Captain VVS Laxman, Arjun Yadav, Pragyan Ojha and Daniel Manohar will be the only four Hyderabad players with an experience of more than 10 first-class matches going into the Ranji Trophy. Hyderabad have been reduced to this situation after almost all of their team defected to the Indian Cricket League (ICL). D Ravi Teja (5 matches), Praneet Arjun (3), Anoof Pai (2), Amol Shinde (2) are the other players with any experience at first-class level.Even Laxman, expected to play Tests for India, might be available for only two games, away matches against Bengal and Punjab. Yadav was appointed the vice-captain for the season. Hyderabad will hope Teja and Arjun build up on their strong debuts last season: Teja, a right-hand opening batsman, scored an 84 against Maharashtra and Arjun, right-arm medium-pacer took four Mumbai wickets in his first showing.Squad: VVS Laxman (captain), Arjun Yadav, DB Ravi Teja, S Daniel Manohar, S Anoof Pai, Amol Shinde, Habeeb Ahmed (wk), Pragyan Ojha, Praneet Arjun, SM Shoaib, Ashwin Yadav, A Lalith Mohan, Vishal Sharma, Mohammad Ahmed Shakeer, Danny Dereck Prince
Uttar Pradesh Any premiership coach will tell you the season after winning the championship is the toughest. Uttar Pradesh should keep that in mind, especially because their success was built around natural talent and not systems, unorthodox methods and not planning. Last season turned into a fairytale where they surprised everybody and probably themselves too. Mohammad Kaif, their captain for the latter half of the season, conjured up innovative ways to stun team after team, and led them to their first Ranji Trophy title. Many teams will anticipate their out-of-the-box strategies and moreover, the lead cast from 2005-06 – Kaif and Suresh Raina currently in South Africa – will miss at least the start of the season.UP will once again depend on youth, despite having the grand old trinity of Ashish Winston Zaidi, Gyanendra Pandey, and Rizwan Shamshad. Their bowling looks stronger than last year with Rudra Pratap Singh adding variety to a line-up that includes Shalabh Srivastava, Praveen Kumar, and Piyush Chawla. Kumar’s ability to play cameos anywhere in the order – as he did last season – will continue to be a bonus.The hostel system – a unique method of nurturing school kids – continues to churn out a major chunk of their talent and if UP can add a modicum of method to their resources, they will be the team to beat at the business end of the season.What they did last season From having four points after four matches and facing relegation, UP produced a spectacular turnaround to beat Hyderabad, Andhra, and Mumbai to reach the final. They continued their surprise-tactics in the title clash as well and opened the batting with Kumar, a strategy that proved crucial to the final outcome. Kumar responded with an upper-cut off his first ball and scored 48 off 55 balls, an innings which demoralised Bengal’s bowlers. They claimed the trophy on the basis of their first-innings lead. Raina, with 620 runs at 68.88 was third on the overall run-scorers’ list; Kumar, with 41 wickets at 23.97, was second in the charts and he also scored 368 runs. The duo, along with Chawla, was among three of the top performers of the Ranji trophy last season.Men to watch RP Singh will have the most at stake. He’s the closest to national selection as far as the World Cup goes and a smashing start to the season could pave a way for his comeback. India will not be playing home Tests before the end of the Ranji season and that also gives Chawla another complete season to develop his skills and prove that he is indeed India’s next quality spinner. Another promising young batsman is left-hand opener and former U-19 captain, Ravikant Shukla.
