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Ryan Watson has been confirmed as Scotland’s new captain, in a widely anticipated move. He replaces Craig Wright who resigned last month when the team were knocked out of the World Cup in the early stages.Watson, the top-order batsman, has played for Scotland since 1996 and admits Wright had left him with a hard act to follow. “It’s a little bit daunting given the success the side has had over the past few years,” he said, “but there will be some new cricketers coming through over time and it’s about overseeing that change. I will try to pick up where Craig left off, bring in some of my own ideas and hopefully achieve the same level of success.”He’s already had a taste of captaincy in the ultimate one-day tournament, leading the team against South Africa in the Caribbean last month when Wright had to return home for personal reasons. At the time Roddy Smith, Scotland Cricket’s chief executive, said he was clearly the man for the job.His next challenge will be to captain Scotland against the county sides in the Friends Provident Trophy, which will give him valuable experience ahead of the first Twenty20 World Cup later this year, where they will face India and Pakistan in the first round.

MS Dhoni has not been finishing off matches of late. Against South Africa, in Kanpur last year, he came in to bat with 90 required off the last 10 overs. India needed 11 off the last over. Dhoni scored 31 off 30 in India’s defeat. In Rajkot later in the series, he scored 47 off 61 and was part of a slowdown after the 30th over, which cost India the match. Dhoni himself fell in the 42nd over. In Canberra he fell third ball when India lost needed 72 at under a run a ball with eight wickets in hand.In Sydney, Dhoni came in with the asking rate under seven, but his 34 off 42 played a big part in the asking rate reaching two a ball towards the end. Along the way, though, he shepherded a young Manish Pandey although he did enjoy some luck: he was dropped once and reprieved when plumb lbw. In trademark fashion, he took the game to the last over, and in trademark fashion, he biffed hit the first ball for six to ease the pressure.With question marks all around him, Dhoni later spoke about how difficult finishing matches for India is. “When there’s a big-hitting batsman there, if he gets out, you hear, ‘What was the need of that shot?’,” Dhoni said. “If that same shot goes for six, everyone applauds. How we bat in the lower middle order is, the main motto is to win the match. People say that even if you have a 51% success rate, it’s very high.”You have to give [the finishers] the benefit of doubt. And yes, it is my responsibility [to finish games], it’s my job and I’ll always take it. But at the same time, there will be times when I won’t finish the job. The others have also come to play; it’s not like there is a mark on my forehead because I’m batting lower down that says: ‘Oh he’s there, so we have won the match.’ It doesn’t happen like that. If someone bowls a good yorker, he bowls a good yorker. You can’t hit it for six. Sometimes people complain that I haven’t hit a helicopter shot – but if it’s a bouncer, how will anyone hit a helicopter shot? You have to respond to things as they happen and accordingly change your batting.”Dhoni was asked if he needs to adapt the way he closes the innings with the way the game is developing. “Till we don’t get a settled five, six and seven, I’ll have to bat lower down the order,” Dhoni said, which might mean he doesn’t have any plans to retire from the ODIs. “For which I will have to slightly adapt. I find it a bit difficult to go in and play the big shot [immediately]. More often than not, I’ve batted after the 30th over. Got a chance to play like five to seven overs, and then go and then play the big shot. I’ve always found it slightly difficult. It’s not an easy job. Nobody has found it easy to straightaway go and play the big shot.”I [still] think that will be my responsibility, because I don’t see any other youngster doing that job. I would love to bat up the order but I don’t see it happening. I’ll have to maybe do a bit more shift in my batting and adapt in a way where I can straightaway go in and try to play a big shot. But overall, you know, this series, the only opportunity where I could have scored 40-45 was the last game where we needed like 80 or something. That was a lost opportunity. Other than that, in the first three games, the way I batted, I couldn’t have done much. If you’re getting out in the 48th-49th over, you can’t get any more runs than what you have. Or the second option is, you try to play not-out, which I don’t think is the kind of cricket we want to play. We’ll try to adapt. I think that’s what my responsibility will be in the coming ODIs that I would be playing.”Dhoni also in a roundabout way said it was not always the fault of the lower middle order if a seemingly easy chase was botched up. In response to a question about whether Pandey surprised him with such a composed performance, Dhoni said: “A lot of times, whenever people score big runs and then they play a big shot and get out, nobody asks any questions. But I think the real question is, if you play a big shot and get out when you go in, whether that is something that needs to be criticised or people who are set and need to carry their innings forward.”You have to form that balance of what is needed at that point according to the demands of the game. You can’t say, ‘This is how I bat.’ The real talent is to adapt to the needs of the game, and that’s how you develop as players. If you want to serve in international cricket for a long time, you have to adapt because every game is different. All conditions, pitches, bowlers are different.”

