Daily News

Thursday, December 1, 2022

LIVE, FIFA World Cup 2022 Croatia vs Belgium, Canada vs Morocco: CRO 0-0 BEL, CAN 0-2 MAR; Atlas Lions in firm control

20:56 (IST)

23' Canada 0-2 Morocco

GOAL! Another goal for Morocco, and boy are they marching confidently towards the knockouts at the moment! Youssef En-Nesyri scores for the Atlas Lions this time, beating two Canadian defenders as well as the goalkeeper to become the first from his nation to score in two different World Cups.

20:46 (IST)

15’ Croatia 0-0 Belgium

Penalty awarded to Croatia! And it’s Modric who will be taking the kick. Golden opportunity for the Croats to gain the early lead!

But just when Modric is preparing to take the kick, the referee decides to consult VAR to check for a possible offside.

And offside it is! No penalty!

20:39 (IST)

4' Canada 0-1 Morocco

GOAL! Poor defending from the Canadians as Hakim Ziyech puts the Atlas Lions ahead inside the first five minutes! Fastest ever goal for the Moroccans at the World Cup and one that gives their knockout hopes a major boost!

20:35 (IST)

And we're underway....

The national anthems have been sung at the two venues that are witnessing the final round of Group F fixtures taking place. Croatia and Morocco get the ball rolling against Belgium and Canada respectively.

20:29 (IST)

Must-win fixture for Belgium:

Roberto Martinez's ageing 'Red Devils' will be knocked out of the 2022 FIFA World Cup if they lose to Croatia today. Should the two sides draw, Belgium will hope for Canada to beat Morocco which will put them level with the Atlas Lions where goal difference will determine the Group F runner-up.

20:18 (IST)

Lineups for the Canada vs Morocco fixture:

Canada: Borjan (c), Johnston, Adekugbe, Miller, Vitoria, Hoilett, Buchanan, Kaye, Larin, Davies, Osorio

Substitutes: St. Clair, Piette, Fraser, Cavallini, Ugbo, Hutchinson, Kone, Pantemis, David, Laryea, Millar, Wotherspoon, Cornelius, Waterman.

Morocco: Bounou, Hakimi, Mazraoui, Amrabat, Aguerd, Saiss (c), Ziyech, Ounahi, Sabiri, Boufal, En-Nesyri

Substitutes: Hamdallah, Zaroury, Mohamedi, Chair, Aboukhlal, Amallah, Ezzalzouli, El Yamiq, Dari, Cheddira, Tagnaouti, El Khannous, Benoun, Attiyat Allah, Jabrane.

20:16 (IST)

Here are the lineups for the Croatia vs Belgium game:

Croatia: Livakovic; Juranovic, Lovren, Gvardiol, Sosa; Modric, Brozovic, Kovacic; Kramaric, Livaja, Perisic.

Substitutes: Grbic, Ivusic, Stanisic, Erlic, Majer, Vlasic, Pasalic, Petkovic, Budimir, Orsic, Vida, Sutalo, Sucic, Jakic.

Belgium: Courtois; Meunier, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, Castagne; Dendoncker, Witsel; Carrasco, De Bruyne, Trossard; Mertens.

Substitutes: Mignolet, Casteels, Theate, Faes, Tielemans, Lukaku, Batshuayi, T Hazard, E Hazard, Doku, Vanaken, De Ketelaere, Openda, Debast.

20:03 (IST)

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the Croatia vs Belgium and Canada vs Morocco matches in the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. The fixtures will take place simultaneously starting at 8.30 pm Indian Standard Time and will bring the race to the knockouts in Group F to a conclusion.

Preview: Belgium face a stiff test in their hope of making it to the knockouts of the 2022 FIFA World Cup, going up against 2018 runners-up Croatia while Morocco will hope to join fellow African nation Senegal in the knockouts when they lock horns with Canada.

