TRENT Bridge’s highly-acclaimed Fox Road Stand has already proved a hit with cricket fans and has now scooped a prestigious national design award.The structure, designed by Nottingham architects Maber Associates, received the accolade last night from the Civic Trust, one of the most respected environmental design award schemes in Europe.Nottinghamshire CCC Chief Executive David Collier said: “The Club is honoured to win this Civic Trust Award.”The stand was opened on time and on budget in June 2002 and won many plaudits from spectators in its first full season.”It takes the investment at the ground to more than £10 million in the past five years to create one of the most popular sporting and conference venues in the United Kingdom.”The Club wishes to record its thanks to Colin Maber and Huw Evans of Maber Associates for the excellence of their designs not only with the Fox Road Stand but also the Radcliffe Road, Hound Road and Office Redevelopments.”The 2,300-seater stand cost £1.9 million to build, taking the number of permanent seats at Trent Bridge to more than 15,000 – the minimum required by the ECB to host internationals.It was officially opened immediately prior to the NatWest Series One-day International between England and Sri Lanka in June last year.Project Architect Huw Evans of Maber Associates added: “We are delighted that the Fox Road Stand has gained a Civic Trust Award.”It provides recognition for Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club’s commitment to good design at Trent Bridge, and also acknowledges the successful integration of a contemporary design into a traditional setting.”On handing out the award, the award judges said: “The stand design is an elegant yet simple solution, which has ensured that a sense of scale has been retained within the cricket ground’s traditional setting.”They also praised how the structure’s contemporary design has been integrated into a traditional cricket arena as well as its unrestricted views of the action.

Graeme Smith, South Africa’s new captain, has launched a remarkable verbal attack on Lance Klusener, describing him as a disruptive influence on the side.Last week, Klusener was left out of the South African squad for the forthcoming tour of England and also not awarded a central contract. When asked about the reasons behind the decision at a business breakfast in Cape Town, Smith did not hold back. “We decided Lance as a team man can only cause hassles and we want to move forward in SA cricket,” Smith said. “To be honest Lance, as fantastic as he is, can sometimes ruin a team.”His ability as a cricketer is very good, but his ability as a team man is not very good and he kind of can infect a team and bring down the youth.”Klusener expressed surprise at Smith’s remarks, saying that the only official comment he had received came from Omar Henry, the chairman of selectors, who had told him the reason for his omission was the need to bring in new blood. “It’s becoming a joke," Klusener told South Africa’s Star newspaper. "Does anyone really know what’s going on out there? For the current captain, who’s played a couple of games with me, to come out with the so-called real reason at a cricketing breakfast is almost laughable. What’s really disturbing is that, whatever the reason for my being dropped, no one in authority has made any effort to sort it out.”

Junior cricketers from India and Pakistan are likely to be at the forefront of a thawing in the relationship between the two countries as early as February. Annual triangular one-day tournaments between Under-19 teams, Academy sides and A teams from the two countries, and Sri Lanka, are being planned, with the first possibly in February.The heads of the two boards, Jagmohan Dalmiya and Lieutenant-General Tauqir Zia, met in London during the Asian Cricket Council meeting at Lord’s to discuss ways to resume cricketing relations. Zia said that regular competition at lower levels would break the ice and help resume cricket between the two countries on a regular basis.Both India and Sri Lanka have their academies operative while the firstentrants in Pakistan’s National Cricket Academy are expected within the next few weeks.Zia added: “The PCB chief executive and Secretary of Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) are discussing the modalities of the tournaments that will soon be implemented.”Zia also said that Dalmiya had updated him on the possibility of India touring Pakistan early next year for three Tests and as many one-day internationals. “Mr Dalmiya has informed me that although the Indian government is very keen to resume bilateral tours between the two countries, the BCCI is still awaiting official clearance from New Delhi for next year’s tour," said Zia. "But Mr Dalmiya is optimistic that BCCI would get the go-ahead and India will tour Pakistan."

Sourav Ganguly has expressed his desire to be one of Kent’s overseas professionals next season. Rahul Dravid had an exceptional season with Kent in 2000, the same year that Ganguly earned more brickbats than bouquets for his Lancashire stint.Ganguly said that a return to the county treadmill was very much on the cards, given India’s less-than-hectic schedule next summer. “I wish to turn out for Kent next season,” he said. “A player can improve a lot by playing county cricket in England. Playing on different pitches there is really tough and it steels one’s nerves. The international calendar is not that crowded next year. I’ll get some time and I want to utilise it by playing in England.”His Lancashire experience may have been marked by headlines about blue shoes and aloofness, but clearly, the postcards from Dravid, Virender Sehwag, Mohammad Kaif and Yuvraj Singh – all playing the county circuit this summer – have convinced him that the English summer is worth another try.