Irani Trophy is not a selection match, but pit the best players outside the Indian team against the Ranji champions at the start of a hectic season, throw in a national selector to watch the match, and every player knows no good performance will go unnoticed. Dilip Vengsarkar, the chairman of the current selection committee, not present here, will testify to that: he made his international debut on the back of a century made against Madan Lal, Bishan Bedi and Erapalli Prasanna, in only his second match for Bombay.Even last year, seven out of the Rest of India XV went on to play for India. Cricinfo takes a look at the hot contenders for an India berth from this year’s side:Subramaniam Badrinath
Badrinath has never been closer to playing for India. If you follow up two bumper domestic seasons with an even more prolific start to the third, you leave the selectors little choice. Although he missed out in Rajkot, he has scored 867 runs this season, only getting out twice. He’s already been rewarded, earning a call-up to replace the injured Gautam Gambhir in the squad for the ODI series, overtaking Manoj Tiwary and Suresh Raina, two who have been picked for India ahead of him previously.Manoj Tiwary
Tiwary’s aggressive 130 under pressure was his first big innings after coming back from the shoulder injury he sustained on the eve of what could have been his ODI debut. His stays on the wicket were brief against South Africa A and with three matches being washed out, this innings would do no harm to what he would be thinking is rightfully his: a second chance.Parthiv Patel
Parthiv has been even more prolific than Badrinath this season, and with 179 and an unbeaten 59, he has served notice that even he can play as a specialist batsman. He may still lose out to Dinesh Karthik as a pure wicketkeeper, but he has done enough to be looked at as an opener.Aakash Chopra
Drafted back into the national fray because of the need for specialist opening batsmen in Australia, Chopra will be disappointed he didn’t get a big score here. Although he scored a double-century against South Africa A, it was a painstaking innings scored on a typical Feroz Shah Kotla wicket. He will get a couple of Ranji games before India play their next Test, against Pakistan at his home ground – the Kotla.Munaf Patel
Munaf the good and Munaf the bad both played this match. In the first innings he was clearly holding back, just running in and putting the ball in. In the second, he knocked over Mumbai. Where does he stand now? Nobody knows. What is wrong with him? He only knows. But if he is not completely fit, as the selectors probably believe, he will do well to get fit, play more domestic cricket, bowl more spells like in the second innings, and get rid of Munaf the bad. Because when he is good, he is just too good.

Two stalwarts of the English game have been honoured in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours list. Clive Radley and Rachael Heyhoe-Flint have been rewarded for their services to cricket both on and off the pitch. Radley earns the MBE while Heyhoe-Flint gets an upgrade to OBE after being awarded the MBE 25 years ago.Radley, 63, played for Middlesex, Auckland and England during a first-class career spanning three decades from the mid-1960s. He finally made his Test debut in New Zealand in 1977-78 aged almost 34, and played eight Tests. But it is off the pitch where he has excelled as coach and he is now head coach with the MCC.Heyhoe-Flint’s contributions to the game are manifold. As an England captain with a shrewd business brain she raised the profile of the sport massively, quick to spot a media opportunity, and later a commentator.She even thought of the first World Cup – the women played theirs two years before the men – when, along with Sir Jack Hayward, they cooked up the idea for the women, who played their first tournament two years before the men. She took England to that title in 1973, the crowning glory of her captaincy which, from 1966, saw her unbeaten in six series.She became an MBE in 1972, and was a shoo-in as one of the first ten female members of the MCC in 1999 and in 2004 she became the first woman elected to the full committee, aged 64. She also represented England at hockey, playing in goal, and was for many years a director of Wolverhampton Wanderers.”I am naturally thrilled to bits,” Heyhoe-Flint told Cricinfo, “particularly that it has been awarded for services to cricket.”My MBE was for services to women’s cricket – so it is really pleasing that I have received the recognition for my deep involvement with the MCC and the Lady Taverners charity -one of the fund raising arms of the Lord’s Taverners – the official charity for recreational cricket.”Nowadays the Lady Taverners are sponsors of junior women’s cricket indoor and outdoor, club and county events for Under-13s and Under-15s, and also cricket events for youngsters with disabilities.

