of Harshitha Samarawickrama, and 18-year-old Vishmi Gunaratne have also been among the runs in the last few months. Their triumph in the Asia Cup will give them confidence that they can push for a place in the final four of the T20 World Cup.The World Cup is scheduled to begin on October 3. Sri Lanka are in Group A for the first round, alongside Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand, and India.

Sri Lanka squad for T20 World Cup 2024

Chamari Athapaththu (capt), Harshitha Samarawickrama, Vishmi Gunaratne, Kavisha Dilshari, Nilakshi de Silva, Hasini Perera, Anushka Sanjeewani (wk), Sachini Nisansala, Udeshika Prabodhani, Inoshi Priyadharshani, Achini Kulasuriya, Inoka Ranaweera, Shashini Gimhani, Ama Kanchana, Sugandika KumariTravelling reserve: Kaushini Nuthyangana

The frequency of the mega auctions and the auction purse were among the other points discussed

Nagraj Gollapudi and S Sudarshanan31-Jul-20243:35

Should the Impact Player rule stay or go?

Delhi Capitals (DC) co-owner Parth Jindal wants the Impact Player rule scrapped, while Kavya Maran, the owner of Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH), recommended a minimum of seven players to be retained without any restrictions on the number of overseas players bought back. There was also a split vote on having a mega auction every five years. These were some of the discussions during the meeting between the BCCI and the owners of the ten IPL teams on Wednesday, in Mumbai.The meeting, which was held at the BCCI office, was organised to discuss various points concerning retentions for the IPL 2025 season. There were also discussions on whether the right-to-match (RTM) card option should be brought back at the auction, and if a special category should be created for uncapped players to incentivise teams that have scouted and developed young talent. The frequency of the mega auctions and the auction purse were among the other points discussed.In a media release, the BCCI said these recommendations will be taken to the IPL governing council for “further deliberation and evaluation” before formulating the player regulations. The rules for both retention and auction for the 2025 season are expected to be finalised by end of August.

Impact Player ‘detrimental to Indian cricket’

The original motive of the Impact Player rule was to allow more Indian players, especially the uncapped ones, to get exposure. However, prominent players and coaches argued that it was not creating a level-playing field, with India’s Test and ODI captain Rohit Sharma saying he was not a big fan of the rule because it would hold back the “development” of allrounders.Jindal agreed with Rohit’s viewpoint. “Some people want it because it gives a chance to young players to play in the IPL,” Jindal said after the meeting. “Some people don’t want it because it is detrimental to Indian cricket in terms of the development of allrounders. So it’s a mixed bag. I’m on the second camp. I don’t want it. I prefer the game as it is 11 versus 11, and I think allrounders are very important. And you have different players who don’t bowl in the IPL or don’t bat in the IPL because of this rule, which is not good for Indian cricket.”

A combination of retention and RTM? Number of retainees?

Retention was the most important item on the agenda and Jindal said it was “all up in the air” with teams requesting various numbers. It is understood Maran asked for at least seven retentions. It is no surprise considering SRH have several big names in their squad. Apart from captain Pat Cummins, the likes of Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Heinrich Klaasen, Nitish Reddy and T Natarajan played important roles in SRH finishing as runners-up in the 2024 season.ESPNcricinfo has learnt that Maran requested the IPL not to impose a cap on the number of overseas as well as capped and uncapped Indians a franchise could retain once the IPL had finalised the retention number. She said they would lean towards retaining maximum overseas players. This view was echoed by more than one franchise during a recent meeting with IPL chief operating officer Hemang Amin.The franchises had told Amin that retaining the core was critical not just from a performance point of view but it enabled teams to create fan loyalty with some of the established players. They also wanted to retain uncapped Indian talent they had deeply invested in.13:31

Runorder: Is the mega auction good for the IPL?

ESPNcricinfo has also learnt that Maran proposed that players could be secured via a plain retention process or a combination of retention and RTM at the auction or all exclusively via the right-to-match (RTM) card. The last method, it is understood, was suggested by Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), who had asked for as many as eight players to be bought back exclusively via the RTM method.Maran is believed to have told the gathering that the franchise would get the choice to discuss with the player whether he wanted to be retained prior to the auction or via the RTM option. This will not leave the player “disgruntled” about his retention price, she said. From previous experience, Maran pointed out that players preferred to go to the auction because they felt the retention amount was on the lower side.An RTM, which allows the market to determine the price, was previously part of the 2018 mega auction but not in 2022 when teams were revamped after a four-year cycle. Maran felt that a player could be paid better in case he preferred the RTM option, so that the auction purse would dictate his exact value. Either way, Maran said, the process would ensure transparency.

Scrap mega auction?

Jindal said while the franchises were “not on the same page on many issues”, he was “surprised” some owners wanted mega auctions scrapped.”I was surprised,” he said. “There was a debate. Some people said that there should not be a mega auction at all. There should be only smaller auctions. I’m not in that camp. I feel that it evens the playing field and it’s very good for everyone. It makes the IPL what it is. It makes it competitive. It makes it an even-playing field.”Maran was one of those in favour of having mega auctions every five years. She also proposed having just a mini-auction for the 2025 season.

