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England say there was no headbutt, Australia say there was. So we have put our heads together to investigate the world of the sporting headbutt

ESPNcricinfo staff29-Nov-20172:29

Jonny Bairstow has been his normal self – Chris Woakes

Trevor Bayliss, the England coach, has insisted what Jonny Bairstow did to Cameron Bancroft during a night out in Perth cannot be classified as a headbutt, even though he admits there was contact between the two players’ heads. Bancroft, meanwhile, in a bizarre press conference in Brisbane following Australia’s victory in the first Test of the ongoing Ashes series, said it was a butt, albeit a playful one.So why the confusion? In the interests of harmony, as relations between Australia and England become increasingly fraught, we have produced a useful guide.Well, it’s not always easy to judge what is a butt and what’s not. Just ask football referees, who have to make decisions regularly to issue a red card or just view a collision as one of those things. We’ve scoured a list of suspected headbutts from various sports and deciphered that there are four main types of butts.Some are easy to spot, while others leave space for the kind of ambiguity surrounding Bairstow’s. So here we go. Which do you think it was?ESPNcricinfo LtdThe Full-Blown Moving Butt
The most famous example of this type was Zinedine Zidane’s headbutt to Italy defender Marco Materazzi in the 2006 football World Cup final. Zidane, then considered the best footballer in the world, drove his head into Materazzi’s chest and was sent off by the referee. As you can see from the illustration of the event, Zidane prepared for the butt when he was a few feet away from Materazzi, bending his left knee and preparing to spring forward. He then got his whole body into the strike, arching his back and bending forward as he delivered the blow. A moving headbutt is pretty easy to spot, and there’s no questioning that it is in fact a butt.ESPNcricinfo LtdThe Standing Butt
This occurs when two sportsmen are standing in close proximity, often amid a melee of other players, and one makes a slight, surreptitious neck movement towards the other to make contact with his head. There’s no movement of the legs or back in this kind of butt, which makes it harder to detect. Also, it’s sometimes tough to tell whether a player has meant to butt the other or just square up, brow to brow, and say hello. In the incident depicted above, for example, Marouane Fellaini, the Manchester United midfielder, appeared to just slowly lower his head onto that of Sergio Aguero, the Manchester City forward. Whether or not a standing butt is considered a butt at all really depends on the speed and intensity of the neck movement. But it can be confusing. Fellaini was sent off for his slow nod, but when Luis Figo, the Portuguese footballer, made a sharp snapping motion with his neck to deliver a standing headbutt to Netherlands midfielder Mark van Bommel in a 2006 World Cup game, he was given just a yellow card.ESPNcricinfo LtdThe Head Push
This is the kind of thing you’ll often see when two mates are simply joshing around, as Bairstow says he was doing with Bancroft. One person places his head on the other’s and then pushes forward, making it more of a head push than a headbutt. This rarely causes any sort of injury or harm, but can be used as a means of intimidation. Joe Hart, the England goalkeeper, received a yellow card for a head push on footballer George Boyd in a Premier League match. As you can see from the depiction above, Hart starts with his head already touching Boyd’s and then stretches his neck forward.ESPNcricinfo LtdThe Head Uppercut
Some headbutt aficionados on social media have pointed out that Bairstow is shorter than Bancroft and would have had trouble executing a butt. Well, perhaps he employed the uppercut technique, as American boxer Victor Ortiz did in his bout against Floyd Mayweather Junior. As seen in the depiction above, this butt is delivered by a shorter man crouching down and then springing upwards to smash his head into a taller man’s jaw or forehead. Argentinian footballer Ariel Ortega used a variation of this butt against Netherlands goalkeeper Edwin van der Saar, who is almost a foot taller than him, in the 1998 World Cup quarter-final. Ortega was sat on the ground, and when van der Saar bent down to harangue him about diving, Ortega sprang up and smashed his head into the big man’s jaw.So which of these techniques did Bairstow use against Bancroft? Was it a full-blooded head uppercut or just a little head push? Perhaps it was none of them and we need a new category – the Bar Room Butt perhaps.Hopefully, both men will be focused solely on their batting techniques by the next Test, in Adelaide.

In a tightly-fought contest, the depth of England’s options proved telling even though the side retains a number of holes