Jimmy Maher has cut short his retirement plan, announcing he will quit from Queensland at the end of the state’s Pura Cup match against South Australia starting in Adelaide on Friday. Earlier in the season Maher announced he was standing down from the captaincy at the close of the summer but would stay on as a player.However, Maher’s up and down form this year, combined with seeing his friend and Bulls team-mate Michael Kasprowicz close his career, made him consider his immediate future. “It [retirement] has been on my mind and I must admit I tossed and turned a fair bit before I settled on this,” Maher said. “Coming here to make this announcement is probably the toughest thing I’ve had to do.”Maher, 34, needs only 99 in Adelaide to become the second player to score 10,000 first-class runs for Queensland, after his team-mate Martin Love. He is the second-most capped Bulls player with 154 first-class games and was the first Queenslander to reach the double of 100 Pura Cup matches and 100 domestic one-day games. However, Maher’s playing days might not be totally over and he is keeping his options open regarding the Twenty20 competitions in India.Maher will be remembered as an integeral part of the state’s strong top order that helped the side dominate the Australian domestic scene for a decade from the mid-1990s. At 21, he tasted Queensland’s first Sheffield Shield triumph in 1994-95.The Bulls went on to win four more titles under Stuart Law, including a hat-trick from 1999-2000 to 2001-02, before Maher took over as leader and guided them to success in 2005-06. His own contribution in that most recent result was to top score with 223 in Queensland’s total of 6 for 900.Maher said he was fortunate to play in such a strong era. “The first Shield win obviously – if I could pick a moment to replayagain, that would be it – but the 1996-97 Shield win in Perth was a special one too, as was the hat-trick of Pura Cup titles,” he said.”Then finally being able to hold up the Pura Cup as captain in 2005-06 was pretty amazing. I look back on the blokes I was fortunate enough to play alongside and pinch myself. If you’d ask me at the start if I could imagine playing 150 games for the Bulls, winning trophies for my state, playing for Australia and being a cricketer for 14 seasons and honestly I’d say ‘no I can’t’.”Maher’s 26-match ODI career did not bring great individual success, but he was part of the World Cup-winning squad in South Africa in 2003, when he was surprisingly selected as the back-up wicketkeeper. His only one-day international half-century had come at Centurion the year before, when he scored 95 against South Africa in his first game back in the side following two appearances four years prior.His domestic one-day highlights reel is dominated by a national-record score of 187 from 129 balls against Western Australia in 2003-04, and his 108 in their FR Cup final victory over Victoria last season was also memorable. Big scores became harder to come by this summer and his 298 Pura Cup runs came at an average of 19.86.The Bulls have one more Pura Cup match this season after the Adelaide game and the selectors will wait until that clash has concluded before deciding on a replacement captain. James Hopes, Chris Simpson and Chris Hartley have all led the state in limited-overs contests in the past two summers.

Pakistan have included youngsters Shoaib Khan and Mansoor Amjad in the 15-member squad for the one-off Twenty20 international against Bangladesh in Karachi, the first Twenty20 international in the country.Shoaib is an opening batsman, while Amjad is a legspinner. However, it’s unlikely they will feature in the match, as the squad has all of Pakistan’s ODI regulars, except Mohammad Yousuf, who had been dropped for last year’s World Twenty20 as well. Nasir Jamshed comes in his place.Younis Khan, who had opted out of the ODI series before making himself available for the fifth one in Karachi, has been included as well.Mohammad Asif and Umar Gul, both of whom who made comebacks during the ODIs following injury layoffs, have been included in the squad, along with Sohail Tanvir, Wahab Riaz and Rao Iftikhar Anjum.Pakistan Twenty20 squad: Shoaib Malik (capt), Salman Butt, Younis Khan, Nasir Jamshed, Misbah-ul-Haq, Shahid Afridi, Kamran Akmal (wk), Fawad Alam, Sohail Tanvir, Mohammad Asif, Umar Gul, Rao Iftikhar Anjum, Wahab Riaz, Shoaib Khan, Mansoor Amjad.

1993

December 14, Sydney

At the age of 26, Gary Kirsten makes his ODI debut. His career is not off to the best of starts, scoring 4 off 27 balls as South Africa were skittled for 69 against Australia.December 26-30, Melbourne
Kirsten makes his Test debut, scoring 16 in a match – the first Australia-South Africa Test since readmission – marred by rain.

