Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out

Lou Vincent and Stephen Fleming strengthened New Zealand’s grip on the second Test on a day that started under clear autumn skies and ended 16 overs early after a thick fog enveloped Wellington. Sri Lanka may hope it lingers because New Zealand, who finished on 253 for 4, are in the driving seat with a 42-run lead and six wickets still in the bag.However, Sri Lanka never let New Zealand’s batsmen cut loose and soon after the lunch break they had clawed back much of the initiative squandered on the first day as Chaminda Vaas, who bounced back from a lacklustre performance in the first Test, pinned Craig Cumming (47) lbw and had Nathan Astle caught at bat-pad first ball. New Zealand were creaking on 153 for 4, and still trailing by 58 runs.But Vincent, who was promoted to No 4 because of Fleming’s bruised knee, bedded down for an innings of unblinking concentration and patience. Unfazed by long periods of no scoring, including a 10-over spell when he was marooned on 64, he chipped away at the Sri Lanka lead and anchored the innings, finishing with 79 from 188 balls.

Vincent compiled a steadying 83-run stand with Cumming for the third wicket in the morning after an early Vaas double strike and then a crucial, unbroken 100-run partnership with Fleming, who batted at No 6. The pair drained the enthusiasm from Sri Lanka’s players and consolidated New Zealand’s advantage.The only real Vincent blemish was a dropped chance by Thilan Samaraweera at slip off Upul Chandana on 64. It was a difficult reflex chance as the ball, delivered from around the wicket into the footholes, travelled low to the right of Samaraweera. One edge also flew perilously close to third slip in the morning session.Fleming, meanwhile, showed no obvious discomfort from either his knee or injured hand, which hampered him in the last innings at Napier, and knuckled down to regain his touch. His unbeaten 60 from 123 balls was a workmanlike innings blessed with the odd flash of his best form, including a couple of well-timed clips and one spanking cover drive.Vaas provided the major threat throughout the day, clearly enjoying the traditional swing-bowler conditions. He bent the ball back into the right-handers’ pads and occasional nipped it away off the seam and through the air, beating the bat on several occasions and also snapping up the early wickets of the Marshall brothers. James Marshall (28) missed a curling inswinger and Hamish Marshall edged a straighter ball to Mahela Jayawardene at first slip, who clung on despite an initial fumble.

Vaas was well supported by Farveez Maharoof, who bowled a tidy spell of nippy inswing at the start of the day, conceding 14 runs from 10 overs. Maharoof might have broken through when Cumming, on 31, looked to have been dropped by Kumar Sangakkara behind the stumps off a delivery that cut back sharply and, according to television replays, brushed the inside edge.Atapattu – mindful of Astle’s valuable contribution with his dibbly-dobblers the previous day – decided to give Jayawardene a bowl after Vaas. Considering that he has taken four wickets in his previous 66 matches, it was a brave but thoughtful gamble. It did not pay off with a wicket but Jayawardene kept it tight – one glorious straight six by Vincent excluded – during a six-over spell.Vaas’s improved form was contrasted by Lasith Malinga, who lacked the sparkle that made him Sri Lanka’s trump card at Napier. He did produce a couple of searing yorkers in his final evening spell before the new ball was taken, but he was also the most wayward of the seamers. Atapattu was reluctant to use him as he tried to put a lid on New Zealand’s scoring.How they were out
Played across an inswinger.
Edged straighter ball while driving on the up.
Beaten by an indipper.
Caught at short leg after inside-edge onto pad.

A report in today’s Times newspaper has highlighted that while tickets for this summer’s Ashes series are more scarce than a George Galloway climbdown, sales for the latter stages of the two Bangladesh Tests can be politely described as sluggish.With eight days to go before Bangladesh make their Lord’s debut, around than 15,000 tickets have been shifted for each of the first three days, but few seem to expect the match to go into a fourth day, with only 3484 seats sold for the Sunday. While those figures would be healthy for any other country, Lord’s, with a capacity of almost 30,000, is usually close to capacity for at least four days.The MCC, who run Lord’s, have pulled out all the stops to market the match to London’s sizeable Bangladeshi community, and ticket prices have been reduced to between £20 and £35 as a further incentive. MCC has been running advertisements on UK satellite station Bangla TV as well as selling tickets through Sonali Bank. But the Bangladeshis’ performance at Hove this week will hardly have led to queues at the box office.”We have targeted our efforts at the Bangladeshi communities in London, recognising both that this is the country’s first Test match here and that they may not be familiar with how to get tickets,” said an MCC spokesman. “We have been working on this match for months and months and taken out adverts in Curry House, the restaurant-trade magazine.”Riverside, the venue for the second Test, reports brisk sales for the first two days, but a spokesman admitted that concerns about whether Bangladesh will last much longer made Saturday and Sunday hard to market.MCC have handed out 5,000 complimentary tickets to schools on each of the first three days, while Durham have reserved 300 seats for children aged between five and 12 to watch the first day’s play. The initiative is part of npower’s drive to get more young people interested in cricket, with tickets priced at just £5 and free adult tickets for every eight children.Click here for Lord’s ticket sales