George Dobell at the Ageas Bowl02-Sep-20182:00

Compton: India couldn’t find someone to match Curran

It was, in the end, the allrounders who made the difference.So England may have a fragile top-order, an unreliable slip cordon and almost no idea what their optimum batting line-up should be but, so great was the depth in their batting, and so plentiful were the options in their bowling, they had enough to secure a series victory over the No.1 rated Test side with a game in hand.Take the first innings of this game at the Ageas Bowl. England were 86 for 6 at one stage. But whereas they might, in the past, have had to rely on Andy Caddick, Ryan Sidebottom or Sajid Mahmood to come in at No. 8 and try to engineer some sort of recovery, now they have Sam Curran.It was a similar story in Birmingham. England were 87 for 7 and leading by just 100 at one stage in their second innings. But then Curran came out and struck a run-a-ball 63 to help England build the total that helped them to an eventual 31-run win.At other times England were grateful for Chris Woakes, who struck their first century of the series from No. 7 at Lord’s, Ben Stokes, who produced a match-clinching spell at Edgbaston and an admirably defiant effort in the second innings in Southampton and Moeen Ali, who has the versatility to plug holes almost wherever they are found and who made an important contribution in the first innings in Southampton. All of them can be considered fine allrounders; all of them produced key contributions with bat and ball at times in this series.It meant that, whatever inroads India made with the new ball, England were – Trent Bridge apart – hard to kill off. There always seemed to be someone to lead a recovery; someone to eke out a few more runs; someone to do just enough to turn a couple of games in England’s favour. It is telling that, of the three batsmen who have scored 250 runs in the series, two are England allrounders: Curran and Jos Buttler. It’s not really that England’s batting has been better than India’s; just that there has been more of it.Perhaps the same could be said of their bowling. That all-round strength also allowed England an unusual amount of options. Whereas India were hugely inconvenienced when R Ashwin suffered something of a modest game in Southampton, England tended to have another option to make amends for such issues. So when Adil Rashid struggled with his length in this match, they were able to rely on Moeen- who they continue to insist is their second spinner – who finished with nine wickets in the match. And when they needed a breakthrough in the first innings, they were able to turn to Stokes – the seventh choice bowler – to produce a whole-hearted and skilful spell. It meant there was no let-up in the pressure the India batsmen faced. No weak link that could be exploited.”I felt like had huge amounts of options,” Joe Root said. “I had points of difference in our attack. We had the ball spinning both ways, we had some left-arm angle and three fantastic seam bowlers who all do very different things. I felt I always had something different to turn to.”There were other factors beyond England’s control. India’s insufficient preparation at the start of the tour may have allowed England an advantage in the first couple of Tests – the tourists have adapted far better to the conditions now – while Virat Kohli has yet to win a toss in the series. In this Test and at Lord’s, in particular, that was significant.One day, too, he may reflect on his decision not to utilise the heavy roller ahead of either of India’s innings in Southampton as an error. With the pitch starting slightly damp, the ball made a few indentations on the first day. Most captains in county cricket would have seized on the chance to use the heavy roller to flatten those indentations out. Kohli, perhaps reasoning that the surface could break up if he did so, used only the light one and was then subjected to the uneven bounce that accounted for KL Rahul, at least, in the fourth innings. Perhaps, had he had that county stint at Surrey as was originally planned, he might have known that the chances of any pitch in England breaking up under a heavy roller are minimal to the point of non-existence.Graphic: Home comforts•ESPNcricinfo LtdMost of all, it does have to be acknowledged that England were playing in conditions – and with a ball – that suits them perfectly. Despite the dry summer, this Test series has been played on pitches providing a remarkable amount of seam movement, while the Duke’s ball – and the skill of those using it – has also produced plenty of swing. There’s nothing wrong in utilising home advantage, but it should be understood that England have done so to an unusually extreme degree. It doesn’t mean England could be considered favourites – or anything like it – when they next travel to India.So it would be foolish to allow this success to mask the flaws within this England side. While Root has a point when he points out the tough conditions with which the top-order batsmen of both sides have had to contend, he might also reflect that his opening batsmen didn’t score many runs in Australia or New Zealand, either. But for a couple of huge scores on a couple of flat pitches, Alastair Cook hasn’t scored runs in a long time. And but for a dropped catch on debut, Keaton Jennings would be averaging in the teens after 11 Tests. There will still be days – and surfaces – when they require bowlers of greater pace and there will still be days when the limitations of their spin attack – and the manner their batsmen play it – will be highlighted.”Of course you’re always looking to get better and at areas you want to improve,” Root said. “We want to make sure we’re starting well with the bat and that’s going to continue to be a big focus for us as a team.”But you’ve also got to be realistic about the conditions we’ve been playing in. There’s been some fine bowling from both teams. The two seam attacks are very high-class.”All of which is true. But, with the series already won, it might make sense to look at other top-order options at The Oval. Rory Burns really has done everything that could have been asked of him to win a chance instead of Jennings. If Alastair Cook were to take the opportunity to announce his retirement ahead of the game, it might provide a suitable opportunity for him to be sent-off in the style deserving of a man who has scored a record amount of Test runs for England. The team will undoubtedly require far greater contributions from their openers if they are to challenge in Sri Lanka or the Caribbean. Neither Cook or Jennings can say they have lacked opportunity.With Stokes clearly carrying a knee injury and Woakes still recovering from his quad strain, it might make sense to allow them to miss the game, too. The likes of Olly Stone and Jamie Overton could be tried if England want to add some pace to their attack, though it seems unlikely such an option will be taken.Whatever they decide to do for The Oval, England have a chance on both winter tours simply because of that all-round depth. And if they could just find a stronger top-order and start to hold a few catches – the early signs of the re-jigged slip cordon in Southampton were encouraging – they really could rise up the Test rankings quite swiftly.

How the WBBL is cricket’s answer to plugging a hole left by the end of the AFL season, as well as engaging a half of the population that was neglected for too long

Daniel Brettig27-Sep-2018When coverage of the AFL Grand Final winds down on Saturday evening, Channel Seven will switch straight from the MCG to North Sydney Oval and a women’s Twenty20 international between Australia and New Zealand. As a statement, it is quite something when taken in isolation: women’s cricket as the spearhead of the summer, on the free-to-air broadcaster’s main channel at that.As Kim McConnie, Cricket Australia’s head of the men’s and women’s Big Bash Leagues, put it to ESPNcricinfo: “I was jumping up and down for joy when I first heard that – what a sign of commitment. I just take my hat off to them for making this move.”Yet, beyond that single programming decision is a far longer story, and a far more intriguing one. How Australian cricket realised that more needed to be done to grab airtime for the game in the days and weeks before the peak summer months of December-January, and how a parallel effort to build the game for women and girls became entwined with it. In its telling arrives an understanding – that to grow any game requires something more than a flurry of publicity or a cultural wave to ride, a discovery numerous other women’s competitions, notably the AFLW, are currently in the process of making.There are many strands to this tale, and in a way it goes back more than a decade – as distantly as 2004 when Cricket Australia’s then strategy, “From Backyard to Baggy Green”, identified how badly the game had failed to engage with half the population. Among the first steps taken from that point was to start a conversation with cricket’s major broadcaster, Channel Nine, to air matches played by the women’s national team. It was a cause taken up with gusto by the head of media rights, Stephanie Beltrame, who will return to importance later in the story.Out of the 2010 commitment to create the BBL, grew a sense that if cricket were to truly diversify its audience, CA needed to establish an equivalent competition for women. Andrew Jones, then the CA’s head of strategy, and latterly the chief executive of Cricket New South Wales, was among numerous lobbyists for the concept. “To make cricket a game for men and women and boys and girls, you needed the BBL clubs to have women’s teams under the same brand and looking the same,” he said.Discussions began to evolve in 2014, although the tournament was held back by a year due to the extra scheduling pressures created by the 2015 men’s World Cup. Within weeks of Michael Clarke lifting the trophy at the MCG, however, the WBBL was back on the table. There was, in some quarters, hesitance about how it should start. Was this simply the new T20 part of the pathway to the national team that already featured the 50-over Women’s National Cricket League, or something more? And could existing club staff stretch their resources to sell it without taking oxygen away from the BBL? Jodie Hawkins, then the head of communications for the Sydney Sixers, and now the club’s general manager, was adamant in the affirmative, and actively campaigned for the tournament to build immediate profile with a launch in the winter of 2015.”There was concern at CA that we would drop our energy around BBL to deliver the WBBL, and that was probably based on some thoughts and fears they had based on history,” Hawkins said. “But our feeling was that it would actually only enhance the BBL by having the women’s team involved as well, and being under a club banner, so originally they said, ‘let your state teams run it’, which is fine in every state other than NSW and Victoria, given we’ve got double the BBL clubs.”Given that we’d worked so hard to build those BBL brands and give them a real identity that stands complementary to the state, we were really keen if they’re running around in our shirts, we wanted them to be part of our club. Therefore we pushed to launch the WBBL and give it the profile it deserved. The WBBL was created as a visible pathway for young girls, but it wasn’t going to do that if you didn’t shine some light on it, and that was why it was really important to us that we launched it properly, so that girls could see there was a visible pathway.”

