Sports

London, June 25: Sania Mirza hopes that within a few years she won’t be the only Indian tennis star battling at the highest level.

Mirza said there was finally plenty of talent beginning to come through the ranks as interest in the sport picks up.

And though the 22-year-old does not feel lonely on the tour, she is aware of the pressure on her shoulders as India’s only top-100 player.

“I hope there’s a lot more tennis players, especially women, come up from India,” she said.

Kingston, June 25 : West Indies coach John Dyson said his resurgent team will be more dangerous at home turf and will play an aggressive brand of cricket in the One-day seeries against India starting on Friday.

Dyson said they have chalked out strategies to tackle key Indian players, though he admitted the new members in the side could spring a surprise.

India would take field in the first of the four ODIs at Sabina Park here Friday, with key players like Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag and Zaheer Khan missing from the series.

Karachi, June 25: Pakistan skipper Younis Khan may have announced his retirement from twenty20 internationals but PCB chief Ejaz Butt says he is confident of convincing the senior batsman to reconsider his decision.

Butt told reporters at the reception hosted by the Prime Minister for the World Cup winning team that he would talk to Younis and convince him to change his decision to retire from T20 cricket.

Karachi, June 25: Pakistani cricketers are planning to encash their Twenty20 World Cup triumph and ask for a hike in the existing contracts with their respective Indian Premier League franchisees next season.

After IPL organisers announced that Pakistani players would be welcome to play next season subject to clearance from both governments, sources in the sports management company representing players like Misbah-ul-Haq, Sohail Tanvir, Umar Gul or Kamran Akmal said they are unlikely to play on their old contractual terms of USD 100,000 each.

Hamburg, June 25: Formula One racing was the winner when Max Mosley caved in to a group of rebel teams to ensure the future of the sport, insiders and the international media said on Thursday.

A deal struck on Wednesday between eight teams organized in the umbrella body FOTA and the world governing body FIA run by Mosley ended a bitter two-month standoff in which the teams had threatened to form a breakaway deal.

New Delhi, June 25: India start their campaign on Friday to put the bad memory of their failure in the World Twenty20 behind them, when they face West Indies in the first One-day International of the four match series.

India and their opponents settle back down to the bump and grind of 50 overs-a-side matches, following a heavy diet of Twenty20 cricket for several of the players in the form of the second edition of the Indian Premier League in South Africa, and the World Twenty20 in England.

But it’s the World Twenty20 which is still fresh on the minds of the Indians.

London, June 25: An inconsistent Sania Mirza’s Wimbledon hopes ended with a second round exit at the hands of her friend Sorana Cristea 4-6, 4-6 at the All England Club here Wednesday.

The Romanian teenager continued her cruise in women’s tennis as he dispatched Sania in an hour and 22 minutes to reach the third round.

Cristea had caused a flutter in the Grand Slam at French Open, knocking out former World No.1 Jelena Jankovic to seal a quarterfinal place.

New Delhi, June 24: Sri Lanka has agreed to allow a ship to off-load its contents, relief material sent by Tamil diaspora, External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna said here Wednesday after meeting a delegation from the island.
Krishna told reporters he had urged Sri Lanka to give permission to the relief ship as a “humanitarian gesture”.

“The Sri Lankan delegation kindly agreed to our suggestion and the ship would now be routed to Sri Lanka through the Indian Red Cross,” he said.

Islamabad, June 24: The Indian team under Mahendra Singh Dhoni was reluctant to play against Pakistan in the Twenty20 World Cup and it showed in their attitude, alleged flamboyant all-rounder Shahid Afridi.

Even though the arch-rivals did not meet in the main tournament, they featured in a sold-out warm up match and Afridi alleged Dhoni and his men did not look keen to play Pakistan even though they claimed so.

London, June 24: Asserting that Twenty20 will be the future of cricket, former Australian wicket-keeper Adam Gilchrist reckons that the game must face up to the reality that some of the world’s best players may put the shortest version before their commitment to Test cricket.

”We’ve very much got to be prepared for that,” Gilchrist said. ”I don’t think it should be a shock when it does happen or if it does happen. In an administrative sense we’ve got to get the planning and scheduling right. The players are crying out to say they want a window for the IPL.

New Delhi, June 24: The former Indian batsman Sanjay Manjrekar said that Pakistan captain Younis Khan’s decision to quit Twenty20 came at wrong time as this will affect the performance of his country’s team in this quick format of cricket.

Manjrekar termed Younis’s decision to quit T20 cricket as ill-timed as according to him, Pakistan team is at the stage of rising in the cricket world and they need good leadership to continue their winning strike.

Karachi, June 24: The short gap between the recently concluded ICC World Twenty20 and the next edition in the West Indies in April 2010 has robbed Pakistan of the chance to fully savour the triumph, the allrounder Shahid Afridi has said.

“I fail to understand why the next World Cup will be played in nine months time,” Afridi told reporters on arrival in Karachi. “If it was being organised after two years, people would have remembered Pakistan’s victory and it would have been more enjoyable.”