Click here for Riverside ticket sales

“The repercussions of the latest dispute between the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and the West Indies Players Association (WIPA) are damaging enough for the two organisations to seek the early intervention of a mutually accepted arbiter.”It is increasingly clear that the divide between the two has become so wide and acrimonious that it is unlikely to be bridged by further bilateral negotiations.”Those were the introductory paragraphs in this column last November 11, the day after the WIPA told its members not to accept the WICB’s invitations to be available for the tour of Australia in January on the specified contract terms, charging they represented “an attempt to exploit the players for commercial purposes”.It took no special skills in logic to come to such a conclusion and, with no essential change in the situation in the intervening eight months, it takes none now to realise that arbitration, final and binding, is necessary to save West Indies cricket from the ultimate disaster of the head-on collision for which the two bodies charged with sustaining it have long since been heading.It is an indictment on both that they remain at loggerheads over a matter that could have been so quickly settled with a little common sense and goodwill.Since it first surfaced prior to the trip to Australia for the VB Series, hundreds of thousands of words have been written on the impasse, hours upon hours have been spent in tiresome and futile discussions and accusations, insults and outright abuse have left the air as pungent as Emmerton.Two foreign telecommunications companies, bitter rivals, each with more capital than many small Caribbean nations, have fought over ownership of the West Indies team and the best West Indian players with a fury once associated with Mike Tyson.If they could have, each would have bitten off the other’s ear.Granted, there has been concerned intervention, from no less a body than Caricom’s sub-committee on cricket, headed by Grenada’s prime minister Keith Mitchell, and even arbitration by Justice Adrian Saunders of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS).But they have been limited in scope and have simply bought time so that the WICB could fulfil its obligations under the International Cricket Council (ICC) schedule.It was inevitable that the argument would reach the point where the procrastination and pussy-footing would have to end.That moment arrived last week when ten of the 13 players chosen for the upcoming tour of Sri Lanka declined to sign the WICB contracts, objecting, as they did back in November, to clause 5, and the WICB responded to the WIPA’s proposal for final, binding arbitration of their differences with a rejection of its own.It now seems as if the WICB is prepared to chose a new team from whoever is prepared to sign the contract, clause 5 and all.That would leave not only the objecting players to consider their future-and there are likely to be many more outside the chosen group- but West Indies cricket as a whole.The WICB’s position from the start is that clause 5 is non-negotiable as it seeks to safeguard the interests of the new sponsor, Digicel, which has put up $20 million for the right.Its relevant parts state: “(a) The player acknowledges that the WICB has the sole and exclusive right to permit any person to represent that they, or their goods or services, have the sponsorship or approval of, or are in any way endorsed with the WICB or any WICB team.(b) the player agrees that at all times whilst representing the WICB (including whilst playing, training, attending official functions, attending media conferences and being present at a match venue) he will not do anything that constitutes a player endorsement in relation to a competitor of a WICB major sponsor unless he has a pre-existing agreement with such a competitor that has been approved in writing by the WICB under this contract or the player’s previous player contract with the WICB or the player’s agreement with such a competitor pre-dates any contract he has had with the WICB.”Such conditions seem reasonable enough. Any team sponsor would seek to protect itself against competitive promotion from a player within the team.On those grounds, the WICB stuck to its position prior to the recent home series with South Africa and deemed players with conflicting personal endorsement agreements with Cable and Wireless ineligible for selection.The consequence was that several of those affected withdrew from their contracts and returned to the team.But legal consultants to the WIPA and its members hold the view that the clause is too restrictive and has advised that they should not sign any contract containing it.Equally, the WICB’s legal counsel is certain that it is on solid ground to insert such a clause as a safeguard of the sponsor’s exclusivity.With such utter divergence, settlement can only be achieved by mediation, either through an independent individual, such as Justice Saunders, or through the law courts.In rebuffing the WIPA’s proposal for a conclusive ruling on the clause 5 issue from Saunders, the WICB could well have been emboldened by the earlier decision of the Cable and Wireless players to give up their contracts to return to the team, even though all of them are now among those who have rejected their Sri Lanka contract.The WICB might also have been fed up with the threats of a player pullout that have so frequently shrouded recent series in doubt almost up to the time the plane takes off or the first ball is bowled.Yet, seeing that it is confident of its position and even at this late stage, the WICB would be well advised to accept the WIPA’s proposal for a conclusive ruling by Justice Saunders, acceptable to all parties, including Digicel, on every aspect of its match/tour contract.It would put the issue to rest, once and for all, so that we won’t have the same chaos and confusion before the Australian series in November and every one after that.It would let all and sundry know where they stand, not least the players.The alternative is likely to be litigation in the law courts with the players’ lawyers claiming restraint of trade. It represents a potentially long, bitter and costly exercise.In this regard, the WICB’s officers would do well to read transcripts of the judgment in the case Kerry Packer’s World Series Cricket brought against the International Cricket Conference (ICC) on the same grounds in 1977.The ICC then stated: “No player who, after October 1, 1977 has played or made himself available to play in a match previously disapproved by the Conference shall thereafter be eligible to play in any Test match.”WICB representatives, president Jeffrey Stollmeyer and vice-president Allan Rae, the vaunted opening pair of the 1950s, saw the dangers implicit in such a stipulation and argued strongly but in vain against it.The upshot was that Justice Slade found in favour of Packer and the ICC and its member boards (including the WICB) had to fork out more than 200,000 pounds in costs and compensation.Not that the court, Caribbean or Privy Council, would find against the WICB in this case but it is a chance neither necessary nor worth taking.Let Justice Saunders, on his own, settle matters now so that West Indies can, in this case at least, be free of the chains of conflict that have bound it and be able to move on.

