It is now six weeks since Ochilo Ayacko, Kenya’s sports minister, decided enough was enough and suspended the Kenyan Cricket Association as the first step towards introducing a new body to truly and democratically represent the sport in the country.The minister’s actions appear to have been covertly backed by the ICC – he claims that he was "urged to take such independent lawful action as I deemed necessary so as to arrest what the ICC considered an unacceptable and indefensible state of affairs concerning the KCA and Kenya cricket generally." While the ICC officially distances itself from Ayacko’s subsequent forming of an alternative body, Cricket Kenya, it is widely believed that all funding to the KCA has been suspended.That the KCA remains legally in charge is down to the courts, who have proved the biggest crutch to the association in the past and are again doing so. Three ex parte injunctions have been granted to the KCA in the last six weeks, all before the same judge who has, rather surprisingly, not found time to hear legal applications from the minister. The judge’s last ruling was particularly contentious and, as with the other injuctions, is in the process of being challenged.The KCA has formally lost the support of almost all Kenya’s clubs. In special meetings earlier this month, not one club affiliated to the Nairobi and Coast associations backed it, with all but four, which abstained, opting to throw in their lot with Cricket Kenya. The KCA’s own domestic league and cup did not even start in 2004-05 as only a handful of clubs are thought to have entered, and even then some of those entries were subsequently challenged.It’s the same story with the players. The 14 who have been on strike since last October continue to refuse to have any dealings with the KCA, and Cricinfo has learned that others have now joined them, not on strike but in refusing to play under the KCA banner.Even the government has turned on the association, with the cabinet backing the minister’s strategy.Financially, the KCA is a shambles. It has not had a sponsor for almost two years, although there are several said to be waiting on the sidelines and willing to back Cricket Kenya if it gets official ICC recognition. Without ICC monies, the KCA has no income stream and things are growing increasingly desperate. A leading coach was evicted from his flat last week after the KCA failed to pay his rent, and recently a group of disgruntled coaches held senior KCA officials hostage in the association offices until their backpay was handed over.Aside from the strikers, who claim they are owed money from as long as two years ago, other players are also out of pocket and have even been asked to pay their own air fares to get to matches with no hope of reimbursement.Last week, Nairobi Gymkhana, the leading club in the country – and the home to the country’s main ground and also the KCA offices – decided to take the KCA to court over outstanding rent.So why are the KCA executive still fighting? The board has suffered a string of resignations lately, with three after Christmas being followed by that of Ramesh Bhalla last week. Even the KCA’s own selectors failed to name a side for the aborted Intercontinental Cup tie against Namibia after one of them said that, in his view, they no longer had the moral right to do so.The official reason that continues to be used by the board is that they have the legal authority to run the game, as proved by the courts. While legal arguments might keep them in control, their moral authority has surely long since expired.However, there are interesting developments behind the scenes, where some increasingly desperate maneuvering is taking place to try and allow senior officials an honourable exit. The thinking seems to be that longer they can hold on, the greater the desire to make concessions to remove them will become.The net is, however, closing. The ICC has raised "deep concerns as to the management and governance of Kenyan cricket" and the minister has gone some way beyond that, claiming that he stepped in to end a cycle of "internal wrangles, corruption and misappropriation of funds." On Friday, the police seized bank records of the KCA as part of ongoing investigations.Comments attributed to the ICC last week that it would take until June 2006 for a new body – ie Cricket Kenya – to be recognised were seized on by supporters of the KCA. But look at the ICC’s position. It cannot back this new body until it is entirely certain that the old KCA is finished. To do so would leave it in an embarrassing situation were the KCA to survive – and despite it being backed into a corner, stranger things have happened in Kenya. And so the ICC has no choice but to sit on the sidelines. It seems unlikely , however, that it will continue to back a body which is unrepresentative, has little support, is broke, and continues to operate under such a cloud.There are potential openings which would enable the ICC to act. One is that the constitutional review which is due any day now will not be delivered. The ICC put great store in this, but the man driving it inside Kenya, Sammy Obingo, the former KCA general manager, changed sides and is now firmly in the minister’s camp. Without this review, there can be no independent elections (there have been none since 1997) and that could give the ICC an excuse to get involved. There are also the ongoing investigations inside Kenya into the board’s management which might provide another opening.The only certainties are that this whole affair will drag on for some time yet, and the longer it does, the greater the harm for the game inside Kenya.