FIFA World Cup: Fixtures | Results | Points Table | Squads | Records

The two fixtures will take place simultaneously at the Ahmad Bin Ali Stadium (CRO vs BEL) and at the Al Thumama Stadium (CAN vs MAR) respectively and will bring the race to Round of 16 spots in Group F to a conclusion.

Both Croatia and Morocco are on four points each though it is the former who sit on top of Group F due to goal difference. The two sides played out a goalless draw in the opening week of the tournament while Belgium started off with a 1-0 win over Canada.

The Moroccans, however, would go on to stun the Belgians 2-0, while Croatia handed Canada a comprehensive 4-1 defeat.

Lineups:

Croatia: Livakovic; Juranovic, Lovren, Gvardiol, Sosa; Modric, Brozovic, Kovacic; Kramaric, Livaja, Perisic.

Belgium: Courtois; Meunier, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, Castagne; Dendoncker, Witsel; Carrasco, De Bruyne, Trossard; Mertens.

Canada: Milan Borjan (c), Alistair Johnston, Samuel Adekugbe, Kamal Miller, Steven Vitoria, Junior Hoilett, Tajon Buchanan, Mark-Anthony Kaye, Cyle Larin, Alphonso Davies, Jonathan Osorio.

Morocco: Yassine Bounou, Achraf Hakimi, Noussair Mazraoui, Sofyan Amrabat, Nayef Aguerd, Romain Saiss (c), Hakim Ziyech, Azzedine Ounahi, Abdelhamid Sabiri, Soufiane Boufal, Youssef En-Nesyri.

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PAK vs ENG 1st Test: England produce world record 506/4 on Day 1, Twitter slams Pakistan bowlers for poor show

England put on an impressive batting display as they crushed the Pakistan bowlers to register a mammoth 506 runs losing just 4 wickets on the opening day of the first Test at the Pindi Cricket Stadium. The English top-order is entirely credited for the massive score as they took full advantage of the poor pitch.

As many as four batters including Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pop, and Harry Brook smashed a century each to their names. The opening pair of Crawley and Duckett initiated the innings in a spectacular fashion and set the foundation with a 233-run stand before Pakistan spinner Zahid Mahmood sent off Duckett on 107 runs. In the next over, Crawley’s 122-run knock came to an end as pacer Haris Rauf rattled the stumps with a brilliant reverse swing.

Following the departure of their openers, wicketkeeper-batter Pope took on the responsibility and registered 108 runs off just 104 deliveries. Joining hands with Brook, Pope stitched a 176-run partnership before Mohammad Ali broke it. Brook came out all guns blazing, bringing up his maiden ton in just 80 balls. During his explosive innings, the 23-year-old notched up a total of 14 boundaries and 2 maximums. At stumps, Brook remained unbeaten at 101 with skipper Ben Stokes batting at 15-ball 34.

The 500-plus total on a single day by The Three Lions has generated remarkable reactions among global cricket enthusiasts. Former English captain Michael Vaughan took to Twitter and dropped a question asking, “Has any team ever scored 500 on day 1 of a Test match?”

https://twitter.com/MichaelVaughan/status/1598271767826825217

Ex-cricketer Tom Moody sarcastically said, “Good to see the ODI series get started in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.”

https://twitter.com/TomMoodyCricket/status/1598198756373323777

A user heaped praise on England’s “Bazball” approach and stated, “506 in a day. Wow! Bazball is madness.”

https://twitter.com/DJaynomics/status/1598293987370340353

Another person hilariously noted, “Self-claimed best bowling lineup leaking runs at 6.75 per over in the test.”

https://twitter.com/iamgk22/status/1598293864908922880

Here are some other reactions:

https://twitter.com/englandcricket/status/1598281061095579648

https://twitter.com/ImMehulOkk/status/1598282102122119169

https://twitter.com/Musskey/status/1598202113599098880

https://twitter.com/bhaveshkjha/status/1598294268086714369

https://twitter.com/cricketnmore/status/1598293894763925504

At the stumps of Day 1, Brook remained unbeaten at 101 with skipper Ben Stokes batting at 15-ball 34. It will be exciting to watch if England opt to declare the innings or continue the run-fest on Friday.