Michael VaughanOn today’s win
We are pleased with the result. We weren’t quite at our best in the first half, but it was difficult because it was slippy and it was hard for the bowlers to keep their footing. We probably bowled too short. But we still had to go out and get 220 and I thought we chased very, very well. I’m not going to sit here and say the toss wasn’t important, because it was.On how chasing today was different to the NatWest Series final
I think we have learnt a lot from Saturday’s game. When you are chasing quite a smallish total you just have to make sure that you don’t allow them back in the game quickly. Saturday we allowed them back too soon. At 33 for 5 Australia looked like they were going to win. We just needed to make sure we were going to give ourselves a platform to accelerate, if we needed to in the last ten overs we had players to. It’s so important that you learn and you learn fast. So to learn within one game shows the team has a bit of character about them.On how important was Trescothick’s innings?
I think it was a tremendous knock. Most importantly England won by nine wickets. We weren’t fantastic in the field. We were good enough, but we weren’t outstanding, and Marcus’s 100 not out was just the platform we needed.On how the terrorist attacks have affected the side
It’s difficult. It certainly puts cricket and sport into perspective. Yesterday we were celebrating London getting the Olympics and then you put the telly on this morning and you see those kinds of things – it just puts sport and life into perspective when you see what is happening. If our win today can go any way towards making a few people happy, that’s fantastic.On how much this win will affect the looming Ashes series
Only time will tell. It certainly can’t hinder your confidence when you win by nine wickets against a team like Australia, but how much of an effect the one-dayers will have on the Ashes is hard to say. History suggests that it won’t have any. It’s just important that you start playing well as individuals and start hitting the ball and bowling nicely. We have got two more knocks before the Ashes series starts, so it’s important to try and make the most of the opportunities you can get.On how pleased he was with his own innings
It was nice but the platform was set. Straussy and Tres really got over that hard part with Lee and McGrath and the ball seaming about. Coming in at 100 for 0, there was no real pressure on the run-rate. You can’t complain – and we just cantered over the line.How dark was it out there? It looked fairly murky late on.
Only for a three or four-over period. I think we got the best of the conditions when we went out there with the sun. When the sun is out at Headingley it makes it that much easier.Ricky PontingOn the toss
It would have been a nice one to win. I would have had a bowl, too. You know coming to Headingley that, if there is cloud cover, you know there will be a bit of seam movement. It was hard to bat on today and then the clouds went away and it was England’s turn to bat. It didn’t seam after ten overs and there were definitely contrasting conditions. The first ten overs of our innings were played under cloud and then the first ten of England’s were like playing at Adelaide.When you lost one wicket, another went straight away.
It’s been the way for us throughout the one-day series so far. We just haven’t reacted well at critical times in the game – especially with our batting. We have probably limped towards our total rather than being able to accelerate towards the end because we have lost wickets consistently through the innings. That is one of the things we have to address as a group and hopefully we can improve on that.But 219 was still a competitive total
I have to admit that I was pretty happy with that total from where we were. Just having sat back and batted myself, the ball was still reacting off the seam. I thought that if conditions were still the same then it might have been defendable but conditions changed dramatically.On the importance of Mike Hussey
Nearly every game on this tour he’s been the man that’s put his hand up for us, so he has was very important for us again today. He’s an exceptional player confronted with any situation. He’s great in the field, so he’s been invaluable to the success we’ve had so far. I imagine he would have been one who was spoken about before the Test squad was announced and he’s going to be with us for the summer anyway, so if there are any injuries I’m sure his name will be top of the list.On Jason Gillespie’s poor form
I’m going to have a chat to him and see where he’s at and see whether he feels he would be better to keep playing or to have a few games off before the Test series. He was a bit below his best again today as a few of us were, probably just when I thought he was starting to get it right again. I thought the way he bowled at Lord’s, on a wicket that offered a bit of assistance, he was a lot better there. He’s always been one that you can rely on in any situation.On today’s performance
It’s always disappointing to lose a game and we will try to pick the areas that we can improve on. It was incredibly hard batting on that wicket today, and I think that’s the most challenging one-day wicket I’ve ever batted on so I was happy with the end total. Istill think we’ve got some room for improvement in our all round game, but probably more so on our bowling and fielding and tactical stuff.On England’s opening pair
Trescothick got away from us, after getting out on a no-ball. Strauss – we allowed him to play the way he likes to play, as well. We bowled too short to him today and any time that we allowed him to try to drive us, he couldn’t do it, so there are areas like that we have to tighten up on. But they played their shots. We have to make sure that we are precise with our execution of our plans ahead of the Ashes series.