Baroda Baroda, never one of the fancied teams from West Zone, have slowly but steadily built a team that must be taken seriously at all levels. Yet, as is so often the case, all the good work has been undone by forces beyond the control of the team management and the Baroda Cricket Association. Irfan Pathan, one of Baroda’s key players, is unavailable to them because of India duties, and Zaheer Khan, who has been a stand-out performer at the domestic level, has moved to Mumbai.Instead of moaning about what might have been, Dashrat Pardeshi, the former Baroda left-arm spinner and currently chairman of the selection committee, is looking at kick-starting the rebuilding process, and using this as an opportunity to strengthen other areas of his team. “If you go into the past Zaheer [Khan] was our main strike weapon, along with Rakesh Patel,” he told . “Our bowling strength in the last five years has depended on medium-pacers, and they have proved their worth. Now that this is weakened we are strengthening the batting and spinning departments.”Pardeshi went on to make a critical point. “Selection on potential and future prospects is fine at the Under-19 level. But at this level you have to take into account more than that,” he explained. “Now that the money factor comes into it as well – the players are paid well for each Ranji match, you have to take into account performances in local tournaments, past Ranji matches and other important matches, not just potential.” With this in mind Baroda are looking to pack their team with batsmen and allrounders.What they did last season Having topped their group in the league phase of the Ranji Trophy with 19 points, Baroda went into their semifinal against Bengal, at Kolkata, with high hopes. But their batsmen failed in the first innings, with only a century from Kiran Powar pushing the score up to 241. Bengal responded with a mammoth 619 – Subhomoy Das, Deep Dasgupta and Lakshmi Rattan Shukla all scoring hundreds, ending the match as a contest. Baroda’s batting once again let them down in the second innings, and when the match ended they were on 252 for 8 and lucky not to have been beaten outright.Men to watch With their team weakened Baroda have looked to induct players from the Under-22 level. These include Ketan Panchal and Pinal Shah, the wicketkeeper, who has already played for India U-19. Broadly, Baroda have gone in for a flavour of youth, but their core still remains the veterans – Jacob Martin and Connor Williams, the top-order batsmen, and the likes of Ajit Bhoite. With Ashok Mankad, that wily old fox, as coach, you can expect that no team will take Baroda lightly and get away with it.
Mumbai Mumbai have won the Ranji Trophy so many times more than anyone else that it is difficult not to peg them as one of the favourites. Amol Muzumdar, a veteran of 13 domestic seasons, has been chosen to lead this season, in place of Nilesh Kulkarni, the left-arm spinner, who will focus on his bowling.Mumbai have a new coach as well. Pravin Amre is well aware of the modern game and its demands, while being firmly rooted in the old style of Mumbai cricket. In recent years there has been talk of a decline in the lofty standards of Mumbai batsmanship – built on the premise that you put an extremely high premium on your wicket. It is this attitude, the mentality, that Amre is aiming to re-instill in this team. “See any team at the start of the season begins with an aim of winning the Ranji Trophy. It’s no different with us,” Amre told Cricinfo. “What makes me really positive is the fact that the selectors, the captain and the coach are all working in one direction. While we’re looking at developing youngsters and promoting them we’re also taking into account the important role the seniors play.” When asked what the primary focus would be, the coach said, “The batting department has to click. That’s crucial. We need to focus a lot on skill training, and that’s what I’ll be doing.”The one thing that has held Mumbai in good stead in the recent past, however, is the manner in which the team has fought back in a crisis. The lower order – especially the likes of Ramesh Powar, Sairaj Bahutule (now with Maharashtra) and Vinayak Samant have chipped in with vital runs when the top order has stumbled. The challenge for the team, though, is in the medium-pace department. With seniors Ajit Agarkar and Zaheer Khan away on national duty, and Avishkar Salvi not in the squad for the first two matches, it provides an opportunity for someone like Kshemal Waingankar, who will be making his Ranji debut, a chance to prove himself.What they did last season When Mumbai topped their group in the league phase with 16 points and set themselves up for a home semi-final at the Wankhede Stadium against UP, there was widespread hope that an outright win would pitchfork them into the final. There was an outright win alright, but it was for UP, by five wickets, as Mumbai’s batsmen failed to fire in either innings. Once the home of Indian batsmanship, Mumbai did not have anyone in the top six who had represented India. Knocked out in the semi-final, they were forced to lick their wounds, only taking consolation from the fact that they had lost to the eventual champions.Men to watch There was a time when Mumbai was bursting with talent ready to force its way into the Indian team. At the moment, though, there’s really only one man on the fringe, and that’s Rohit Sharma, the middle-order batsman. For over a year now he has caught the eye with his stylish stroke play, but when he had the chance to make it count – in the Challenger Series – he could not make the most of it, coming up with two cameos but no innings of substance. Still, it is he that opposition teams will worry about, apart of course from the ever-prolific Muzumdar, despite no longer being the scary force he once was.