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Pakistan vs England: Visitors score 506 runs on Day 1 breaking multiple records in Rawalpindi

England got off to a dominant start in the three-match Test series against Pakistan in Rawalpindi on Thursday, amassing over 500 runs as records tumbled on Day 1.

As many as four batters scored centuries after England opted to make first use of what was a batting paradise prepared by the Pindi Cricket Stadium curator. Openers Zak Crawley (122) and Ben Duckett (107) smashed tons and shared a 233-run opening stand to push the Babar Azam-led side to the backfoot.

600 in a day anyone 🤷🏻🤷🏻 #PAKvENG

— Michael Vaughan (@MichaelVaughan) December 1, 2022

The Pakistanis appeared to be fighting back by dismissing both Crawley and Duckett in a space of a few deliveries, and getting rid of former captain and batting star Joe Root (23) — the only Englishman to be dismissed for less than 100 on the opening day.

Wicketkeeper-batter Ollie Pope and Harry Brook, however, would continue to make mincemeat of the Pakistani attack with a 176-run fourth-wicket stand that ensured the tourists remained firmly in control.

Here are some of the records that were broken and milestones achieved on the opening day of the Test:

— England are now the first team to score 500 runs on the opening day of a Test. The record had previously belonged to Australia, who had scored 494 runs against South Africa in Sydney in 1910.

— England fell just three runs short of the record for most runs scored in any given day of a Test hosted in Asia; Sri Lanka, who scored 509 runs on Day 2 against Bangladesh at Colombo’s P Sara Oval, still hold that record.

— The 506 runs scored by England stands at the fifth spot in the record for most runs collected on any given day of a Test.

— The score of 506/4 however, is the highest score by an away team across any given day of a Test

— This is also the first instance of four batters scoring tons on the opening day of a Test.

What made England’s feat on the opening day even more impressive was the fact that several members of the English squad were bogged down by illness in the build-up to the series opener, which nearly forced the Pakistan Cricket Board to postpone the match. The illness forced the visitors to hand the wicketkeeper’s gloves to Pope with Ben Foakes yet to fully recover on Thursday morning.

The hosts too had missed out on pace spearhead Shaheen Afridi, who had undergone surgery for appendicitis and had also been dealing with a host of other issues.

As many as three Pakistani bowlers — pacers Haris Rauf, Mohammad Ali and legspinner Zahid Mahmood — made their Test debuts in Rawalpindi. Both Rauf and Ali got a wicket each while Mahmood accounted for the dismissals of Duckett and Root.

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Highlights, Pakistan vs England, Full Cricket Score: Visitors end Day 1 of first Test on 506/4

Pakistan vs England 1st Test Preview: The first Test between Pakistan and England is going ahead as scheduled despite several England players having been ill on the eve of the match.

The Pakistan Cricket Board said in a statement Thursday two hours before the scheduled start that the England and Wales Cricket Board “has informed the PCB that they are in a position to field an XI, and, as such, the first Test will commence as per schedule today at the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium.”

Several England players were affected by a virus ahead of the team’s first Test in Pakistan in 17 years, leading to discussions about postponing the start of the match by one day. Officials from both teams had agreed to delay a final decision on whether to postpone the game until 7:30 AM local time Thursday — just two hours before the scheduled toss.

Only five England players — Harry Brook, Zak Crawley, Keaton Jennings, Ollie Pope and Joe Root — turned up for the training at the Pindi Cricket Stadium on Wednesday. The rest of the squad members, including captain Ben Stokes, stayed in the hotel as team officials said six or seven players had been affected by the virus.

Brook, Crawley, Pope and Root all were named in England’s playing XI for the first Test.