The storms are done and the floodwaters have abated, but lightning still struck for the second time at the Bangabandhu National Stadium today, as New Zealand’s James Franklin emulated his idol, Wasim Akram, by claiming cricket’s equivalent of the hole-in-one, the prized hat-trick.Five-and-half years on from the Asian Test Championship final at Dhaka, where Wasim skittled three Sri Lankan batsmen en route to victory, Franklin’s precision line proved too much for three helpless Bangladesh tailenders, who found themselves in the record books for all the wrong reasons.And the comparisons don’t stop there. Like Wasim, Franklin is a left-armer seamer, and he too had to wait until the first ball of his next over to claim his crowning glory. Now it’s up to Franklin to go on and take hat-tricks in consecutive matches as Wasim did in March 1999. Appropriately enough, the man himself was looking on from the commentary box today.Franklin’s hat-trick was only the second by a New Zealand bowler in Test history, 28 years after Peter Petherick spun his way into Kiwi folklore on debut at Lahore. Franklin himself is in just his fourth Test, after being cast aside by the New Zealand selectors in 2001 following his first two Tests against Pakistan when he was just 20 years of age.That Franklin is even on this tour is fortuitous. He was overlooked for the winter tour of England, and instead headed to Lancashire to play club cricket where, after a string of injuries in the New Zealand team, he was drafted into the side for the third Test at Trent Bridge. Six wickets later, he had effectively booked his ticket to Bangladesh.The seamers had failed to fire for most of the first day, so there must have been some temptation for Stephen Fleming to open from one end with the left-arm spin of Daniel Vettori. He didn’t and, as they say, the rest is history.Spectators and media alike were just finding their seats when Manjural Islam Rana, so disciplined yesterday afternoon, drove loosely at Franklin’s fifth ball of the morning and gave Brendan McCullum a simple catch behind the stumps. Mohammad Rafique received a beautifully angled delivery first-up, and the edge that flew to Scott Styris at second slip was unavoidable.Jacob Oram then completed a tidy over from the other end, whereupon Franklin returned to rip out Tapash Baisya’s off stump with a delivery that the great Wasim himself would have been proud of. Tapash had elected to play no stroke, but at the last minute, the ball swung in just enough to find the ultimate target.Andrew McLean is a presenter on The Cricket Club, New Zealand’s only national cricket radio show.