“The WBBL was created as a visible pathway for young girls, but it wasn’t going to do that if you didn’t shine some light on it, and that was why it was really important to us that we launched it properly.”Sydney Sixers general manager Jodie Hawkins

Not unlike the early work done in 2011 to launch the BBL on a similarly tight budget, Hawkins and others found themselves broadening their role descriptions considerably in the course of preparing for the event. “It was literally down to getting uniforms tailored to girls so we weren’t just sticking a man’s shirt on a female player,” she said. “We wanted to pay particular attention to making sure it looked right and it really gave the tournament and the players the spotlight they deserved.”CA did send up Mike McKenna as the speaker from their perspective. But we found venues, sourced uniforms, organised players, and really drove it, made sure we had content to go nationally, set up a WhatsApp group with all the other communications managers so every team had something to use that wasn’t just NSW-based. Every club had content out of that launch to help promote their team.”There were teething troubles. The initial tournament schedule was imperfect, and logistical issues also reared their head, particularly the extra travel and relocation requirements for players who moved states to join different WBBL teams. But by the end of the tournament in 2016, there was a sense that interest was growing, from broadcasters and sponsors, as well as fans.”In that first year, while it was fan-facing, it didn’t necessarily get the cut of the marketing from our Sixers perspective or a national perspective that it deserved, but we learned a lot in that first season that really allowed us to improve in WBBL 02,” Hawkins said. “By then, CA had really caught up and realised there was a bit of a groundswell among the public for there to be women’s sport to follow, and very quickly everyone changed their focus to make sure we created an elite pathway and a fan-focused product.”At the same time, another part of the story came together – the move to full professionalism among female cricketers. While CA had paid centrally contracted players well for some time, the move to broaden this to state level took a turn when NSW, via a sponsorship with Lend Lease, was able to offer handsome enough contracts for their own players to go full-time. For Jones, this was a case of investment to ensure the quality of the cricket matched the scope of the competition.Getty Images”By that stage, it had occurred to us that to make the product as good as possible. We needed to professionalise it first, not wait for it to be good and then professionalise it,” he said. “To make it good, you had to professionalise it so they could train more and therefore improve and be better cricketers.”We made the point in CA and state CEOs meetings that if we’re not excited about it, why would anyone else be excited about it? We’ve got to treat it like its fantastic and then people will take the lead from us.”For McConnie, the move to professionalism – broadened to all players last year with the signing of a historic first joint MoU, covering both men and women – is a significant show of leadership by cricket. “I’m pretty proud of where cricket has taken a leadership stance on that,” she said. “If you think about the recently signed MoU, the women are on a minimum of A$55,000, and we truly have gender pay equity, which enables them to start to address and look at this as a full-time career.”Cricket has absolutely led the way when you think about gender equity in remuneration for professional players. There are not many leagues in the world, let alone Australia, that can stand up and say that. I think we’ve taken that first step and led the way, and we would highly encourage and want to see the rest of the leagues follow that path. It’s not easy to get right, but we’ve tried to take that leadership position and really show the way.”Part of our vision is to be a sport for all Australians. In order to be a sport for all Australians, you need to appeal to all Australians, it’s quite obvious! We want to be the leading sport for women and girls and that’s our ambition. So it is an investment for us to make sure that it is a sport that appeals to women and girls. If you’re a 14-year-old in school today, it’s very hard for us to encourage her to be a future cricketer if she can’t see that happening around her.”

“We’ve got to think our product is amazing and others will be guided by that. We’re not going to wait for people to find it amazing before we do.”New South Wales chief executive Andrew Jones

Beltrame, and CA’s media rights team, meanwhile, had managed to cajole the Ten Network, BBL rights holders, into going beyond their existing agreement to broadcast a selection of WBBL matches in season two. This decision allowed for further proof to be gained that women’s cricket would rate strongly if positioned in the right time slots, helped too by the common identity link between WBBL and BBL teams. Audiences on Ten in that first season of television coverage regularly outstripped free-to-air broadcasts of the A-League and even some pay television broadcasts of the NRL or AFL.”There was evidence from those broadcast games that it was going to be successful,” Jones said. “There was appetite to watch it, if it was on in the right time slot. People watch a sport, a club and a time slot, and if you’ve got two out of those three things, you’ll be in business. The evidence suggested if we put WBBL on at the right time, such as 7.30pm on a Friday or a Saturday night, then people would watch it.”As this knowledge was being gleaned, another front was opening up for discussion – scheduling. In early 2016, as part of CA’s overarching strategy reviews, questions began to be posed about how to expand cricket’s footprint on the season, particularly given the turf wars that are habitually fought with the football codes for television audiences, spectators and participants. The men’s domestic limited-overs competition, which had been aired on Channel Nine, albeit at CA’s production cost, was not seen as enough of an audience grabber, and, for 2017 at least, the preference was to have the network cover the women’s Ashes instead.This left a hole in the October window in seasons that had no major women’s international series scheduled. Jones, asked to contribute to the brainstorming in March 2016, responded on the first of the next month with something that was no-one’s idea of an April Fool’s joke. “From a long-term point of view, it wasn’t good to not have cricket on at that time of year,” Jones said. “You need cricket on straight after the footy finishes. So I sat down and thought about that for a little bit and worked out the obvious answer was to move the WBBL into that window, because people want to watch T20, they want to watch BBL.”We can’t extend men’s BBL because of the Sheffield Shield, no-one wants to cut the Shield, and rightly so. Fifty-over domestic cricket’s not cutting it, and we can’t have more international cricket. So, when you eliminate all those possibilities, you’re left with the fact that it pretty much has to be the WBBL. So we lobbied and agreed that WBBL would move into its own window from 2019 onwards.”The main conclusion was we need to move the WBBL into its own window to create Friday-night cricket basically, straight after the footy season. Friday night, Saturday night, Sunday afternoon, just like footy. Everyone has had the experience of the first Friday after the Grand Final, realising there’s nothing on. That was the glaring opportunity where we finally put two and two together and said, ‘right, the obvious solution is WBBL’.”When the women’s Ashes matches rated strongly on Nine, while also pulling in decent attendances in Brisbane and Sydney, the plan to move the WBBL to its own window from 2019 onwards gathered speed. It also meant that women’s cricket would be a more major discussion point in negotiations with broadcasters than at any time in the past. The end result, shuffled into an A$1.18-billion-deal with Seven and Fox Sports, was an increase in televised WBBL games from 12 to 23, and the guarantee that all women’s internationals would be aired on Seven, starting with Saturday night.”It was led by our media rights team, but they were very committed to making sure women’s cricket was a core part of the negotiations, and it was a great result to go from 12 games broadcast on free-to-air TV to 23,” McConnie said. “That doesn’t happen without the broadcaster also getting behind it. You could clearly have seen the negotiations end up somewhere in the middle, but it got momentum and traction and we got to 23 because it was really important for the media rights team, but also for the broadcaster.”If you look at the success we had with the women’s Ashes last season, it was just fantastic, and if you look at the numbers overall, women’s sport over the past two years has reached a tipping point, where people are really starting to get involved. The work the AFLW has done is great, the women’s Ashes was really a major milestone when you look at numbers through the gate, broadcast numbers, it was really quite impressive, and that really led to some of the thinking to say it is time for the WBBL to have its own share of voice and its own window.”