(with inputs from The Associated Press)

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Jatin Paranjpe, Ashok Malhotra and Sulakshana Naik named in BCCI’s Cricket Advisory Committee

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Thursday named Jatin Paranjpe, Ashok Malhotra and Sulakshana Naik in the Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC).

The announcement comes at a time when the board is receiving applications for the senior selectors’ posts following the ouster of the Chetan Sharma-led committee, which was sacked following the disappointing conclusion to India’s T20 World Cup campaign.

The CAC, whose first members included Indian batting legends Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman, is tasked with interviewing potential selectors and coaches and forwarding their choices to the BCCI president and secretary for formal appointments.

Naik has the most caps as a player among the three, having represented the country in two Tests, 46 ODIs and 31 T20Is in an international career spanning more than a decade.

Paranjpe represented Team India in four one-day internationals in 1998 besides over a hundred appearances for the Mumbai cricket team in both First-Class and List A formats. Malhotra had represented India in seven Tests and 20 ODIs besides leading the Indian Cricketers Association.

Malhotra replaced former India seamer Madan Lal and Paranjape came in place of Rudra Pratap Singh, who has joined Mumbai Indians as a talent scout. Only former women’s international Naik remained from the last committee.

“Malhotra has represented India in seven Tests and 20 ODIs and recently served as the President of the Indian Cricketers’ Association. Paranjape has played four ODIs for India and was part of the senior men’s selection Committee,” BCCI secretary Jay Shah was quoted as saying in a press release.

In November, the BCCI had sacked the entire selection panel headed by Chetan Sharma. The other members were Harvinder Singh, Sunil Joshi and Debasish Mohanty.

It is understood that Chetan, despite his unceremonious dumping and adverse performance report after India’s semifinal debacle at the T20 World Cup, has reapplied alongside Harvinder.

Joshi and Mohanty (tenure ended) have decided against reapplication.

Some of the prominent names to have applied are Nayan Mongia, Venkatesh Prasad, Maninder Singh, Shiv Sunder Das, Subroto Banerjee, Salil Ankola, Amay Khurasiya, Reetinder Singh Sodhi, Nikhil Chopra and Atul Wassan to name a few.

With inputs from PTI

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Watch: England’s Joe Root feeds kitten at Pindi Cricket Stadium ahead of first Test

England vs Pakistan in the opening Test of a three-match series got underway on Thursday at the Pindi Cricket Stadium. On Wednesday, England team arrived at the venue early in the morning and went through a brief on-field training session.

During the session, their ace batter Joe Root, along with some of his teammates, found an adorable kitten inside the ground and went on to feed it. A clip of it has been shared on Twitter by Danny Reuben, Head of Communications of the England Men’s Team.

Always thinking of others. @root66 feeding one of the Pindi Cricket Ground’s kittens this morning at practice. 🐈 🦁🦁🦁 pic.twitter.com/zoDyE4sK9f

— Danny Reuben (@dannyreuben) November 30, 2022

In the footage, Root can be spotted coming out of the dressing room with a tiny bowl in his hands. Then he approached his teammates who were playing with the kitten. In a heart-winning gesture, the 31-year-old batter sat in front of the little cat and kept the bowl before it.

The kitten, evidently quite hungry, accepted the offering and continued to have the food from the bowl. The sight delighted Root and his other team members and the smile on their faces said it all.

The caption of the post explained, “Always thinking of others. Joe Root is feeding one of the Pindi Cricket Ground’s kittens this morning at practice.”

Since being uploaded, the 23-second footage has earned more than 4 lakh views so far. It has also garnered as many as 6,200 likes on the microblogging site.

Ahead of the first Test, England players and staff, including skipper Ben Stokes, fell ill after reaching Pakistan. Though there was no official clarification, the reason behind their illness was possibly food poisoning.

Despite question marks at first, the Three Lions fielded their playing XI for the first Test. Winning the toss, Stokes opted to bat.