ScorecardWellington bowled themselves into a position of complete control against Canterbury at the Village Green, Christchurch. After day two was wrecked by rain and a late start on day three, Wellington took their score through to 512 before dismissing Canterbury for a paltry 181. Only Nixon McLean impressed, scoring an unbeaten half century (53 not out) on his Canterbury debut. Mark Gillespie (3 for 53), Iain O’Brien (3 for 34) and Grant Elliott (3 for 45) were the pick of the bowlers. Canterbury were 0 for 0 following on. ScorecardOtago will be hoping to return to Harry Barker Reserve tomorrow to perform last rites on an outclassed Northern Districts side. Already leading by 219 on the first innings, Otago had Northern in all sorts of trouble at stumps on the third day at 104 for 5. By close of play Daniel Flynn (28 not out) and Joseph Yovich (23 not out) were attempting a salvage job but the odds were stacked against them. The only disappointing factor for Otago was Aaron Redmond failed in his bid for a century. Stranded on 99 not out overnight, he was trapped in front by Graeme Aldridge, a national prospect, without adding to his score. Northern’s batsmen could get no change from Otago’s seam attack and for the second time in the match suffered a top-order collapse. Both David Sewell and Warren McSkimming picked up two wickets ScorecardA draw looks the most likely option in the Central Districts-Auckland match at McLean Park. Facing a 103-run deficit on the first innings, Central had batted themselves into a position of some comfort at 200 for 3 at stumps. Mathew Sinclair, the New Zealand discard, made an accomplished 61, before Peter Ingram (55) and Geoff Barnett (61 not out) joined in a stand of 95 for the third wicket. Kerry Walmsley has two of the three wickets to fall. Auckland should have been in a much better position but batted so slowly yesterday that an outright victory is now no more than a long shot. Its 327 was scored in 130 overs with Michael Mason taking 3 for 42 off 29 overs and Brendon Diamanti 5 for 82 off 30 overs.
Scorecard Maninder Bisla and Sangram Singh shared a massive 268-run partnership as Himachal Pradesh took control of their opening game against Kerala at Palghat. After electing to bat first, Himachal lost both their openers with just 53 on the board. But both Bisla and Sangram cracked unbeaten hundreds and flogged the bowlers to all corners of the park. Himachal finished the day in complete command as newly relegated Kerala wondered what depths awaited them yet. Scorecard Pravanjan Mullick helped Orissa get out of a sticky situation as they finished the first day with 276 for 6 at Srinagar. Jammu & Kashmir’s decision to field first appeared to have been justified when they reduced Orissa to 74 for 4. But a 99-run stand between Mullick and Pinninti Jayachandra (59) rescued them before Debasis Mohanty, the former Indian swing bowler, then made a handy 43 and helped continue the fightback. Scorecard Seventeen wickets tumbled on the opening day at Nagpur as Vidarbha and Rajasthan began their campaigns. Chandrasekhar Atram and Sandeep Singh, the Vidarbha opening bowlers, snapped up seven wickets between them as Rajasthan were skittled out for just 101 after being inserted. Vidarbha also found the going extremely tough, as S Mathur and Pudiyangum Krishnakumar reduced them to 97 for 7 at the end of the first day. Scorecard Jasvir Singh compiled a patient 109 as Services were well placed after choosing to bat first in their game against Goa at Palam A Stadium in Delhi. Madhusudhan Reddy, the opener, made 75 and his 156-run second-wicket stand with Jasvir helped to set a solid platform. Scorecard The Bihar bowlers restricted Saurashtra to a modest 230 for 6 at the end of the opening day at Rajkot. Shitanshu Kotak’s painstaking 68, spread over nearly five hours, was the main contribution for Saurashtra as most of the batsmen got a start but failed to kick on to a big score. Jaydev Shah and Prakash Bhatt made 40 apiece but the Bihar bowlers struck at regular intervals and gave their team the upper hand.
Kent’s director of cricket, Ian Brayshaw, has turned down the offer of an extension to his contract, and will not be returning to Canterbury next season.”I have enjoyed every minute of my time at Kent,” said Brayshaw, who is to return home to Perth after two years. "I shall take with me many happy memories and am confident that the club will continue to perform at the top of English county cricket for many years to come.”Kent finished third in the Championship last season, and put a bad start to 2003 behind them to finish mid-table in Division One, although they still face relegation in the National League unless they can beat Warwickshire on Sunday. “The playing staff contains some highly talented cricketers who offer the club a really exciting future,” said Brayshaw. "In Simon Willis and Chris Stone the club have two excellent coaches.””Ian has made a huge contribution during his two years at Kent," said their chairman of cricket Mike Denness. “He has left us with his thoughts regarding the best possible coaching structure for the future. We will be giving these full consideration over the next few weeks before making any decision regarding his successor.”