Shane Bond is still some time away from getting back into bowling training as the New Zealand team start to look towards their next mission, the tour of India in September-October.The fast bowler, who has been out of cricket since suffering a stress fracture in his back during the Bank Alfalah Cup tournament in Sri Lanka in May, is officially described as “progressing nicely” by New Zealand Cricket’s sports science medical co-ordinator Warren Frost. “He’s still on the comeback trail and is building up his work in the gym. He is still a little from being back bowling.”Meanwhile, ace batsman Nathan Astle has resumed his build-up to full fitness, and his training will be stepped up another level this week. Apart from these two, Frost said everyone else still in New Zealand was in training which was a little unusual given the injury problems that have plagued the top level cricketers in recent seasons. The players were enjoying the break, Frost said. He is in contact with them every week and sees them every four to six weeks.

Wasim Jaffer and Gautam Gambhir starred for India A against the South Africans at Arundel. Jaffer scored 90 and Gambhir 64 in their 319 all out, in which Shaun Pollock came back strongly.Gambhir’s sparkling innings came from only 69 balls and Jaffer consolidated India A’s good start by batting for over three hours for a solid 90, including 12 fours, after Shiv Sunder Das chose to bat.Das himself dug in for 33 and Ambati Rayudu, who lofted Robin Peterson for two sixes over long-on off successive balls, was Dewalt Pretorious’s first victim, lbw for 32, after a stand of 56 from 86 balls with Jaffer.Pollock, who only arrived back in England on Friday after visiting his pregnant wife in South Africa, took 4 for 46, including a second new-ball spell of three wickets for one run in seven balls that ended the innings.In what is South Africa’s last match before Thursday’s first Test againstEngland, Pretorious did his chances of selection no harm by taking 3 for 41.He had a post-tea purple patch of 3 for 9 in 18 balls, boosting his chances of adding to the solitary Test cap he won against Australia at Newlands in March 2002.Pretorious, coming around the wicket, then bowled Parthiv Patel (8) after he shouldered arms. Meanwhile, Jaffer spent an uncomfortable half-hour in the 80s before breaking loose with a glorious cover drive off Pretorious. But, trying to repeat the stroke, he failed to keep the ball down and was caught low down by Graeme Smith.Wickets then fell cheaply before Pollock wrapped up the innings by havingIrfan Pathan junior caught in the slips by Smith before clean-bowling last manAavishkar Salvi for nought. But the day belonged to India A.

Cricket in Viña del Mar was reintroduced by two teams of players from the local natural gas company, GasValpo. GasValpo is a very old Chilean business which was bought by the Australian Gas and Light Company AGL a few years ago. The idea of forming a cricket club came from the Australian influence (Martin Turner is to be thanked for that) but as GasValpo has a very active sporting club and the members were keen to learn a “new” sport cricket.So in early 2003 the interested players began practising after watching the most recent world cup highlights on video to enable them to understand the basics of the game. Practice sessions were initially held at a local school but more recently in the GasValpo grounds on Camino Internacional in Reñaca Alto. Numbers of players have grown gradually from 7 to about 18 since the sessions commenced.The first actual game was held on Saturday 23rd August 2003 at the Carinbineros (uniformed police) complex in Reñaca Alto. It is hoped that in addition to this venture some games can also be held at the Valparaiso Cricket Club where cricket was last played approximately 40 years ago.Interest has been generated already in Chile’s second largest city. A half page spread in the local newspaper and an interview on an important radio station is helping the public to become aware that cricket is once again being played in Viña del Mar, the spiritual home of cricket in Chile.The first official game is scheduled for the beginning of October this year and will be against a team of players from San Bernardo, a suburb in the southern outskits of Santiago. The Viña team is confident of winning this match!The San Bernardo Cricket Club was recently formed this year and they too have been training hard for their first match against Viña del Mar. Both clubs are creating history as they are 100% Chilean. The teams comprise both men and women and it is hoped to eventually have a mens and a womens team.This season San Bernardo and Viña will play not only each other but also a team comprised of Chilean born players from Santiago and the Chilean U/15 team. It is hoped that both clubs will progress to the main Chilean club competition which is centred around the four clubs in Santiago in a few years time.