Trinidad and Tobago Under-19 suffered from another poor all-round display in their final West Indies Under-19 Challenge match against defending champions Guyana at Canaree, St Kitts.T&T lost the encounter by a narrow five-run margin after needing six runs off the last over of the match with only one wicket in hand. The loss allowed Guyana to proceed to the semi-finals of the tournament along with Barbados, Jamaica and Leeward Islands.In the other games yesterday, Leewards defeated Windward Islands by 192 runs to book their place in the next round and Barbados were able to come out on top against leaders Jamaica by five wickets.Guyana, who were also in a must-win situation, amassed a competitive total of 201 for 8 in their 50 overs with Rajindra Chandrika top scoring with 43. Javon Charles was the pick of the bowlers for T&T, picking up 3 for 35.T&T, in reply, kept the game interesting right down to the end as Sumant Maraj battled for 36 overs to top score with 56 but that was not enough as T&T eventually ran out of batsmen after trying to accelerate the scoring late in the game.”It was a very disappointing tournament for T&T,” said team manager Narsingh Rambarran. But Rambarran said there were also some positives.”Darren Bravo was very consistent throughout the tournament while Milton Dookran provided him with some good support. There are some talented players there who can go further in the game.”

Australian fast bowler Brett Lee could hardly hide his excitement about being back in action when he called Twenty20 “three hours of the most amazing cricket”. He will be spearheading Australia’s attack in the ICC World Twenty20 after a seven-month layoff from the game.The quartet of players Australia trooped out in front of the media in Johannesburg on Thursday – Michael Clarke, Michael Hussey, Andrew Symonds and Lee – all indicated it was important to remember the 20-over game was all about entertaining the crowd.”We need to make sure we adapt to this new tournament as quickly as possible but the most important thing is this event is attracting a different demographic to cricket,” Lee said. “Bearing in mind that Australia haven’t come here to finish second, third or fourth, Twenty20 is all about having fun with the crowd. It’s three hours of the most amazing cricket with plenty of sixes.”Lee missed Australia’s victorious World Cup campaign in the Caribbean after injuring his ankle ligaments during a training session in February and the ICC World Twenty20 provided the perfect opportunity for him to re-establish himself as a star on the global cricket stage.”This tournament is a massive consolation for missing the World Cup, it’s a real opportunity for me,” Lee said. “I’ve been able to use the time off to concentrate purely on pre-season fitness and it was a good opportunity to give my body a bit of a rest from bowling. So I’m really happy with my fitness and the way I’ve been bowling. I’m champing at the bit.”Lee said it was also important to embrace the differences that Twenty20 has brought to the game. “Things like sitting on the boundary and not in the change rooms, teams having to swap change rooms straight after a match – we should embrace it as new and accept that things are done differently in Twenty20. The spectators like it and it brings us closer to them.”Lee indicated that he would not be looking to cut down on speed or bowl defensively in the tournament. “The aim is still to get ten wickets, no matter what form of the game,” he said. “If you can get wickets early on, it’s definitely going to dent the opposition’s run-scoring.”You need to keep the boundary-scoring down too, but you need a couple of guys who are around 150 kph, using their pace and getting the ball up in the spot. If the batsmen are going for big shots, it does mean you have a better chance of taking a wicket and it doesn’t matter if it comes by knocking [down] the stumps or if it’s caught on the boundary.”Australia are once again overflowing with batting power as they enter the inaugural ICC World Twenty20 as favourites, but Hussey, who had a disappointing World Cup with little opportunity to shine, said he was just chuffed to be part of a winning team.”I actually thoroughly enjoyed the West Indies, it was just a pleasure to be with the team and see how well the top four batted and how well the bowlers executed our plans,” Hussey said. “I probably won’t get a lot of opportunity in this tournament either, but I’m really keen to play and get into a match situation again. I’m sick and tired of all the training.”Hussey said that Australia would have to rely on their natural instincts because they did not have much experience of Twenty20 cricket. “You can put a couple of tactical things in place, but it’s best to just let your instincts take over and trust your skills,” he said.”We haven’t played much of this format of cricket, so we’ll need to get our skills up. But we are all very experienced cricketers who know our games very well and we don’t rely on one or two key players – we have match-winners all the way through the squad.”