Two umpiring mates, Brent Bowden and Tony Hill, chatted about their Christmas-present wish-list during the Auckland-Central Districts State Championship match at Eden Park Outer Oval last week.Both said that top of the present list would be a free five-day pass as umpires to a New Zealand Test match against the touring Bangladesh side.Yesterday Brian Aldridge, the New Zealand Cricket umpiring manager, changed into a red suit, donned the white whiskers and with a ho-ho-ho granted both their wishes.Hill, from Papakura and a staunch Counties and Northern Districts man, will stand in the first Bangladesh-New Zealand Test at Hamilton starting on December 18, and Bowden will be umpire for the second Test at the Basin Reserve starting on December 26.This will be Hill’s first Test, and Bowden’s second – he stood in the New Zealand-Australia Test at Eden Park in early 2000.”Billy” Bowden was delighted to be back in the Test lists, and especially pleased that Hill had won his first Test, after six years an umpire and seven One-Day Internationals.”This is a fantastic thing for Tony, he has earned it and now he will have the special pleasure of starting his Test career on his home ND ground at Hamilton,” said Bowden.”It will be good to have a Test at Hamilton, with ‘Turk’ (John Turkington, the ND chief executive) and my Northern Districts mates there,” said Hill.”I realised that this is the last year under the present Test umpiring appointment system, and next year the International Cricket Councill will change the system,” said Hill, “so I was rather hopeful that I could get a Test before the new scheme comes in.”And now it comes as a nicely wrapped Christmas present.”Bowden and the touring Bangladeshis will get a preview of each other’s Test form when the tourists start a three-day game against a New Zealand District Association XI at Wanganui tomorrow. Bowden and Dave Quested will be the umpires, Hill and David Orchard (South Africa) will handle the first Test and Bowden and Daryl Harper (Australia) will stand in the second.Barry Jarman of Australia will be the ICC match referee for both Tests.Trevor Chappell, the Bangladesh coach, had his team training this afternoon soon after arriving in Wanganui, and said he had been delighted at the quality of practice facilities offered his team.He expected to name his playing team after inspecting the Victoria Park pitch. It will be a journey into the unknown for Chappell – he does not have any knowledge of the ability or the form of the District Association XI.Teams:Bangladesh (from): Khaled Mashud (captain), Habibul Bashar, Aminul Islam, Javed Omar, Mohammad Ashraful, Al Sahariar, Enamul Haque, Hasibul Hossain, Mohammad Sharif, Khaled Mahmud, Fahim Muntasir, Tushar Imran, Mashrafe Mortaza, Sanwar Hossain.New Zealand District Association XI: Peter McGlashan, Tim Anderson, Simon Andrews, Peter Fulton, Jaden Hatwell, Peter Ingram, Harley James, Taraia Robin, Grant Robinson, Neil Rushton, Greg Todd, Scott Baldwin (12th man).
Tharindu Kaushal’s indifferent outing at Galle raised concerns over whether he could become Rangana Herath’s spin-bowling successor, but Herath himself could still play for some time yet, Angelo Mathews said. Herath played a leading role in a second successive Galle victory for Sri Lanka, this time claiming match figures of 10 for 147.Herath is now 37 (five years older than Dhammika Prasad, who was Sri Lanka’s second-oldest player in this XI) and has said he would assess his future and retirement following next year’s World T20. Mathews had also suggested that Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene had more international cricket in them, but both batsmen have now retired, leaving Mathews with a green Test top order.”I believe, Rangana can play few more years because he is also working very hard with our trainer and now he has reduced lot of weight,” Mathews said. “We mustn’t look at his age but at his performance. That said, I accept the fact that other bowlers also should come up. If they want to achieve what Rangana has achieved, they need to work hard.”Among those needing work is Kaushal, who returned figures of 1 for 94 in this Test match. He had been particularly disappointing in the first innings, where he failed to find a consistent length, and proved expensive. He also overstepped six times.Kaushal was recently banned from bowling the doosra, following biomechanical Tests in Chennai. Both Mathews and the Sri Lanka team’s coaches believe he can be penetrative even without that delivery, particularly as he turns the offbreak substantially. However, his lack of control and subtlety appear to be frustrating his career.”Tharindu Kaushal was pretty disappointing – he was not bowling at his best,” Mathews said. “We wanted to go with Kaushal, especially on this wicket. It was a tactical move. We wanted someone who can really give it a rip on this wicket. Unfortunately, he was pretty poor in this game.”He’s still working very hard with spin coach Piyal Wijetunge. We just wanted him to bowl his offspinners on the spot. If he does that, he’s going to get lot more wickets than with his doosra. But he didn’t do that well. He can keep improving.Mathews suggested the team was wary of asking Kaushal to make too many changes so early in his career. “When it comes to pace, he doesn’t change his pace that much. We didn’t want to change him upside down, because the way he bowls, he’s going to get lot of wickets.”Mathews issued glowing praise to the top-order batsmen that formed the bedrock of Sri Lanka’s first innings 484. The top four had had a particularly lean series against India, against whom Sri Lanka did not cross 400. Opener Dimuth Karunaratne made a career-best 186, and for much of that innings batted in the company of Dinesh Chandimal, who hit 151. The pair put on 238 for the third wicket.”We had some individual brilliance to lead us to victory,” Mathews said. “To start off with, Dimuth and Chandimal were brilliant. They batted us to a position where we could hardly lose. After getting 480-odd, it gives the bowlers some cushioning to go out there and enjoy themselves. We haven’t put up a total like that for quite some time.”We can’t keep talking of the past all the time, so we’ve decided to take up the challenge and responsibility. After Sangakkara and Mahela left the team, we needed those guys to stand up and take the responsibility. I’m glad that they did it.”