Australia have rested five of their big guns for the second-Test warm-up against Worcestershire, but rain threatens to curtail the traditional Ashes tour fixture. Bad weather has forced the cancellation of the side’s final training session at the New Road ground and it is predicted to continue through the three-day match.Glenn McGrath, Brett Lee and Shane Warne have been rested after their success in the first Test at Lord’s, while Adam Gilchrist and Damien Martyn also have free time this weekend. The five will be replaced by the non-Test members, with Brad Hodge and Shaun Tait getting their first matches of the tour. Brad Haddin, whose only game was against Somerset, will stand-in behind the stumps and Michael Kasprowicz and Stuart MacGill will step into an attack led by the struggling Jason Gillespie.Worcestershire, who were the traditional opponents for the opening contest of an Ashes tour, have the international bowlers Shoaib Akhtar, Gareth Batty, Kabir Ali and Ray Price in their squad, but Shoaib has already been ruled out with injury. The game is due to start tomorrow.The Australian XI Matthew Hayden, Justin Langer, Ricky Ponting (capt), Simon Katich, Brad Hodge, Michael Clarke, Brad Haddin (wk), Jason Gillespie, Michael Kasprowicz, Shaun Tait and Stuart MacGill.Worcestershire Vikram Solanki (capt), Stephen Moore, Stephen Peters, Graeme Hick, Ben Smith, Zander de Bruyn, Gareth Batty, Kabir Ali, James Pipe, Matt Mason, Nadeem Malik, Ray Price (12th man to be named).