“Cricket has absolutely led the way when you think about gender equity in remuneration for professional players [in Australia]. There are not many leagues in the world that can stand up and say that.”Kim McConnie, CA head of men’s and women’s Big Bash Leagues

The seamless transition from AFL to cricket on Grand Final day is also instructive as a reminder of where the two sports sit in regards to their nascent women’s competitions. A recent round of questions from players and supporters of the AFLW about a seeming lack of long-term thinking brought suggestions that a new “vision statement” was being prepared by the league. However, from Hawkins’ perspective, the race is now less about getting established than building permanence – “business as usual”.”You can’t build a league with a short-term view, it just doesn’t work,” she said. “You need to know what’s next and we’ve spent a lot of time at [BBL] general managers’ conferences, talking about what’s next, what do we need to do, how are we continuing to build. But when we’re talking about what’s next, we’re talking five years’ time. We know where we’re going next year, we know the changes we need to make and the differences you want to have. You can’t build tournaments year-to-year and trying to make change as you go.”The fact there’s more and more women’s cricket added each new broadcast agreement just shows that it’s a priority to CA to get it on TV, because that’s how you build a league, making it the most visible you can, but it’s also shown a desire for the network to cover women’s sport, because it is something that people want to see. Sometimes, you just need to tell them and show them in order to get them on board. Channel Ten were brilliant coming to the party with that, but the way that it’s growing and the structure of the new deal is really positive for the growth of the tournament.”The race isn’t now on to set-up a women’s league, the race is on to make it the most sustainable that it can be. That’s what sports are now competing in: it’s how do we make this product sustainable, as opposed to how do we build a league. Everyone’s now got something, but we’re talking about how do we make this a long-term play for us, not a ride-the-wave-and-then-jump-out-at-the-end. This is now business as usual, and to make it business as usual, you need to make it fully sustainable.”Sustainability means profitability, whether measured in terms of individual club finances or the composition for broadcast deals. To that end, Jones articulated a truly ambitious vision. “Our aspiration now is for WBBL to be the fourth-biggest sports league in Australia, behind the big three – BBL, NRL and AFL. We think it will be over a five-to-10-year period,” he said. “It’s extremely exciting and extremely satisfying. I think it’ll be our greatest contribution to the game probably.”And it all starts on Saturday night.

If crease occupation turns itself into a substantial innings, Khawaja’s method is not a problem, but, so far this series, the tactic hasn’t translated into runs

Andrew McGlashan14-Dec-2018In a batting line-up without Steven Smith and David Warner, Usman Khawaja was billed as Australia’s leading light heading into the series against India.ESPNcricinfo LtdThe outcome of the first three innings in the opening two Tests has been somewhat different, with Khawaja rendered scoreless for long periods. Perhaps his truncated build-up, following a knee injury that required surgery, has played a part in him not being in top form, but the upshot is that Australia’s innings have stalled when he has been at the crease.In Adelaide, he made 28 off 125 balls and 8 off 42, and on the opening day in Perth, he collected only 5 off 38 balls. By the end of the first innings at the Perth Stadium, it felt as though he was playing himself out of nick. India have bowled very well at him, but he has not been able to find a release shot – even to rotate the strike. In the 205 balls faced, he has managed a solitary boundary; to jog your memory, it was a tickle down the leg side against Jasprit Bumrah in Adelaide.The pressure has told in his last two dismissals: in the second innings in Adelaide, he carved a lofted drive to deep cover and, in Perth, edged a cut against a ball that probably wasn’t quite wide enough for the shot.In the first Test, R Ashwin claimed his wicket both times but the pressure has also been created by the quicks in both Tests so far, specifically the around-the-wicket line which he has not been able to counter, at least from a position of scoring runs. His inability to find a way around it also brought his downfall against Umesh Yadav today.It could stem back to the 2017-18 Ashes. While he had a reasonably successful series, England’s quicks employed the around-the-wicket tactic repeatedly, to some success. Of Khawaja’s five dismissals to pace, four came when right-arm quicks were angling it into his body from around the stumps, and he averaged just 25.00 when targeted from that angle.In this series, he has faced 121 deliveries from around the wicket by the quicks and made just 15 runs. Some players, such as Adam Gilchrist when England’s quicks troubled him with the same line in the 2005 Ashes, would try to hit their way out, but Khawaja’s attempts had been largely about survival until he slashed at Umesh. As per ESPNcricinfo’s logs, his shot intent is defensive 78% of the time, as compared to just 65% when faced from over the stumps.There was a stark contrast with how Travis Head played on the opening day in Perth. He took a notably attacking option and scored 34 off 47 balls delivered to him from around the wicket, before slashing to third man attempting another boundary.If crease occupation eventually turns itself into a substantial innings, Khawaja’s method does not have to be a major problem, but so far this series, the tactic hasn’t translated into runs. It will be fascinating to watch what he does through the rest of the matches to try and put the pressure back on the bowlers.