1994

January 21, Melbourne
Opening with half-brother Peter, Kirsten scores an unbeaten 112 – his first ODI hundred – as South Africa clinch a 28-run win.

1995

November 30 – December 4, Johannesburg
Kirsten finally scores a Test hundred – his first – in his 17th Test in the first Test against England.

1996

February-March, Wills World Cup
Kirsten starts the tournament with an unbeaten 188 against UAE, the highest individual score in a World Cup match. However, South Africa lose in the quarter-finals against West Indies after winning all the matches in the group phase.April, Sharjah
Kirsten scores 356 runs in five innings, including two hundreds against India – one in the final, as South Africa win the triangular tournament, also involving Pakistan.October-December, South Africa’s tour to India
Kirsten amasses over 300 runs at an average of 50 in both the Titan Cup – including India and Australia – and the three Tests against India. He makes a century in each innings as South Africa win the second Test in Kolkata by 329 runs.

1998

June-August, South Africa’s tour to England
Kirsten scores his first double-hundred in the third Test at Old Trafford, that England save by the skin of the teeth.

1999

December 26-30 , Durban
Scores his Test best of 275 against England, the then joint-highest Test score for a South African batsman. Kirsten’s knock – which lasted 878 minutes – still stands as the second-longest innings (in terms of duration) in Test cricket.

2002

October 18, 2002, East London
With his hundred against Bangladesh, Kirsten became the first player to score a century against all other nine Test-playing nations.

2003

February-March, World Cup 2003, South Africa
Bows out of ODIs after South Africa’s bizarre first-round exit at home. In 185 ODIs, Kirsten has 6798 runs at an impressive average of 40.95.August 21-25, Leeds
Kirsten’s painstaking knocks of 130 and 60 set up South Africa’s 191-run victory in the fourth Test at Headingley, and prompted a rethink of his future.September 2

Defers retirement, which was originally intended to be after the fifth Test against England at the Oval.October 17-21, Lahore
Playing the first Test against Pakistan, he required ten stitches in his face when he missed an attempted hook shot off Shoaib Akhtar on the first day. To everyone’s surprise, he was batting again on the fourth morning

2004

March 15, South Africa’s tour to New Zealand
Kirsten confirms that he would retire from the game after the ongoing tour of New Zealand.March 18-22, Auckland
He becomes the first South African to play 100 Tests during the second Test against New Zealand.March 30, Wellington
Kirsten signs off his Test career in style, with a gutsy 76 in the third Test against New Zealand aiding South Africa to square the series. He finished with 7289 runs – including 21 hundreds – from 101 Tests, at an average of 45.27, being South Africa’s most-capped player and leading run-scorer at the time.April 24, 2004
Receives lifetime achievement award at the inaugural South African Cricket Awards.Post retirement, he stays involved with the game, mainly in coaching activities in South Africa. He spends time with the Warriors, a South African domestic franchise team, as a consultant batting coach. In 2006, Kirsten sets up his own academy in Cape Town.In April 2006, Kirsten powered South Africa to victory in the 20-20 World Cricket Classic in Bermuda, with centuries in the semi-final and the final.Kirsten conducts a week-long coaching clinic for the Zimbabwe national team in June 2007, before completing a Cricket South Africa Level 3 coaching course.He continues to be involved with the Gary Kirsten Cricket Academy, which conducts camps and performance programmes aimed mainly at cricketers in the age group of 16-24.