Even the most ardent pessimists are daring to dream that the Ashes will be regained by England. “In racing terms, we have our noses in front,” said a cautious Geoffrey Boycott in . For some ardent optimists, though, victory is already in the bag. “The Ashes are coming home” roared a premature headline in .England, of course, were kept in the hunt by that victory at Trent Bridge, and just how important keeping the Ashes alive is to the future of English cricket was underlined by s Richard Williams. “English cricket was briefly threatened with the most damaging defeat in its history,” he wrote, “given the hopes invested in this series. Had Australia forced the win […] many of the game’s gains of the past five weeks would have been forfeited.”Whether or not England regain the urn remains to be seen. But whatever happens, journalists are talking excitedly about their belief that this series is second-to-none for intense drama. “For spectacle and sheer unrelenting excitement, if not for the quality of the cricket,” began Christopher Martin-Jenkins in , “this really must be accounted the greatest of all Test series.””Never in the 129-year history of Test cricket can three consecutive matches have ended in such dramatic circumstances,” agreed s Angus Fraser, while Simon Barnes wondered how much more the nation could take. “Just when Wimbledon was safely over,” he wrote in “the England cricket team have set to outdo Tim Henman as a cause of national neurosis.”One unbearable climax has followed another as England have repeatedly outplayed Australia and have repeatedly found it hard, if not impossible, to make the killing stroke. The finger freezes on the trigger. England simply cannot believe in their own superiority over the old enemy.””For once a tense endgame didn’t look likely,” wrote Derek Pringle in . “Vaughan’s men looked like they might give the Aussies a good towelling. Yet with Ricky Ponting’s side unable to say die, at least not yet, the drama began to wind its way to another tortuous resolution. England’s batsmen made it hard for themselves. What began as positive intent quickly began to look like blind panic.”The papers re-enacted the tense moments of England’s chase to the line, with ‘s Glenn Moore adding: “Turmoil invaded the minds of the England team as their run-chase coughed and spluttered like a Ferrari running on diesel.” At the helm in the final push were Ashley Giles and Matthew Hoggard, and Giles admitted in his column that his nerves were on the edge of fraying.”I would rather just watch,” he recalled saying prior to his innings, but in the aftermath he was naturally delighted. “To go out there and get the winning runs was awesome.” Hoggard, he reported, was in a much calmer, determined frame of mind. “”Come on, let’s you and me get it done,” he said, with a bit of a smile.”That they did is to the whole team’s credit, as Simon Barnes acknowledged. “Giles and Hoggard stuck it out in a cheer-every-run nerve-stretcher,” he wrote, “and that, perhaps was most appropriate of all. This has been a team performance in a summer of team performances […] when one English player fails, another stands up for his time of glory.”Credit is due in no small part to Michael Vaughan and Duncan Fletcher, as Derek Pringle observed. “Old England might have folded,” he wrote. “But Vaughan and Duncan Fletcher have built a team not only hungry for success but who back themselves fully.”And Vaughan’s superior captaincy when compared to that of Ricky Ponting is a key factor in England’s series lead, suggests Richard Williams. “At every turn Ricky Ponting has found himself outmanoeuvred by Vaughan, even in the psychological contest whose rules his own predecessors invented.”Mike Selvey, in agreed, but suggested that there was a brief passage of play where Ponting had got it right – and this nearly cost England victory. “For two hours Ricky Ponting, such an unimaginative captain for much of the game, cast off his cloak and abetted by Warne’s influence became inspirational,” said Selvey.Attention hovered over the two Joneses, with Geoffrey Boycott acclaiming Simon for producing “the biggest improvement out of all the bowlers in this series.” But he gave short shrift to Geraint, whose keeping, he said, “means the bowlers have to strive much harder. Instead of having to take 10 wickets in an innings, they have to take 14 or 15. Everyone makes mistakes but Jones makes too many. The problem is, I don’t know who you would stick in his place. But if he doesn’t improve soon, his errors will cost a Test match.”David Hopps is not convinced, either. “To believe that Jones’ wicketkeeping will rise to the challenge at the last requires an evangelical zeal. He is the perkiest of batsmen […], but the wicketkeeping, oh the wicketkeeping. How much more pressure can we take?”We are set to find out when this series heads for its dramatic climax at the Oval at the start of September. ‘s Paul Hayward knows just how big a match this will be for English cricket: “There will be a five-day hole in the English economy, a flooding back to the sport that dominated our childhood summers before football rolled its tanks on to the village green and the local rec.”Thumb through the catalogue of great sporting events on English soil since the honeyed summer of ’66,” he added, “and few reach the magnitude of the Oval Test.” If you think the matches to date have been big, the final act will be huge. Don’t go away.

Andrew Flintoff, the England allrounder, has said that he thought it was hard to work with Sourav Ganguly, the India captain, and terms him an awkward character.In an extract from Being Freddie, his autobiography published this week, Flintoff spoke of when Ganguly was his Lancashire team-mate in 2000. “Ganguly just didn’t work out at all,” he wrote. “You can accept a player not playing well, because we all have our ups and downs in our career, but he just didn’t want to get involved.”He wasn’t interested in the other players and it became a situation where it was 10 players and Ganguly in the team. He turned up as if he was royalty – it was like having Prince Charles on your side. There were rumours he was asking people to carry his coffin for him, although he never asked me.”I’ve been out for dinner with him [Ganguly] since that season a couple of times on England duty, the most notable time being that winter in Kenya for the ICC Trophy,” Flintoff continued. “We went out to a little curry house he had found and saw the umpire Venkatraghavan sitting over the other side of the room. Straight away he got up and went over to talk to him for 20 minutes while I sat like a spare part eating my curry on my own. We say hello to each other now and we are pleasant to each other, but it doesn’t go any further than that. I don’t dislike the bloke, but it’s a struggle with him.”