Faf du Plessis’ team is all about breaking stereotypes, and if that means going into a Cape Town Test without a spinner for only the third time in 25 years, so be it

Liam Brickhill in Cape Town03-Jan-2019Castle Lager picked up the sponsor’s tab for this Test series against Pakistan, and the outfield at Newlands is adorned with the beer company’s #SmashTheLabel campaign ads. The gist is to break down the stereotypes South Africa’s disparate groups and peoples have created for each other, and using the hashtag you can nominate someone on social media to win a free ticket to the cricket, provided they’ve never been to a match before.Castle, and Cricket South Africa, are trying to attract people other than the stereotypical cricket fan to the ground. The common or garden Capetonian is pigeonholed as a laidback, dope-smoking, driving-slowly-in-the-fast-lane-on-the-way-to-the-beach, knocking-off-at-3-o’clock-on a-Friday-to-go-surfing, cooler-than-thou hipster. An afternoon stroll around the ground showed that a lot of the people attending this match still fit the cliche. But a whole lot didn’t, and South African cricket is slowly but surely stretching beyond its traditional boundaries. The recentMzansi Super League was a signifier of that transformation, and South African cricket crowds – Newlands included – are increasingly diverse.That wasn’t the only label smashed today. The stereotypical Newlands track has a bit of wobble and a five-for for Vernon Philander in it, and starts to turn on day four. Three quicks and a spinner is the standard arrangement for both visiting and hosting teams here, and examples of any deviation from that formula are few and far between. South Africa had no specialist spinner in their XI here five years ago against Australia, but that plan backfired as JP Duminy and Dean Elgar bowled a combined 61 overs in that game, and South Africa lost by 245 runs.You’d have to go back to well before the turn of the millennium to find another Newlands Test that South Africa played without a specialist spinner – or someone like Nicky Boje or Robin Peterson, who perhaps weren’t quite ‘specialist’ in the truest sense, but were the next best thing in the South African context. So conducive can the Newlands track be to spin that Paul Adams once opened the bowling here, against England way back in 2000. Paul Harris won a Player-of-the-Match award here, for goodness sake.South Africa thus broke down a major stereotype at this ground when they decided on four fast bowlers this morning, which is a combination normally reserved for the Wanderers or Centurion. Indeed, Philander has played 55 of his 56 Tests with either Dale Steyn or Kagiso Rabada to share the new ball with, but day one at Newlands was only the seventh time all three had operated together, and the very first time that they had all been together in an attack wholly centered around pace.Dale Steyn made the opening incision•AFPThe decision to go against the grain in selection clearly worked. Steyn and Philander. Rabada and Olivier. Rabada and Steyn. Philander and Olivier. No matter which way South Africa’s four quicks were combined, there was no let-up in the pressure exerted on Pakistan, and they were blasted out by tea.Philander is regarded as the undisputed King of Cape Town, but perhaps that’s not a label that fits either: Steyn, Makhaya Ntini and Shaun Pollock have all taken more wickets here. Or maybe it does: Philander took his 50th wicket in his 10th Newlands Test this morning, while Pollock took 51 in 11 and Ntini 53 in 13. Steyn has 70 but has played five more Tests than Philander here, and Philander has, by far, the best strike rate of the four, taking a wicket every 35.7 balls under the mountain.Philander is part of a South African squad that is embracing change, and smashing labels along the way. Indeed, they’ve come a long way since the aloof, burly-man clique of the noughties that had a reputation for making the team rookie feel like a fuzzy-lipped 13-year-old being hazed into his first day of big school.Things have changed. The world has moved on. And the label no longer fits. Current captain Faf du Plessis welcomed the uncapped Zubayr Hamza to the Test squad with an invite to come and stand in the slips if he gets a chance to take the field as 12th man.”I’m looking forward to him coming on to the field as 12th man and getting one of those high ones that just test you as a youngster, just to see where you are with a bit of swirl in the wind here in Cape Town,” du Plessis said of Hamza. “Hopefully he takes it. He’s a good fielder. I made a joke with him yesterday, to say is he ready to come and field in the slips there with the big boys. And he said yes, he’ll come, he’s ready for it.”One doesn’t like to stereotype, but it’s hard to imagine the Smith-Kallis-de Villiers cordon inviting a fresh-out-the-box greenhorn into the slips with them.But I digress. Life is different under Faf. As a captain, he is not above a bit of 21st century PDA to thank his players for a good performance, as when he said he’d give Steyn a kiss on the cheek to congratulate him on the Test bowling record, or when he enveloped Dean Elgar – lying prone having held a blinder at third slip – with a bear hug this morning.Tabraiz Shamsi, who was not at Newlands but was clearly watching, tweeted: “U will know you’ve found ur soul mate when u find somebody who hugs u the way @faf1307 hugs his bowlers when they take an important wicket lol.” Du Plessis is willing to experiment, smash labels, and be different. Hell, he’ll even play four quicks on a pitch that traditionally has something for the spinners if he needs to.

Can you think of a team to stop this all-star combination?

ESPNcricinfo staff24-Apr-2019Twenty-two members of our staff picked their alI-time World Cup XIs, from which we compiled a composite team. A total of 39 players featured in at least one of those 22 individual teams. Ten players featured in half or more of the sides. Of these, Wasim Akram was the only unanimous choice.The battle for the final spot was a close one: Kumar Sangakkara pipped the likes of Sanath Jayasuriya, Steve Waugh, Kapil Dev and AB de Villiers.Only two of the players in the final XI featured in a World Cup before 1992, both a reflection of how the ODI game has evolved and the average age of the selectors.ESPNcricinfo LtdAdam Gilchrist (wk)Matches 31 Runs 1085 Average 36.16 Strike Rate 98.01 Dismissals 52
The destructive keeper-batsman has three World Cup titles. His finest moment came in his final World Cup match, when his 149 (aided by a squash ball in his glove) clinched the third of those title wins.Sachin Tendulkar
Matches 45 Runs 2278 Ave 56.95 SR 88.98 100s/50s 6/15
In the three World Cups where he opened throughout, Tendulkar topped the run-scoring charts twice, in 1996 and 2003; he was second in 2011, when India won the title in his record-equalling sixth World Cup.Ricky PontingMatches 46 Runs 1743 Ave 45.86 SR 79.95 100s/50s 5/6
Part of a record 34-match unbeaten World Cup streak during which Australia won a hat-trick of titles, two under his captaincy. Ponting’s best was a stunning 140 not out in the 2003 final. Also a gun fielder, with the most World Cup catches for an outfielder.Viv RichardsMatches 23 Runs 1013 Ave 63.31 SR 85.05 100s/50s 3/5
Two-time World Cup champion (and nearly a third). A trendsetter with the bat, who was voted the greatest ODI player by a jury in 2015. And don’t forget his electric fielding.Kumar SangakkaraMatches 37 Runs 1532 Ave 56.74 SR 86.55 100s/50s 5/7
Hundreds in four consecutive World Cup innings in 2015 – an ODI record. The leading run scorer among left-handers. Also the most dismissals for a keeper, though Gilchrist is first choice for that role in this XI.Imran Khan (c)Matches 28 Runs 666 Ave 35.05 Wickets 34 Ave 19.26
The man who delivered Pakistan’s 1992 triumph. Steady with the bat (he didn’t bowl in the 1983 edition) and deadly with the ball, Imran is also our pick to lead this side.Lance Klusener
Matches 14 Runs 372 Ave 124.00 Wickets 22 Ave 22.13
The least experienced member of this side makes it on the back of his legendary showing in the 1999 edition. The stunning numbers reflect how awe-inducing his finishing was. Also a handy fast-bowling option.Wasim AkramMatches 38 Wickets 55 Ave 23.83 Economy Rate 4.04 4s/5s 2/1
The greatest left-arm bowler of his generation, and perhaps of all time. He swung the 1992 World Cup final his team’s way with bat and ball, and led them to the final in 1999.Shane Warne
Matches 17 Wickets 32 Ave 19.50 ER 3.83 4s/5s 4/0
The wizard who cast memorable World Cup spells. He came up with Man-of-the-Match performances in the thrilling 1996 and 1999 semi-finals, and in Australia’s dominating win in the 1999 final.Muttiah MuralitharanMatches 40 Wickets 68 Ave 19.63 ER 3.88 4s/5s 4/0
His first World Cup was Sri Lanka’s remarkable 1996 victory, and he played a key role in their 2003, 2007 and 2011 campaigns, a constant menace to opposition batsmen.Glenn McGrathMatches 39 Wickets 71 Average 18.19 ER 3.96 4s/5s 0/2
The leading wicket-taker in World Cup history improved his performance with each edition, finishing with a record 26 wickets, the Player-of-the-Tournament award, and a hat-trick of titles in 2007.Do you have a better all-time World Cup XI in mind? Send in your team.