At the beginning of the series against Australia, India’s middle-order batsman Robin Uthappa had said his team would meet “fire with fire”. On the eve of the fourth ODI in Chandigarh with India trailing 0-2, Uthappa admitted that the “intensity levels had dropped” after the World Twenty20 because “they had little time to plan for a tough series”.Keeping the intensity levels high and playing hard cricket is what Ricky Ponting had said aggression was all about. He felt Australia’s dominance was a result of them training and preparing harder than most teams and their confident on-field attitude was a result of their meticulous planning. In Kochi, Australia had Yuvraj Singh caught on the drive by Matthew Hayden at short cover for 10. In Hyderabad, however, Yuvraj scored a scintillating 121 off 115 balls and Ponting said a team meeting had been held to form a plan of attack against him.”We’ve looked at a few different lines and lengths that we should be bowling to him and some areas that we let him off in the last game. We’ll adjust things a little bit and test him in different areas and see what the outcome is.”Ponting had also said the inclusion of India’s big three – Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid – in the ODI squad after they opted out of the Twenty20 tournament could work to Australia’s advantage because they knew their strengths and weaknesses. That statement was backed up by what followed. Ganguly hasn’t had a hit yet but Tendulkar and Dravid have scored only 90 runs between them in five innings.”If you have a look at a couple of their [Tendulkar and Dravid’s] dismissals, it would have been the way that we wanted to get them out, the way we’ve got them out a few times in the past. We know that they are quality players and on any given day they can be match-winners for India.”Sachin was just working his way into his innings the last game, setting himself up for a big one, so we have to make sure we don’t let him off the hook early on. If Ganguly plays tomorrow, we’ve got a pretty good idea of where we should be bowling to him and, so far, we’ve got Dravid pretty well looked after. But you can’t expect that to keep happening, these guys are going to come good and play well at some stage and we’re prepared for that if they do.”Australia have backed up all their talk with quality performances in the three games so far. It doesn’t matter whether the Indians get in the Australians’ faces on Monday, what matters is if they’ll be able to get on the scoreboard.

Drawn – ScorecardMCC rested many of their leading players for a non first-class match and the XI was completed by Plum Warner, the manager, and Jack Hobbs, reporting on the tour for a newspaper. Chipperfield hit one five and eight fours in an excellent innings of 157. Hobbs, opening the innings, made 44 while the Nawab of Pataudi top scored with an unbeaten 94. On the last day R. Little and A. Baker, aged 16, put on 102 for the fourth Northern Districts wicket, Little making 117.

Luke Wright, the Sussex allrounder, has been forced to fly home from the England performance camp in Mohali with a foot injury. He will receive treatment back at Hove in conjunction with the ECB academy with a view to him rejoining the squad in the New Year.Steven Finn, the 18-year-old Middlesex fast bowler, will bolster the squad in India after impressing during the second half of last season. His performances during the Under-19 series against Pakistan caught the eye and he operates with a high action and generates decent pace.Wright is one of the bright prospects in English cricket after making a half-century on his ODI debut against India at The Oval in September. However, since then runs have been harder to come by and his five innings at the ICC World Twenty20 in South Africa brought 43 runs including two ducks. He was part of the one-day squad in Sri Lanka but didn’t play in any of the five matches.The performance squad will spend the first part of the camp in Mohali before moving to Chennai. Ashley Giles and Martyn Moxon are providing specialist coaching alongside Kevin Shine while David Parsons, the interim academy director, will replace Giles in December.