In the past few weeks, Cricinfo has been receiving many comments and queries on the USA Council of League Presidents (CLP), and its apparent failure to capitalize on the overwhelming mandate it received from USA Cricket Association (USACA) on June 4 to carry out a top-to-bottom reform of the organization. Here is our attempt to answer the question, with what information is available to us The CLP has existed on paper for at least as long as the USACA constitution. Ironically, it owes its existence to a political battle within the USACA. The drafters of the original constitution had wanted to add a member to the board of directors to represent the unaffiliated cricket clubs who were not members of any leagues, in order to make the USACA fully representative of US cricket. This was strongly opposed by the established leagues, which instead voted that the extra seat should represent them instead.For good measure, the USACA constitution was also amended to require US leagues to have a minimum of eight member-clubs in order to qualify as a recognized league. Taken together, these changes deprived many independent cricket clubs in the USA – estimated to be between 50 to 100 – of any voice in US cricket affairs, and consolidated power in the hands of the US cricket leagues.By all accounts, the CLP did not do anything of consequence for the past decade, except vote for a representative to sit on the USACA board every two years. In their turn, the CLP representatives seem to have done very little for the US cricket leagues other than to pass through paperwork that emanated from the USACA executive.Things changed after the 2005 USACA elections when, for perhaps the first time in its history, the CLP was actually called to a meeting in Dallas. Gladstone Dainty, president of the USACA, denounced the meeting as illegal. But a substantial majority of USACA member leagues attended anyway, and voted to re-instate Veman Reddy as CLP chairman (he had secured the most votes in the USACA elections but had been disqualified on a technicality). They also passed a series of resolutions and called for an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) of the USACA in New York on June 4.The June 4 EGM was the largest-ever meeting of USACA member clubs and appeared to be a ringing endorsement for radical reform of USACA governance. But, behind the scenes, the CLP was already beginning to run into trouble. Its lawyers suggested that the specific resolutions might not hold up under court challenge, since it could not be proved that every single member club had received written notification for the EGM containing the texts of the proposed resolutions. So the resolutions were shelved, and general resolutions on reforming USACA and asking for new elections were adopted instead.The CLP also appointed a seven-member interim committee to run its affairs. In retrospect, this seems to have been a strategic mistake. The USACA’s attorneys immediately pounced on the list, and added them to the dissidents they had already been suing. They justified their action by saying that the CLP was illegally using USACA’s logo and name on its own web site — a curious argument, since CLP is a part of USACA under its constitution. The dissidents’ attorney, who now also became the CLP’s by default, advised that no further use be made of the CLP website until all legal issues were resolved. The interim council, in its own view, was dead in the water within hours of coming into existence.The CLP’s posture did not sit well with its critics, who accused it of everything from betrayal of its original mandate to knuckling under to legal broadsides. The truth, it now appears, was more complicated. First, there were differences within the interim council, which had been convened hastily and on an ad hoc basis — there were those who wanted to move ahead, and others who wanted to wait to see how the legal issues would play out.Secondly, there were some who wanted to negotiate with Dainty, and others who were adamantly opposed to such moves; the USACA took advantage of these differences, offering incentives to some while negotiating with the others.Thirdly, resentment developed between the CLP and the USACA dissidents who had spearheaded the opposition to Dainty’s USACA, but who now saw themselves being ostracized as part of the old regime who had to be excluded from any future role in USACA.And finally, whatever possibilities might have existed for independent action on the part of CLP were crushed by their own attorney, who warned of dire consequences if they did anything to give Dainty’s attorneys another excuse for legal action. The result was that the CLP ended up playing a zero-sum game with themselves, with nothing to show for their efforts.There are those who equate CLP with USACA, and claim there is little to choose between the two. This would not be an accurate comparison. The USACA, as presently run by Dainty, appears to be an autocratic organization, with decisions made at the top. The CLP, on the other hand, is ultra-democratic, with too may contending opinions and no mechanism or resolving them into action. Neither, it seems, is a good model for US cricket as they stand Each would have to undergo drastic revision before it can compete for attention in US cricket.

Japan claimed their first ICC cricket title with a six-run victory over the Cook Islands in the final of the East Asia-Pacific (EAP) Cricket Cup tournament in Vanuatu.Japan, sent into bat, scored 161 off 48 overs with opening batsmen Tetsuro Chino top scoring with 51 off 120 balls and Cooks’ wicketkeeper Ioane Tangimetua claiming five catches. The Cook Islands fell just short, dismissed for 155 with Tuakana Marukore top scoring with 55 and Chris Brown chipping in with 45. Japan’s paceman Patrick Giles-Jones finished with 3 for 31 off 10 overs.Japan and the Cook Islands, by finishing first and second, qualified for the EAP Cricket Trophy to be played in mid-2006 to claim a place in the World Cricket League in early 2007.Final placings 1 Japan, 2 Cook Islands, 3 Vanuatu, 4 Tonga, 5 Indonesia, 6 Samoa.