South Africa may be relieved with Richie Benaud’s ruling which has kept Shoaib Akhtar out of the second Test at Faisalabad, but Graeme Smith and his not-so-merry men will still be hard-pressed to level the series after the first-Test debacle. Akhtar was instrumental in starting the slide in the second innings at Lahore, but more worrying for Eric Simons, the South African coach, was his batsmen’s inability to come to terms with Pakistan’s spinners.Between them, Danish Kaneria, Shoaib Malik and Mushtaq Ahmed took 12 wickets in the Lahore Test. Mushtaq was the least of the threats, though, which persuaded the selectors to call up Mansoor Amjad, a 17-year-old wrist-spinner who has yet to play a first-class match, although he has appeared for Pakistan’s age-group teams. He is unlikely to make his debut at Faisalabad, but South Africa can expect another severe examination by spin at the Iqbal Stadium.The lack of experience in playing quality spin bowling showed quite clearly at Lahore, as none of the batsmen attempted to use their feet and smother the spin. There were also far too many batsmen who got starts, and then failed to cash in: Smith, Herschelle Gibbs, Jacques Kallis and Boeta Dippenaar all made scores of between 24 and 33 in the first innings at Lahore.To make matters worse, the South Africans have no-one to exploit the conditions, which are again likely to favour the slow bowlers. Paul Adams picked up seven wickets in Pakistan’s first innings in the first Test, but also served up plenty of hit-me balls – and he was taken apart in the second innings, when he disappeared for 57 in 11 overs. The only other spinner in the squad, Robin Peterson, is hardly a wicket-taking option.Pakistan might be one strike bowler short, but their batting will be bolstered by the return of Inzamam-ul-Haq, their captain, who missed the first Test with a hamstring injury. He will step in for Yousuf Youhana, who has a hamstring strain of his own. Pakistan’s line-up in Lahore lacked experience, but Asim Kamal, the 27-year-old left-hander who filled in for Inzamam there, made an encouraging 99 on his debut. It was an excellent example of how to construct a Test-match innings. It lacked the flourish of extravagant shotmaking, but in a batting order already bursting with exciting strokeplayers, Kamal’s solidity is a huge asset.Smith’s short stint as South Africa’s captain has been notable for his hard-nosed approach, and his earnest attempt to ensure that his side shrugs off the choker’s tag that it has been stuck with. The South Africans demonstrated this newfound steel as recently as the one-day series in Pakistan, turning a 0-2 deficit into a 3-2 series win. It is time to display that resolve again.Pakistan (probable): 1 Taufeeq Umar, 2 Imran Farhat, 3 Yasir Hameed, 4 Inzamam-ul-Haq (capt), 5 Asim Kamal, 6 Abdul Razzaq, 7 Moin Khan (wk), 8 Shoaib Malik, 9 Mushtaq Ahmed, 10 Mohammad Sami, 11 Danish Kaneria.South Africa (probable): 1 Graeme Smith (capt), 2 Herschelle Gibbs, 3 Gary Kirsten, 4 Jacques Kallis, 5 Boeta Dippenaar, 6 Neil McKenzie, 7 Mark Boucher (wk), 8 Shaun Pollock, 9 Paul Adams, 10 Makhaya Ntini, 11 Andre Nel.