Holders Karnataka State Cricket Association XI could not have beenvery happy at stumps on the first day of their Buchi Babu All Indiainvitation tournament quarterfinal against National Cricket Academy atthe CPT-IP ground in Chennai on Thursday. They struggled during theday to score at two runs an over and when play was called off with 4.5overs still left to be bowled because of bad light, they were 182 forfive wickets.After KSCA won the toss, Mithun Beerala was off to a confident start.He hit four boundaries and out of the first wicket stand of 22 runsoff 10.5 overs with Roland Barrington, he scored all but one beforebeing caught by Sharandeep Singh off medium pacer RB Patel.Joined by Amit Kumar, Barrington continued to struggle and by the timehe was second out, leg before to skipper RS Sodhi, at 56 in the 21stover, he had batted 104 minutes and faced 61 balls for his 18.Vijay Bharadwaj did not last long. He was bowled by Sriram for sixruns for which he took his time – 48 balls. Amit Kumar who haddominated the scoring till then was fourth out at 86. For his 34, hebatted two hours, faced 67 balls and hit six fours.AR Mahesh and RC Shanbal then brought about a recovery of sorts byadding 40 runs for the fifth wicket but the runs continued to bescored at a tardy rate. The association lasted all of 25.4 oversbefore Shanbal was caught by Gambhir off Kaif. During his stay of anhour and a half, Shanbal faced 74 balls and hit two fours.The recovery process continued with Mahesh and SN Shiraguppi adding 56runs for the unbroken sixth wicket partnership which has so far lasted29 overs. When stumps were drawn prematurely, Mahesh had come throughunbeaten with 40 for which he had faced 180 balls. He had only threeboundary hits. Shirugappi was not much more enterprising scoring 25off 93 balls with just one four.Sodhi tried eight bowlers in all including himself and five of themcame through with one wicket each. At the end of the day’s play, theyoungsters from the Bangalore based academy would have no doubt lookedback at a job well done.

ScorecardSri Lanka A are well on course for a convincing win against MCC at Arundel after their middle order feasted on a friendly attack. Wicketkeeper Kaushal Silva struck an unbeaten 118 while Test batsman Jehan Mubarak and allrounder Gayan Wijekoon contributed useful innings.Ishara Amerasinghe, the seam bowler, then took out three of MCC’s top order as they again struggled with the bat. Craig McMillan completed his second failure of the match when he was caught for a four-ball duck and it was left to former India opener Aakash Chopra to provide the main resistance.MCC were boosted early in the day when they trapped Thilan Samaraweera lbw for 21, but they didn’t have much more to celebrate. Silva and Mubarak added 96, then Silva added another 102 with Wijekoon, as the Sri Lankans built a handsome lead of 248 before declaring.

Division One

4th dayDurham overcame some early jitters to complete a six-wicket with over Yorkshire at Chester-le-Street. Graham Onions took two balls to end Yorkshire’s second innings and completed his five-wicket haul, leaving a target of 131. But Darren Gough and Tim Bresnan reduced Durham to 35 for 3 before an aggressive half-century from Michael Di Venuto put them back on course. An unbroken stand of 54 between Dale Benkenstein and Phil Mustard completed the job as Durham sealed a full hand of 22 points.Sean Ervine and Dimitri Mascarenhas defied Kent as Hampshire battled strongly to secure a draw at Canterbury. Five dropped catches – three from Martin van Jaarsveld – didn’t help Kent’s cause. The sixth-wicket pair put on an unbeaten 89, with Ervine reaching his 18th first-class fifty. Jimmy Adams and Michael Brown set a solid platform with an opening stand of 58, before both were removed by Yasir Arafat, who went on to grab four wickets, dismissing John Crawley for 38 and Michael Carberry for 6. But Andrew Hall was the only other striker, with one wicket, as Ervine (56*) and Mascarenhas (33*) did the rest.2nd daySussex picked up their second win of the season with a thumping innings-and-109-run victory over Worcestershire at New Road – in spite of a majestic 108 from Graeme Hick. Worcestershire were reduced to 50 for 4 – Robin Martin-Jenkins removing Steven Moore, Vikram Solanki and Ben Smith all falling in a hurry. Hick was Hick, stroking 15 fours and two sixes, but it was always going to be a lone fight – in spite of a fighting partnership with Gareth Batty (64). Mushtaq Ahmed and Rana Naved each picked up three wickets to dismiss Worcestershire for 303 and condemning them to their fourth defeat in five games.

Division Two

Andy Caddick tore through Gloucestershire’s lower-order to take 6 for 111 and set Somerset up for a convincing eight-wicket win at Taunton. Resuming on 389 for 4 with Marcus North on 101, Gloucestershire slipped to 465 all out leaving Somerset 172 to win. Marcus Trescothick couldn’t open with Justin Langer due to tendonitis in his foot, but Somerset raced to their target in just 32 overs. Langer carved six fours in his bristling 41 before James Hildreth saw his side home with a solid 51.Northamptonshire completed a six-wicket victory against Derbyshire at Northampton, 11 overs into the final day. David Sales went early to leave then tottering in 23 for 4 chasing 79, but Rob White settled any nerves with a 34-ball 43. Stephen Peters remained firm at the other end as Northamptonshire take 21 points for their four day’s work.