Aston Villa’s draw at the weekend signaled the club’s worst start to a new league season since 1969, as yet again the individual errors continued to pile up, with Joe Bennett’s red card proving so costly this time around and with the club sitting just outside the relegation zone, are Paul Lambert’s immediate future and the club’s Premier League status in danger?
After taking just six points from their opening nine games, the current league table does not make for pretty reading for supporters and they sit in 17th place, just two points above struggling promoted outfits Reading and Southampton and an out-of-sorts QPR side.
The old adage is that the league usually sorts itself out after the first 10 games and that the cream will inevitably rise to the top, which looks about right at the moment with Chelsea and both Manchester clubs occupying the top three. Conversely, though, those teams set to struggle will sink to the bottom and unfortunately it looks already like the club are going to have a serious relegation battle on their hands this term.
Lambert has had a tricky start to the season in terms of league fixtures but he’s yet to play any of last season’s top four either home and away and the last two home games against Norwich and West Brom will go down as a missed opportunity that they drew both matches. While game away at Newcastle and Tottenham are more than difficult, they’ve been truly rotten on the road picking up just one point in five games so far and scoring just two goals.
The side have looked bereft of quality and most importantly creativity this campaign; we all knew that taking over from the ruinous reign of Alex McLeish was going to be a difficult job and a long-term one at that, but nobody banked on the club having quite the awful start that they’ve had. Charles N’Zogbia hasn’t been able to break into the side of late and Darren Bent continues to be bizarrely overlooked when they look short of goals in favour of the raw but profligate Christian Benteke.
A few more factoids for you – McLeish amassed 11 points from his first nine league games last season compared to Lambert’s six, Gabriel Agbonlahor was the only player to start against Norwich with more than 100 Premier League appearances under his belt and he hasn’t scored in his last 28 top flight games. They’ve kept just one clean sheet this season and they have won just one of their last 19 league games.
That last statistic will tell you that the problem is simply more to do with the manager, rather a systemic lack of confidence and crucially, lack of form and quality in key areas, so we cannot lay the blame entirely at Lambert’s door, nor should the club panic and seek to replace him.
However, you have to question the wisdom with bringing in a whole swathe of inexperienced lower league players in the way that Lambert has when the club are looking to establish themselves in mid-table. The likes of Bennett, Bowery and Lowton are unfamiliar with the demands of the top flight while El Ahmadi, Holman, Vlaar and Benteke all require a settling in period, even if the foreign recruits have all done reasonably well up until this point.
In that sense, it’s misplaced arrogance on Lambert’s part that he felt that by placing his faith in the club’s youth would be enough to see them through and he’s constructed one of the most vulnerable sides in the Premier League at present, all of his own making. Bolstered by how well his inexperienced Norwich side did last season, he’s attempted to replicate that young, hungry vigour at Aston Villa but it’s not worked yet and it ignores the fact that the Canaries had an extremely settled side after winning back-to-back promotions, while at Villa Park, the new players have been hamstrung by the doom and gloom around the place.