Washington, June 24: Pakistan’s victory in the world Twenty20 championship is “the best news” for the trouble-torn country since former president Pervez Musharraf’s exit and gives Pakistanis a new weapon to fight the Taliban, according to a noted Forbes columnist.

Karachi, June 24: Wasim Akram, the former Pakistan fast bowler, has said the 17-year-old left-arm seamer Mohammad Aamer needs to put on weight to add more power to his bowling.

Aamer who called for his selection to the national side in July last year, made his international debut in the World Twenty 20 and took six wickets at a strike-rate of 24 from seven matches. He played a crucial role in the final, dismissing Tillakaratne Dilshan for a duck in the first over.

London, June 24: Shahid Afridi, who guided Pakistan to glory in the Twenty20 World Cup, may soon receive an offer to play in Sheffield Shield for the Australian domestic side New South Wales.

The 29-year-old cricketer helped Pakistan win their first major title in 17 years by beating their sub-continental rival Sri Lanka by eight wickets in the final at Lord’s on Sunday.

“He is clearly one of the world’s best Twenty20 players, but also he would be a valuable addition to our dressing room, our young players would learn a lot from him.”

Hyderabad, June 24: The Andhra Pradesh government Tuesday ordered probe into allegations that suspended secretary of Andhra Cricket Association (ACA) V. Chamundeswarnath sexually exploited women cricketers.

State Home Minister P. Sabita Indra Reddy ordered a special officer to look into the complaints that Chamundeswarnath sought sexual favours from women cricketers for selection.

The special officer will also probe allegations of corruption against Chamundeswarnath, who was manager of Indian women’s team at Twenty 20 World Cup.

London, June 24: Shane Warne, the former Australian legspinner, has said the decision to leave out Michael Vaughan from the pre-Ashes camp was a blunder given his wealth of experience as a former Ashes-winning captain.

Vaughan has made only 147 runs at 21.00 for Yorkshire this season and the chief selector Geoff Miller said he would have to make runs consistently in the county season to force his way back.

London, June 24: Andy Murray needed a tough effort to finally get past upset-minded US player Robert Kendrick 7-5, 6-7 (3-7), 6-3, 6-4 to thrill a Centre court crowd Wednesday at Wimbledon.
Third seed Murray fired 20 aces, with Kendrick producing 16 of his own.

New Delhi, June 23: After her title triumph in Indonesia Super Series, a confident Saina Nehwal will open her campaign against Thailand’s Porntip Buranaprasertsuk in the Malaysian Open Grand Prix Gold badminton at Johar Bahru Wednesday.

Saina has been given the second seeding in the tournament while France’s Pi Hongyan is the top seed in the 32-player draw.

The 19-year-old Indian upset world No. 3 Chinese Lin Wang Sunday to become the first Indian to win a Super Series tournament.

London, June 23: There was a time, not all that long ago, when Maria Sharapova wondered when she would be back at Grand Slam tournaments, let alone winning matches.

Surgery in October on her right shoulder a fairly important part of a tennis player’s body forced Sharapova off the tour for the better part of a year. She returned to singles action last month, and she struggled quite a bit yesterday before reaching the second round at Wimbledon getting past qualifier Viktoriya Kutuzova of Ukraine 7-5, 6-4.

Maria Sharapova

New Delhi, June 23: The practice match of the touring Indian team ahead of four-match ODI series in West Indies has been cancelled due to Swine flu outbreak in Trinidad and Tobago.

The Indian team has been advised to not leave their team hotel to avoid any infection as a precautionary measure.

The Trinidad and Tobago Health Ministry said the match was called off as a measure of preventing spread of influenza A (H1N1) virus.

Kingston, June 23: The Indian team sports a distinctly depleted look in absence of Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag and Zaheer Khan but West Indies captain Chris Gayle said he would not make the folly of underestimating the visitors in the forthcoming four-match ODI series starting on Friday.

After arriving here from England along with Ramnaresh Sarwan, Jerome Taylor and Xavier Marshall, Gayle said India maybe without some of the star players but West Indies would do well not to take them lightly.

Dhaka, June 23: Bangladeshi cricket authorities have sacked the national team captain, an official said, 10 days after returning home to fans angry at an early exit from the World Twenty20 tournament.

“Mohammad Ashraful has been removed from the captaincy because of poor batting,” an official, who declined to be named. The 24-year-old middle order batsman bore the brunt of the blame for the team’s disastrous performance in the competition in England which saw them exit after the first round of play.

Islamabad, June 23: Pakistan Cricket Board Director General Javed Miandad wants Younis Khan to take back his decision of retiring from Twenty20 cricket, saying his presence was important to defend the World T20 title next year and win the 2011 ODI World Cup.

“The next T20 World Cup is just a year away and then we have the main World Cup in early 2011 so it would be better if Younis remained captain in all forms of the game,” he said.

London, June 23: Scarcely had the players stepped off the field at Lord’s when celebratory gunfire began to crackle nearly 4,000 miles away. Sweets were thrust into smiling mouths. Children danced with unrestrained glee. And cars raced through the streets, packed with revellers as they whooped with delight and waved the Pakistani flag.