Ranadeb Bose has lashed out against national selector Ranjib Biswal for suggesting he was not quick enough. Biswal, the East Zone selector in the five-member committee, said recently that it was tough to “fight” for Bose because the team management believes he “is almost as slow as Dada (Sourav Ganguly).”Hurt by the statement, Bose said, “If he has said that, he’s lying. Nobody in his right mind can say I am as slow as Souray. I was between 132-134 kmph at the Challenger Trophy. It was live on TV and those who want can check. Souray bowls at around 120 and the difference in our pace is significant. Biswal saw me in the recent Ranji match against Orissa where the keeper was collecting it from near his chest. I must say he is a liar if he says I bowl at Sourav’s pace.”Biswal had also said that the competition for the fast bowler’s slot for Australia tour was between Pathan, Ishant, Munaf, VRV Singh and Pankaj Singh. “Of the five, only VRV and Pankaj are faster than me,” Bose said. “Given the pace Munaf has bowled at of late, that is. And I am not talking about performance, since the selector has talked just about pace.”I know I don’t have a chance to play for India anymore. Maybe because I don’t do a lot of things like sending messages to certain people on their birthdays, marriage anniversaries or don’t try to please them by doing things that go beyond performing in the cricket field. It’s disappointing, but I have to accept it.”

Search for Tom Parker on the internet and you get 17,100 results, most of which involve Elvis Presley’s manager. The Tom Parker that you will encounter at the Sydney Cricket Ground, though, is more focussed on a rock and roll of a different kind: hammering in the rocky surface before rolling it evenly.The 22-yards that Parker tends has been making a bit of news of late. It’s excited Brett Lee and prompted Brad Hogg to let out a grimace. Words like abrasive and rough are being replaced by lively and green. Both captains thought it was a “good wicket”, suggesting that there could be a bit in there for everyone. When a batsman and bowler call a pitch “good” you have something exciting brewing.”I tend to leave a bit more grass on the pitches these days than years gone by,” said Parker, who’s been the head groundsman here for close to a decade. “This pitch has probably got a bit more grass on it than we had in 2004. I feel it will probably have a bit more bounce in it. I’m just trying to keep a bit of pace in the pitch, trying to get a bit more carry to the keeper, and more consistent bounce throughout the match.”In years gone by, it has probably played a little slow and a little low. It’s going to seam around a bit on day one and on day two it should flatten out a bit more. By day four and five it starts to turn. To me that’s a cricket pitch. It should be changing every day.”India wouldn’t mind a surface that’s tending towards the bowlers. Look back at India’s overseas wins in the recent past – in Nottingham, Johannesburg and Kingston – and you have triumphs being engineered on lively surfaces. Rahul Dravid made an interesting point after the victory in Trent Bridge. “I’ve always felt we’ve done well when we’ve had the opportunity to take 20 wickets – we might lose the odd game but we also win games … Sometimes we’re put on the back foot early on good pitches, when we struggle to take 20 wickets.”While the batsmen thrive on flat pitches at home, they’ve not able to capitalise on hard surfaces abroad. Cape Town last year, when they collapsed for 169 in the second innings, was a classic instance of imploding on a benign track but there have been other instances of botching up chances in Lord’s and Melbourne as well. Given a choice, India might just prefer life on the pitch; not only will it enhance their bowlers chances but also offer their strokeplayers some pace to play with.Kumble, in his first press conference as captain, had made it clear that he wanted to “take the pitch and conditions out of the equation”. He reiterated the point here, adding that he “doesn’t want to worry too much about that”. The quick outfield will bring a smile. It means India’s batsmen can manage fours instead of having to rely on twos and threes. It may also mean a slightly better fielding effort, an area of their cricket which was exposed at the MCG.”It’s more to do with thinking and being a bit positive,” Kumble said. “If the mind is thinking positive, running between the wickets and fielding will be different.”