The thrilling sight of Jofra Archer bowling and a tantalising finish: not much more a fan could ask for at Lord’s

Fram Hansotia21-Aug-2019Choice of game
England went into day five of a pulsating Lord’s Ashes Test, leading by 104 runs with six wickets in hand, and all results still possible.Crowd favourite
Although Ben Stokes played an invaluable role in this game, carving his name into the Lord’s honours board for a third time, Jofra Archer was the player who thrilled us all. He showed no signs of nervousness that tends to be expected from Test debutants. Not since Kevin Pietersen 14 years ago has an England Test debutant seemed so comfortable and self-assured on the biggest stage.There is something primal and inexplicably thrilling about watching an express pace bowler amble up to the crease and then release the ball at 90-plus mph. A large part of Archer’s mystique comes from his deceptively short run-up, which seems more suited to that of a military-medium pacer. Despite being the youngest member of this England line-up, Archer was the man Joe Root turned to when England needed a breakthrough. In contrast with England’s other bowlers, the majority of Archer’s deliveries were accompanied by animated exclamations or groans of disbelief as balls whistled past the edge of the bat. The crowd seemed aware they were watching an exciting young pacer in action.Key performer
Archer thrilled with the ball and Marnus Labuschagne resisted ably with the bat, but Ben Stokes’ century proved to be the significant difference between the two sides. Beginning the day cautiously and running hard between the wickets, he ensured that minimal risks were taken yet the total was kept ticking along. Post lunch, once the lead had extended to near-200 but the game was threatening to meander to a stale draw, Stokes rode his luck and cut loose, smacking Nathan Lyon for consecutive sixes before smoking Peter Siddle through the covers. The sudden acceleration swung the momentum England’s way, and created a tantalising sense of belief in the crowd, which Archer’s opening spell only served to heighten.Face-off I enjoyed
Archer seemed determined to take on Australia single-handedly. He struck Labuschagne, and there was a brief period where Cummins (who had bounced Archer earlier in the Test) had six fielders in catching positions behind him, and three crouched around the bat beside him. Proper Test cricket.Wow moment
Joe Denly catching Tim Paine at full stretch, parallel to the ground, while the ball had almost passed him. The crowd erupted with pure, unadulterated elation. It released an afternoon’s frustration, and sparked a frantic and nerve-wracking final seven overs.AFPShot of the day
Stokes displayed his array of expansive stroke-play as he approached his century, blasting Lyon and Siddle around Lord’s. However, the shot that left a lasting impact on the memory was a checked on-drive off Hazlewood, while he was still in the 30s. It sent both non-striker and umpire scurrying to evade it, and was an indicator of the form he is in.One thing I would have changed
Widespread boos met the announcement at the start of the day that Cricket Australia had substituted Steven Smith for the remainder of the match. While completely understandable, one suspects Australia may have had more of a go at chasing down their fourth-innings target if Smith was anchoring the batting line-up. Having said that, as like-for-like substitutes go, Labuschagne certainly exceeded expectations, with a gutsy, stroke-filled half-century that crushed the English crowd’s hopes of an Australian collapse.Crowd meter
The atmosphere was easily the most animated that I have experienced at Lord’s, yet the high-quality cricket by either side was appreciated with admirable sportsmanship.Overall
Although the momentum oscillated between both teams during this Test, Archer dampened Smith’s aura of invincibility on Saturday, and may have single-handedly altered the outcome of this Ashes. What had seemed to be inevitably becoming a record-breaking series for Smith, has morphed into another potentially thrilling Ashes series.England dominated day five, and any chances of an Australian victory were extinguished by Jos Buttler and Stokes’ partnership. If not for two turning points today, one controllable (Jason Roy dropping a regulation catch at slip, which would have opened up an end and left England with six wickets to get off 20 overs), and the other uncontrollable (losing a crucial ten overs to rain this morning), England might have been celebrating another famous Ashes victory.Want to do a Fan Following report? Read our FAQs here.

Playing in his second U-19 World Cup, the allrounder is one of the early pace-setters for the tournament’s MVP