Of course, the obvious counter-argument to this is that Lambert has been urged from above to move on some of the club’s biggest earners and that this situation has been foisted upon him somewhat. Mark Hughes’ QPR side also serve to highlight that experience is not necessarily key to a team performing well given their terrible start to the new campaign, plus their 4-2 win away at Manchester City in the Capital One Cup hinted that there’s good side trying to break through, just that they lack consistency, which at least bodes well for the future.
This is Aston Villa’s worst league start in 43 years, even worse than the 1986-7 season when they were relegated from the top flight, so it shows you how serious their current situation is. While patience may be the watchword of Lambert’s regime at the moment, should they continue to struggle to pick up points on the road and at home, then owner Randy Lerner will be faced with a difficult decision. The 43-year-old boss has been saved by the poor form of others and comparisons to McLeish so far, but they cannot save him forever.
FootballFanCast General Stay ahead in the world of football analysis, commentary, and fan insights with FootballFancast. FootballFanCast General Stay ahead in the world of football analysis, commentary, and fan insights with FootballFancast.
By subscribing, you agree to receive newsletter and marketing emails, and accept Valnet’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. You can unsubscribe anytime.
Former Zimbabwe captain Terrence Duffin is set to make a comeback when he turns out for Zimbabwe A in their South African Airways Challenge Pool B match against South African provincial side Gauteng at Queens Sports Club in Bulawayo.Duffin last played competitive cricket at the beginning of May when he turned out for Southerns in the Logan Cup. He aggravated a thumb injury that he suffered against South Africa in September last year and missed out on the first-class matches against India A and South Africa A, and was not considered for the Twenty20 World Championship in South Africa last month.A good performance from Duffin will certainly see him being called up to the Zimbabwe senior national team set to play against Sri Lanka. Duffin is expected to bring solidity into the Zimbabwe top-order batting order and should combine well with Tino Mawoyo.Blessing Mahwire, the fast bowler, has replaced Mawoyo as captain and looks set to lead the bowling attack while legspinners Graeme Cremer and Tafadzwa Kamungozi will fight it out should coach Andy Pycroft opt for one slow bowler.The South Africans arrived in Zimbabwe’s second largest city on Wednesday afternoon and held one practice session at the match venue.Gauteng are captained by Shane Burger and coached by Lawrence Mahaklane.On Sunday, the two teams meet in a limited overs match at the same venue before the South Africans head back home.Zimbabwe A Blessing Mahwire (capt), Terry Duffin, Graeme Cremer, Trevor Garwe, Prosper Tsvanu, Alester Maregwede, Regis Chakabva (wk), Kamungozi, Tino Mawoyo, Eric Chauluka, Tendai Chisoro, Admire Manyumwa, Steven Nyamuzinga.Gauteng Shane Burger (capt), Richard Cameron, Richard das Neves, Yunus Keiler, Johnson Mafa, Dumisa Makalima, Brian Mathebula, William Motaung, Omphile Ramela, Warren Swann, Jean Symes, Dane Villas.
Australia 9 for 602 dec and 1 for 202 dec beat England 157 and 370 (Collingwood 96, Pietersen 92) by 277 runs Scorecard and ball-by-ball commentary How they were out – England
Australia needed just 19 overs on the final morning at Brisbane to wrap up the first Test by the whopping margin of 277 runs, as England’s final five wickets folded for the addition of 77. Their slim chances of saving the game effectively ended after four balls when Kevin Pietersen flicked Brett Lee to Damien Martyn at short midwicket. He failed to add to his overnight 92.Resuming on 293 for 7, England’s hopes depended largely on some conflicting weather forecasts, but the day dawned bright and heroics rather than hail were needed. Lee took the new ball after the first delivery, and three balls later Pietersen was on his way.Geraint Jones and Ashley Giles gave the vocal Barmy Army – sitting together for the first time in the match and relishing the freedom – some cheer with a few spirited blows, but Jones’s breezy 33 ended when one from Glenn McGrath kept low from a good length and shattered his stumps via an inside edge.Giles continued the resistance in partnership with Matthew Hoggard and peppered the off-side boundary with some effective cuts, but he too fell on the stroke of drinks, as Stuart Clark cramped him for room and Shane Warne at first slip took a comfortable catch from a thin deflection. The same combination dealt with Hoggard six overs later, and the end came swiftly when Harmison hooked Clark to McGrath at fine leg,Australia’s two injury worries – Ricky Ponting and McGrath – both took the field, but McGrath needed injections in his sore heel while Ponting’s back was clearly still an issue as he stood stiffly at mid-off rather than his more customary slip.