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out

Ashwell Prince halted a South African slide on the second day in Cape Town after Dwayne Bravo’s three wickets left them facing the prospect of a significant deficit. However, West Indies produced a resilient effort to stay in contention, as Bravo put in a marathon 24-over spell, but Prince and Boucher added an unbeaten 87 to put South Africa back on course for a useful lead.It’s been a long while since West Indies have found themselves ahead in a series and for the majority of the day they were without Fidel Edwards, who was forced off the field after pulling up with a hamstring strain five balls into his fifth over. To compound the problems Jerome Taylor also left the field later in the day, severely cutting into Chris Gayle’s resources, at a time when South Africa were ripe for the taking at 131 for 5 following Bravo’s successes which included Jacques Kallis and Hashim Amla in eight balls. Gayle’s hand was forced when Bravo eventually needed a break – his 24 overs only broken by lunch and tea – and he used the spin of Rawl Lewis and Marlon Samuels in tandem during the final session.This allowed South Africa to claw back ground with Prince and Boucher putting their head down for some hard graft. Prince’s fifty took 129 balls as he made a vital contribution following a lean period although boundaries were a rare commodity as the outfield remained slow and the pitch tough for scoring. One delivery from Powell burst through the surface to suggest batting last will be a tricky proposition.It reinforced the feeling that West Indies’ total wasn’t as disappointing as it appeared and would have been worth closer to 300 with a quicker outfield. Shivnarine Chanderpaul was left unbeaten on 65 off 223 balls when Andre Nel cleaned up the innings in the first three overs of the day.South Africa were given a stronger start than of late with Graeme Smith and Neil McKenzie adding 46 – the first double-figure opening stand of the home season – but none of the top four could build on their starts. Taylor helped take up the slack after Edwards’s departure with a lively spell either side of lunch which brought two wickets. McKenzie was drawn forward outside off stump and the delivery held its line to take the edge and Gayle completed a regulation catch. McKenzie hadn’t been overawed during his first Test innings in three-and-half years, but his demise for 23 set a trend.Smith was far from convincing, always giving the impression that he was close to being trapped lbw or edging to slip, and fell in predictable style as he pushed away from his body. The catch would probably have carried to first slip, but Ramdin dived across and made sure of the scalp.With Amla and Kallis adding 59 for the third wicket South Africa were making strong progress towards taking control and Kallis was beginning to look especially dangerous. The breakthrough came when he was caught on the back foot and edged through to Ramdin, soon followed by Amla who was trapped on the crease by a delivery that shaped back in.Refreshed by the tea interval, Bravo continued to make inroads when he found AB de Villiers’ outside edge and three wickets had fallen for 11 in 10 overs. Last week in Port Elizabeth, Bravo savoured his first Test victory and did more than his fair share to try and ensure the wait for number two isn’t as long. His nagging length and accuracy – he conceded less than two-an-over – were ideally suited to a two-paced surface. One more strike and West Indies would have been into the long tail with South Africa’s prospects of levelling the series fading. Now, though, this is anyone’s game and an intriguing battle lies ahead.

Matt Nicholson, the Australian fast bowler, will deputise for Mohammad Asif at Surrey for the first half of the season – and possibly the entire summer.Nicholson took 44 wickets for Surrey last season in the Championship, but with uncertainty over Asif’s involvement, he could play a fuller role than was first anticipated. Asif, the Pakistan fast bowler, will be unavailable until June at the earliest, and his board have also expressed concerns about his workload.”The Pakistan board have said they are not going to allow their quick bowlers to play county cricket, which is understandable as most of their first-choice bowlers are on the sidelines at the moment,” Alan Butcher, the Surrey manager, said.”So while we have a contract, it must be said it’s far from certain that he’ll be able to take up that contract. At the end of last season Matt made it very plain that he’d be delighted to come back and play for us, and I know that everyone in the dressing room is really delighted he will be with us for at least the first part of the season.”I would have no qualms at all if it turned into a full season’s contract.”