All Today’s Yesterdays – November 6 down the yearsNovember 5 | November 71999
The sort of all-action performance that makes you wonder how Michael Slater can ever fail to make the Test team gave Australia the whip hand over Pakistan in the first Test at Brisbane. Most batsmen would have started cautiously in reply to an imposing total of 367, but not Slater. He butchered 169 and put on 269 for the first wicket with Greg Blewett. And after Mark Waugh stroked an even hundred, Adam Gilchrist and Shane Warne rubbed it in. Gilchrist smacked an 88-ball 81 in his first Test innings, and Warne gleefully smeared four sixes in a then-Test-best 86, piling on 86 for the tenth wicket with his old mate Scott “Can’t bowl, can’t field” Muller (6 not out). Much-hyped before the series, Shoaib Akhtar nursed typically erratic figures of 32-2-153-4. In all Australia’s 575 took only 139.4 overs, the first display of the batting fireworks with which they would light up world cricket in the years to come. A defiant 119 from Saeed Anwar could not stop Australia completing an innings victory on the final day.1956
Birth of Western Australia’s Graeme Wood, a compact left-hand opener renowned for his stubborn determination and eccentric running – he became known as the “Kamikaze Kid” after a series of fiascos against England in 1978-79. Throughout his career Wood confounded expectations. Most notably, he followed hundreds in consecutive Tests (against England in 1980 and New Zealand the following winter) with three successive ducks. His Test career looked to be over after the 1985 England tour when he struggled, apart from a ten-hour 172 at Trent Bridge, but outstanding domestic form saw him return in 1988-89. He made a brave hundred against Ambrose, Marshall, Walsh and Patterson on a Perth flyer, but was dropped for the final time after the next match, as Australia tried out another left-handed opener … Mark Taylor.1956
Preparing a traditional Calcutta dustbowl backfired on India as they went down to a 94-run defeat to Australia in the third Test. In all 39 wickets fell in the match, and 35 of them went to spinners. Richie Benaud benefited more than anyone, taking 6 for 52 and 5 for 53, and though offspinner Ghulam Ahmed almost matched him with 7 for 49 and 3 for 81, a fourth-innings target of 231 proved beyond the Indians. It gave Australia a 2-0 series victory, neatly bringing down the curtain on the 45-Test career of their captain, Ian Johnson. He finished with exactly 1000 runs – and a slightly less symmetrical 109 wickets.1921
Birth of a true allrounder. New Zealander Geoff “Boney” Rabone was an aggressive batsman, an offspinner capable of turning to leggies or even medium-pace, an outstanding slip fielder and a popular captain. He captained New Zealand in five of his 12 Tests, and though they didn’t actually win any of them, it was hardly Rabone’s fault. At times he opened the batting and bowling, and he turned in some heroic performances, most notably in his first match as captain, against South Africa at Durban in 1953-54, when he made 107 (next-best: 32) and 68 (19) as the Kiwis went down to an innings defeat. He played his last Test against England at Auckland in 1954-55, when New Zealand were skittled for the alltime Test low of 26.1994
A rout at Harare, where Sri Lanka took their one-day series against Zimbabwe 2-1 with a thumping 191-run victory. It was their biggest win, in terms of runs, until they smashed India by 245 runs at Sharjah in 2000-01. The old firm of Aravinda de Silva and Arjuna Ranatunga set them up with a fourth-wicket partnership of 143 in 24 overs, with de Silva batting through for an unbeaten 107. Zimbabwe were always going to be up against it chasing 297, and it was effectively over when Chaminda Vaas and Ravindra Pushpakumara reduced them to 22 for 5. They were finally all out for 105 – there were only three fours in the whole innings – with Mark Dekker (23 off 109 balls) settling for some batting practice.Other birthdays
1876 Ernie Hayes (England)
1897 Jack O’Connor (England)
1919 Allen Lissette (New Zealand)
1927 Eric Atkinson (West Indies)

The State Canterbury Wizards’ side for the opening State Championship match against the State Otago Volts in Timaru, starting on Monday, has a well-seasoned look to it.The side will be led by international Craig McMillan, who was unavailable for the Black Caps’ tour of Pakistan. Unfortunately, injury to Shane Bond and Wade Cornelius has taken some of the teeth from the potential attack, while Nathan Astle, is still not ready to play. But with Chris Martin and Warren Wisneski having made international appearances there is still a solid core to the new ball attack. Also selected are Brendon Donkers and Stephen Cunis.They will be supplemented by Paul Wiseman, the Test off-spinner and Aaron Redmond, the leg-spinner. However, injury to Redmond this week will mean that David Kelly will travel to Timaru as cover for Redmond in case he has not recovered as quickly as hoped for the match.Canterbury’s newer brigade of batsmen are also represented in the side with Shanan Stewart, Michael Papps, Peter Fulton and Neil Broom included. McMillan and Gary Stead will provide a necessary rod of experience in the batting order.The full team is: Craig McMillan (capt), Neil Broom, Steven Cunis, Brendon Donkers, Peter Fulton, Chris Martin, Michael Papps, Aaron Redmond, Gary Stead, Shanan Stewart, Paul Wiseman, Warren Wisneski.Unavailable along with Bond, Astle and Cornelius were Chris Cairns, Chris Harris and Brendon McCullum.