Retention pot instead of slabs

During their meeting with Amin, some franchises, including SRH, had suggested that the IPL must allow them the discretion to negotiate the retention amounts with the players instead of ranking them via retention slabs which has been the norm in previous mega auctions.Maran is believed to have suggested that based on the number of players retained, the IPL could determine an amount which the franchise then would negotiate with the players.Apart from Jindal and Maran, other owners who were present at the meeting were Shah Rukh Khan (principal owner of KKR), Manoj Badale and Ranjit Barthakur (principal owner and chair of Rajasthan Royals respectively), Kiran Gandhi (DC co-owner), Rupa Gurunath and Kasi Viswanathan (owner and CEO of CSK respectively), Prathmesh Mishra and Rajesh Menon (chair and vice-president at Diageo, the group that owns RCB), Sanjiv Goenka and Shashwat Goenka (LSG owner and his son), Ness Wadia (co-owner of Punjab Kings), Amit Soni (CVC Partners, owners of Gujarat Titans) and Akash Ambani (Mumbai Indians owner), who is understood to have attended virtually.

Mathews fell for 39 in his farewell Test, even as Chandimal’s fifty helped SL reduce deficit to 127

Madushka Balasuriya19-Jun-2025Partnerships were the name of the game for Sri Lanka as every top-order batter chipped in to whittle away at Bangladesh’s healthy first-innings total of 495. By stumps, Sri Lanka’s deficit had been trimmed to just 127.A majority of it was cut down courtesy Pathum Nissanka, who struck a career-best 187 off 256 balls. It was his first ton on home soil, and a knock that had seen him dominate from the first new ball to the second. He would have been eyeing a maiden Test double hundred – to go with one in ODIs – but that second new ball and the unpredictability of a wobble seam combined to dislodge him, as Hasan Mahmud sneaked an inducker through bat and pad late in the day.That wicket may end up keeping Bangladesh’s heads from dropping heading into day four, after the Sri Lanka batters had spent the majority of day three steadily shaking out any confidence the visitors may have gathered during their dominance on the opening two days.Nissanka was part of four steady stands, alongside Lahiru Udara, Dinesh Chandimal, Angelo Mathews and Kamindu Mendis, which were worth 47, 157, 89, and 38, respectively. More pressingly for Bangladesh, the scoring during each of these stands came at a fair clip, with Sri Lanka’s run rate consistently hovering around four an over.Dinesh Chandimal and Pathum Nissanka added 147 for the second wicket•Sri Lanka Cricket

But even following Nissanka’s dismissal, any respite seemed short lived as Dhananjaya de Silva and Kamindu already sped to a stand of 37 off 45 deliveries by the end of play. For Bangladesh, the four wickets were shared equally among Mahmud, Taijul Islam, Nayeem Hasan and Mominul Haque. But with three of the five bowlers employed going at over four runs runs an over, it was a tough day out for the visitors.On a surface that had started showing signs of deterioration – but one that was still good for batting by Galle’s usual day three standards – Sri Lanka’s batters showed Bangladesh where theirs had faltered. Well, as much as you could falter having scored 495.Bangladesh had spent the first two days content at progressing at a touch above three runs an over, rarely shifting pressure on to the Sri Lanka bowlers. In the end, it proved to be the difference between a total of near-500 and perhaps 600.Fine margins, usually, but with Sri Lanka knocking off 75% of Bangladesh’s total in just three sessions, there now lies the very real possibility that Bangladesh could be asked to bat out day five – rain allowing – just to save the Test. And while this Galle surface has been more batter-friendly than usual, the ball misbehaved occasionally, and you imagine that will only get more frequent over the next two days.That said, Sri Lanka still have work to do to make that possibility a reality. But you wouldn’t back against them judging by how they went about their batting across the day.Angelo Mathews got a guard of honour from the Bangladesh players•Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP/Getty Images

Aside from a brief period before tea, when scoring slowed to a trickle, Sri Lanka’s batters had it all their own way. This was down to a combination of positive intent from the batters, and some inconsistent lines and lengths from the Bangladesh bowlers. Nissanka, in particular, was batting with supreme authority: anything short was dispatched square, and anything overpitched was laced through the covers.His aggression, and ability to alleviate even small periods of pressure with a boundary or two, meant the pressure on his partners was kept to a minimum. It saw Chandimal notch up a 33rd Test fifty, while Mathews, too, might have enjoined a similar milestone if not for being at the end of one of those rare deliveries that misbehaved. Mominul, the part-timer, got one to dip and turn past Mathews’ forward defence, tickling the outside edge on the way.Each of the wickets to fall, in fact, were against the run of play. Debutant Udara had made it look a far cry from his first Test during a fluent 34-ball 29, before chipping a leading edge back to Taijul. Chandimal, meanwhile, clipped a leg-side offbreak low to leg slip off Nayeem.But with each wicket, Sri Lanka simply dusted themselves off and set about putting together another brisk stand. It was a sharp contrast from Bangladesh’s innings, which had two mammoth stands in the middle, but either side of those had only one reach even 20.Sri Lanka had begun the day with similar efficiency, wrapping up the Bangladesh innings inside the first 15 minutes of the morning session. Asitha Fernando did the honours, ending with figures of 4 for 86.