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Ruturaj Gaikwad - The method to his madness

With his second hundred on the trot, and third of the Vijay Hazare Trophy 2022, Ruturaj Gaikwad leapfrogged into the fourth position of the leading run-getters table. The 25-year-old’s 168 vs Assam in the semi-final took his tally to 552 from just four innings. Gaikwad has put on a freak show in his last two appearances for Maharashtra but it’s the method in his batting that has taken center stage. Yes, there was a double hundred vs Uttar Pradesh in the quarterfinal but it wasn’t a slam-bang approach from the word go, in both the hundreds. A watchful start precedes intent vs spin and then it’s just straight and big. Very much in the V.

Against Assam, it was a “mila ke khelna” (a slang used in cricketing circles for playing correct) start as he waited for the loose balls and didn’t show the urge to press the accelerator early in the innings. The cover-drives were as elegant as they could get, short and wide were put away with disdain and anything on the pads was sent to the ropes in a hurry. The team total read 93/1 in 19.5 overs when Gaikwad brought up his fifty off 56 balls. There was no sense of urgency in the eight boundaries hit but what followed next was something which we have seen in the IPL too in the past and in the game against Uttar Pradesh, where he hit 220*.

Gaikwad exploded, and how.

“How” is the keyword here. Again, there was proper method and not madness about his approach in this crucial period of the game. In a 50-over tie, the period from 20-35 overs can swing momentum multiples times and it’s a phase which every side wants to boss to maintain a good grip on the contest. Maharashtra lost Satyajeet Bachhav for 41 in the 22nd over and Ankit Bawne’s arrival injected urgency in the innings.

Severe against spin

It was a batting-against-spin masterclass on display as Gaikwad effortlessly went about scoring runs, mostly in the V. Batting is mostly a reactive process and the right-hander was very pleasing to the eye as he found gaps with precision and cleared ropes with ease. Focus was mostly on timing as he showed intent against the spinners. Inside outs, lofted hits over the bowler’s head and powerful pulls towards the mid-wicket region highlighted his second half of the innings where he scored runs at a brisk rate. The opener’s next fifty runs came off just 32 balls and it included three beautiful sixes.

The third half of the innings had intent written all over it as he went after everything, and succeeded. The next 68 runs came off just 38 balls, and even the seamer’s weren’t spared this time around. He finally miscued a Riyan Parag delivery while looking to hit his seventh six of the innings and a brilliant catch by Saahil Jain at long-on ended the masterclass. 168 runs off 126 balls, 18 boundaries and 6 sixes.

Similar template vs UP

He followed a similar template in the game against UP. It was a very good seam attack featuring the likes of Ankit Rajpoot, Shivam Mavi, and Kartik Tyagi. Spinners Shiva Singh and Shivam Sharma too are known to be very accurate and have enjoyed a lot of success in their career.

There were plenty of oohs and aahs early in the fixture as UP seamers did make the ball talk and kept the Maharashtra batters under check. They were 29/1 after 10 overs and Gaikwad had only managed 18 runs off the 35 balls he faced.

The right-hander looked busy moment spin was introduced into the attack. UP skipper Karan Sharma rotated his spinners with Kartik Tyagi and even rolled his arm over to rush in a few overs. Gaikwad used the period to get himself set and then made most of the drop, while he was batting on 49. He brought his fifty (off 72 balls) with a six, 100 (109 balls) with a six, 200 (153 balls) with a six and stormed into record books.

Against UP, the seven consecutive sixes off Shiva Singh caught most of the attention and the overall approach in the second half of the innings kind of took a backseat. Like the Mahrashtra fixture, bulk of the scoring vs done against spin and it certainly didn’t turn out to be a memorable fixture for left-arm spinner Shiva.

Action now shifts to the title clash featuring Maharashtra and Saurashtra. All eyes will be on how the likes of Jaydev Unadkat and Chetan Sakariya operate against a formidable Maharashtra batting unit featuring Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ankit Bawne and Rahul Tripathi.

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