Print Wrap: Daily dose of headlines

Every morning Cricketnirvana brings you a roundup of headlines from the leading national dailies across the cricketing nations. Here's what some of the newspapers are talking about…
 

A choice beyond comprehension

Australian cricket writer, Peter Roebuck, in The Age presents his views about the re-appointment of Chris Gayle as West Indies captain for their tour down-under…

Chris Gayle's nomination as West Indian captain for the tour down under is beyond comprehension. Far from standing firm, the West Indian Cricket Board has capitulated in the most craven manner. Never mind that its captain and senior players have let it down badly and repeatedly. Never mind that many have been inactive, almost inert. Never mind that Gayle's team was mauled in England or that a shadow side had perforce been sent to the Champions Trophy. Never mind that Gayle himself has seemed hell-bent on destruction. Still the board accommodated the ringleader of the rebellion.

Gayle is a busted flush. Sympathisers say he cares about West Indian cricket. If so, he has a curious way of showing it. Appointed on a wing and a prayer by authorities desperate to stop the inexorable slide in West Indian cricket, the languid Jamaican has been a profound disappointment. If nothing else, his abject performance during the Test series in England ought to have cost him his job. Given the honour of captaining the party and therefore following in the footsteps of Sir Frank Worrell, Sir Garfield Sobers and Clive Lloyd, the sunglassed opener promptly signed to play for the Kolkata Klowns (or whatever) in the IPL and arranged to join the team a week before the first Test. Then he lingered longer, played an extra match and arrived a couple of days before the series began. So much for leadership, for the great tradition of West Indian cricket, for Test cricket.

Inevitably, the West Indies were routed. By all accounts they barely put up a fight. Admittedly, it was cold in Durham but that hardly explains, let alone excuses, an abject display. If it was not the lowest point in Caribbean cricket then it was mighty close. And Gayle was the leader. Mostly he stood at slip, smothered in sweaters, watching as his team was torn apart. The West Indies were present in body but not mind, let alone spirit.

Nor is that all. Next, Gayle and chums refused to represent the region in an international tournament in South Africa, thereby letting down hosts, opponents and supporters. Talks between their association and the WICB had broken down. By all mature accounts the demands of the players were unreasonable. They demanded the overwhelming bulk of cricket revenue to be split between them. Floyd Reiffer was put in charge of a shadow team. His players did their best but lacked depth. Rejection has been their reward. Meanwhile, West Indian cricket's truest leader, Daren Ganga, a tactician with a proven record and an ability to unite his players, has not made the touring party….


Bollinger confident about his future after champagne performances

After back-to-back impressive ODI performances in India, an extremely confident Aussie pacer, Doug Bollinger expects to be a regular fixture in the national squad, writes The Sydney Morning Herald…

Mohali: It has taken two games for Doug Bollinger to prove himself to be Australia's in-form bowler.

A solid Champions League Twenty20 campaign for NSW was not enough to get the left-armer picked for the opening two matches against India, but his subsequent bowling efforts in games three and four have seemingly made him a certain starter for the remainder of the seven-match series.

Last Saturday night, Bollinger was the only Australian bowler not to feel the force of Yuvraj Singh and Mahendra Dhoni in their dominant 148-run stand at Delhi, conceding 26 runs from his 10 overs when the others were going at more than four runs an over.
When Mitchell Johnson was belted for 34 runs from his opening three overs on Monday night in Mohali, Bollinger was the man Ricky Ponting turned to to curb Virender Sehwag. He dismissed the aggressive opening batsman with just his fourth delivery, one of three top-five scalps he took in the match, including that of Indian captain Dhoni for 26, in his 3-38 from nine overs.

However, Bollinger's game-changing performance did not earn him the man-of-the-match award, with that going to Shane Watson for the 3-29 and 49 with the bat. But Bollinger insisted he was not at all hung-up on the decision.

''That's all right, as long as we win - that's the be-all and end-all,'' he said. ''We're two-all now and we're going to Hyderabad pretty confident.''

While it would have been easy for Bollinger, in just his fifth one-day international, to lose faith after bowling so well in Delhi but going unrewarded, the 28-year-old said his confidence was high after that match.

''I spoke to [coach] Tim Nielsen after the game and just said to him I could have bowled worse and then got three-for, so that's just the nature of the beast. It's why we love and hate the game, isn't it? I'm really happy with the way I bowled in Delhi….''

Andrew Strauss: England not the genuine article in South Africa

England skipper Andrew Strauss wants his team to draw confidence from their 2-1 Ashes victory, ahead of their tough tour of South Africa, reports an English daily, The Telegraph…

Much is expected of England, especially in the aftermath of a busy summer that saw them emerge with a 2-1 win over Australia.
Strauss and his team held their first training session in Bloemfontein yesterday, as they began the two-and-a-half-month tour, which starts with a 50-over warm-up game against the Diamond Eagles on Friday. 

Although optimistic, Strauss has warned there is plenty of work still to be done in the build-up. 

He said: "I don't think any of us will get carried away or any of us have done. 

"I think we're all aware that at this stage of our development, we're not the genuine article, not the finished product by any means.
"So anyone who thinks that we might be going easy on ourselves at the moment is off the mark. 

"At the same time, this challenge comes at a good time for us having just won the Ashes, we've got some confidence there.
"I think more than anything, (it has given us) confidence in our ability to pull out performances when we really need them. So we need to draw on that because this is a tough tour and if we can go on and win the series here, that's going to be a massive achievement." 

England have a history of making poor starts to tours and Strauss agrees that the structure of this trip will help his side's cause….

Scorers get ready to throw the book at authorities in uprising

Another English newspaper, The Times echoes the voice of scorers who complain of being treated as second-class citizens by cricketing authorities…

Ever since cricket grew from an 18th-century game to a fully fledged sport in Hambledon, the role of the scorer has been integral to the proceedings.

However, the fraternity of scorers, who now use computers rather than carving notches into wooden boards to record ball-by-ball coverage for posterity, believe they are being treated as second-class citizens by cricketing authorities.

So strongly do they feel after their treatment — or lack of it — at the recent World Twenty20 in England that they are even talking about forming their own trade union.

Several months after the tournament ended, some of the 25 scorers claim they are still waiting to be paid their £93 match fee and others found that they had to queue with temporary catering staff for accreditation to get into the Brit Oval.

Their desire for recognition has resulted in a paper that will go before David Richardson, the general manager of the ICC, to consider their complaints.

David Kendix, who advises the ICC on scoring and sits on its cricket committee, said: “I have put forward to the general manager ways of more efficient accreditation such as formal letters of appointment, that provision has to be made for their meals and have drawn attention to MCC that there was not great clarity over whether the ECB or the ground authority were providing the budget for the scorers.”

Keith Booth, who has scored for Surrey for 15 years as well as in nearly 100 international matches, spent 90 minutes queueing for accreditation in the Montgomery Hall near the Alec Stewart Gate before he was given a pass. “People seeking work were given quite a grilling and I was asked to show my passport, which I am not in the habit of carrying around,” he said. “I reached the scorers’ box not long before the first ball. In the break between matches, one look at the length of the queue meant we could not contemplate using our meal vouchers, but fortunately the dressing-room attendant nicked some tea for us from the players’ dining room.

“No one was aware that Ireland and Scotland would be accompanied by scorers until they actually turned up. They had not been informed that scorers were being provided by the ECB and/or the host venue. It is the kind of scenario one might expect at a club Sunday third XI fixture; one would assume that at international level, officials would be exempt from this maladministration….”