Sreshth Shah in Bloemfontein22-Jan-2020Nyeem Young spent most of his formative years at his grandparents’ house at St James, a parish in Barbados, while his parents worked. After taping up a rubber ball, he would bowl at the garbage can in his backyard to bide time. His grandfather was a bit of a cricket nerd, and Young grew up watching all kind of cricket games on television at his house.From watching cricket on TV together, these days Young senior wakes up at 4am to watch his grandson live at the Under-19 World Cup. So far, Young has made his grandfather’s effort worth it by winning the Player of the Match award in both games he has played so far.Remarkably, both the performances have come in different circumstances. Against Australia, Young walked in to a tricky situation, with West Indies 73 for 4 in chase of 180. He fought through difficult periods against spin before finding his own in a composed innings of 61 in 69 balls to seal his West Indies’ first win against Australia in the tournament’s history.Against England, Young had the liberty to display his full array of strokes. He smashed a 41-ball 66, his fourth fifty in five games, to lift West Indies to 267. To cap off that batting performance, the medium-pacer ran through the England batting line-up to take his maiden five-for in the West Indies maroon.Young appears a confident young man, not daunted by media attention or press conferences. He looks at you in the eye and answers, a rare trait among teenagers at the tournament. What is the secret to his confidence?”When you see a tweet from Ian Bishop calling you a ‘future star’, it relaxes the nerves,” Young tells ESPNcricinfo. “For him to acknowledge my performance, speak to me, tweet about me, it means a lot.”Young’s journey began as a nine-year old when his school teacher asked him to play an Under-11 match. Before long, he made the Barbados U-13s and 15s, playing alongside fellow allrounder Rahkeem Cornwall. Now, in 2020, he finds himself playing in his second Under-19 World Cup.The journey has been far from a smooth sail, though. Despite making 299 in a school’s game as a 15-year old, he had failed to make a mark the next few years. It appeared, to him, that the transition into the under-19s would not be possible, but an arm around his shoulder changed everything.”After that summer, I was a bit down,” Young continues, “because I couldn’t believe my form could drop so significantly within 12 months. I felt depressed at a very young age. Very hurtful. I thought it would be hard to go into the Under-19 team.”That’s when Corey Collymore, my coach back then, came to my rescue. He had trust in me and calmed my anxiety by telling me that he believed in my potential. I haven’t watched him play, and yet he’s my favourite cricketer, just because of the person he is. He is very honest with me and still messages me here before games.”Nyeem considers himself to be in the Ben Stokes mould. The higher the pressure, the more he thrives. That’s why he’s grown as a bowler once he moved from taking the new ball.”At the last World Cup, I was the new-ball bowler. Now been a middle-overs and death bowler,” Young says. “. I enjoy this more because when I bowl middle overs, it’s all about containing and I get to use my variations.”Bowling at the death, I can show my slower balls and bouncers. I enjoy bowling at the death more than anything else. To have that confidence of bowling in the hardest part of the innings is a good asset. Chatting with Chris Jordan, who visits Barbados often, has also helped me.”Despite his hard-hitting batting style, evidence of which is the cracked glass window at the media centre at Kimberley’s Diamond Oval, Nyeem has aspirations to play all three formats and not just white-ball cricket.He admits he doesn’t watch much Test cricket but believes he’s a very adjustable character. He also understands why specific senior players from the Caribbean prefer white-ball formats to Test cricket.”Each player looks at things differently. Those who want to play specific formats, it’s because they know their strengths – like (Nicholas) Pooran and (Kieron) Pollard,” Young says. “I enjoy playing the faster game, and I’ll be honest, sometimes I don’t even watch Test cricket, but playing multi-day cricket is something different.”Players within the Caribbean do tend to play limited-overs cricket, and that’s just their choice. And then there are people who just want to play Test cricket like Kraigg B(rathwaite). If we show teenagers and kids how enjoyable three-day cricket is, then that will help them develop a love for red-ball cricket.”My next aim is to play in the Barbados first team and maybe get a CPL gig. Barbados are a bit like Mumbai Indians in the IPL, so many good players that they can field three teams. We have around eight-nine Test players from Barbados, so when the national team isn’t playing, it’s difficult making it to the first XI.”I learnt patience after watching a documentary on Mumbai Indians on Netflix. Seeing how hard some of the players train despite not playing in the Mumbai Indians XI has inspired me. I thought it may be easy playing franchise cricket, but seeing the documentary has shown that making it to the XI of an elite team is more difficult than it looks.”St James in Barbados may be known as the ‘Gold Coast’ of the country, because of the rich and famous people living there, but from within that parish, it appears that a rough diamond has been discovered instead. Where Young goes after the World Cup only time will tell, but for now, he’s made himself one of the early contenders to become the World Cup’s Player of the Tournament.

The Mumbai batsman, who thinks an international call-up isn’t far away, has had a brilliant run in this season’s domestic limited-overs tournaments

Saurabh Somani13-Nov-2019One of the features of Suryakumar Yadav’s batting is how well he picks his spots. He can be inventive with his shot-making or keep the scoreboard moving with risk-free cricket, or he can hit big. But, when the strokes aren’t flowing as smoothly, Yadav finds a way to still keep ticking over without getting bogged down.Then suddenly, an innings that began with a mite less fluency explodes into a match-winning one as the touch returns. The advantage Yadav has is that even when the ball is not hitting the sweet spot on his bat, he doesn’t dawdle, he hasn’t put pressure on himself (and his batting partner) with a dot-ball build-up, and is therefore in prime position to tear away to a fantastic score when bat makes more accurate geometric arcs and the ball pings off it.His run of scores in India’s domestic season so far bear witness to that. Across the 50-overs Vijay Hazare Trophy and Deodhar Trophy, and the ongoing Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy T20s, Yadav has scored runs at an average of 93.80 and a strike rate of 163.98. It’s a particularly rich vein of form, which prompted Harbhajan Singh to wonder on Twitter why Yadav wasn’t being considered for the national team, being a seemingly perfect fit.Ask Yadav about it and he just laughs. “I have been sharing the dressing room with him since 2011 [at Mumbai Indians, his first IPL franchise]. We had a good friendship on and off the field,” Yadav tells ESPNcricinfo. “When I left Mumbai Indians and went to Kolkata Knight Riders [in the 2014 auction], he was always behind me, ‘why are you not playing for India? You are not doing justice to your talent. I think it’s high time you become a little more consistent.'”There was a lot of what you can call constructive criticism. I really enjoyed it. I could feel he wants me to go ahead and play for the country, which was the best thing. Knowing he tweeted, I was really happy. I called him and told him, ‘thank you so much Bhajju for tweeting for me. It means a lot that you tweeted’. He keeps motivating me, keeps pushing me, because he feels I’m not doing justice to my talent. And that’s good, there have to be a few people who keep doing this for you.”

If you think only about ‘I have to play for India’, it puts unnecessary pressure on you. But I strongly feel that the time is around the corner and I’m going to push the door this year.”Suryakumar Yadav

The natural question then is: does Yadav feel he is doing justice to his talent?”Well, currently I’m just enjoying the brand of cricket I am playing,” he says. “I have always loved playing fearless cricket, for any format. So, instead of thinking of ‘justice’ or ‘injustice’, I feel rather I should enjoy my cricket more, keep scoring runs, keep winning games. That will help me more to push the door and play for India. My father always checks all the websites any time an India A team is announced. He calls me as soon as he sees it, and tells me ‘your name is not there’. I tell him ‘that’s not a problem’. The most important thing I feel is that you have to score so much that you force them to pick you.”I always feel some things in life are not in our hands. If you think only about ‘I have to play for India’, it puts unnecessary pressure on yourself. Of course, I have been thinking that I’m not there in that circle still. But I strongly feel that the time is around the corner and I’m going to push the door this year.”Every player who is doing well says the same things, more or less, but Yadav’s season has been particularly special so far. In the Vijay Hazare Trophy, he batted only four times in eight matches, but had a better average or strike rate (minimum 100 runs) than him. His average (113.00) was higher than that of Yashasvi Jaiswal, who hit a double century and two hundreds in six innings. It was higher than that of Manish Pandey, who looked like he would never get out. His strike rate (154.79) was better than that of Shivam Dube, who was collecting sixes as if getting them at bargain rates in an online sale, or Shahrukh Khan, whose late-order exploits already had people speaking of him playing in his superstar namesake’s IPL team.Yadav has carried that form into the T20 format, where he’s also leading Mumbai. He’s had his share of ups and downs, but leadership roles, whether as captain or senior team member, seem to sit well on him now. “There is an app called ‘One Giant Mind’. I have been using that since July,” he says. “It helps you stay calm, tells you how to breathe and what to think in pressure situations. So far, it’s worked really well. Not just because I’ve scored runs, it keeps me stable on the ground too. Even if I’m at the non-striker’s end or fielding, or if I have to take a decision on the ground or off the ground.”It hasn’t always been all calm, even though the first controversy of his career was not of his own making. The headline “‘Injured’ Suryakumar Yadav scores unbeaten 182” first brought Yadav to the notice of the cricketing world, when, declared injured by Mumbai Indians in the 2011 Champions League, he batted in an age-group game even as his IPL franchise had wangled a special concession of playing five overseas players due to their injury roster.Yadav can laugh about it all now. “Actually, the thing is I didn’t know the rules. They said I was not fit, I said, ‘okay, that’s not a problem, then I’ll go back home.’ I got to know there’s a local match. I was batting and wasn’t feeling that much pain in my hand (he had a finger injury). So I thought I can go and play, and I got a double-hundred (182) over there. Since I was scoring runs, I forgot the pain also! But it was highlighted in next day’s newspapers completely, that I’m fit for Mumbai but unfit for Mumbai Indians. I was like, ‘What is happening?'”Then I got a call from them. They were like, ‘bro, if you are unfit for a Champions League tournament, then you can’t go back and play’. I said I was sincerely sorry but I didn’t know the rule. I didn’t even ask anyone before playing. That was my mistake. I was under a lot of pressure and didn’t know what to do. I called our team (Mumbai Indians) manager Rahul [Sanghvi]. He told me I could go to NCA and give the fitness test. If I cleared it, I could come back to the squad. So I went and gave the fitness test and they said I’m good to go. I came back (to the Mumbai Indians squad) and played the tournament, and we won also. That was the best thing.”BCCIIt’s an endearing story, but the fact remains that if Yadav could go and score 182, how was he pronounced unfit in the first place? “Because that time, when I was batting in the nets, I was feeling a lot of pain,” he says. “Maybe it was too hot, I was sweating a lot… and that time I was feeling it’s paining a lot. So I came back, three-four games of Champions League went. I was at home for about a week, and I got a call that there is a local game, so I thought ‘let’s give it a try, if it pains, it’s a local tournament, they can take care of me.’ So I played, and got runs.”That Mumbai didn’t hold it against Yadav was proven when they went for him aggressively in the January 2018 IPL auction, beating out Knight Riders and Delhi Daredevils [now Capitals] with a final bid of INR 3.2 crore.While he makes no bones about having loved his stint at Knight Riders, Yadav cannot hide his joy at being back with his ‘home’ franchise. But even for Mumbai Indians, there is one thing he absolutely will not do: “I just avoid facing him [Jasprit Bumrah, in the nets]! I have actually seen him bowl too much at international level,” he chuckles. “I have faced him a lot when I was at Mumbai Indians in his first year [in 2013]. I was batting in the nets and he was like literally on fire when he was bowling. There was something, a big spark. From that day till today, I’ve never batted against him in the nets. Never!”In match-play, Yadav has an enviable head-to-head record against Bumrah, albeit over a small sample size. In 12 balls across five T20s, Yadav has hit 27 runs off Bumrah and been dismissed once. There aren’t too many batsmen in world cricket who can claim a 200-plus strike rate against arguably the best white-ball bowler in the world. But he’s still not going to face up to Bumrah in the nets. Ever.”There’s no one other than him [that I don’t want to face in the nets]. Only Bumrah. That guy is something else. I’m telling you, seriously. I mean, why do you want to face the fastest bowler, and a toe-crusher, that too in the nets?” he laughs. “In the game it’s fine. I’ve told him also very clearly. Recently when he got a hat-trick in the West Indies, I texted him, ‘Boss, (When you’re back I’m not going to play even a single ball from you in the nets). He was laughing and he replied that he is going to bowl slow to me in the nets, otherwise I’ll hit him behind [the wicket].”It was a fun conversation. But no chance! I’ve told him clearly.”Clearly, it’s not only while batting out in the middle that Yadav sees the gaps. He knows how to pick his spot in the nets too.

Aston Villa face a transfer fight with Manchester United to sign an “incredible” £67m star this summer, according to a new report.

Aston Villa chase new defender as Rogers gains admirers

The Villans strengthened their bid to finish in the top four over the weekend as they beat Nottingham Forest 2-1. Unai Emery will be keen to secure another season of Champions League football, as it will help their finances when it comes to the summer, and perhaps more importantly help them keep players such as Morgan Rogers.

NSWE prepared to spend: Aston Villa plot move for "aggressive" £50m star

He’s a wanted man.

ByTom Cunningham Apr 7, 2025

The midfielder has been one of Villa’s best players this season, and that has earned him the reward of an international stage. It may also not be a surprise to see Rogers’ performances have “attracted admirers”, according to The Athletic’s David Ornstein. No specific teams are mentioned, but it is clear that huge clubs have taken notice of the Villa midfielder.

On the incomings front, Villa are looking to make an offer to sign Ousmane Diomande from Sporting CP. Emery is keen on signing a new defender this summer, and Diomande has emerged on their radar, as Sporting are willing to sell as long as they receive a £50 million fee.

Aston Villa looking to beat Man Utd to Maignan deal

As well as looking to sign a new defender, Emery is also planning on strengthening his goalkeeper department, as according to journalist Niccolò Ceccarini, relayed by Sport Witness, Aston Villa are interested in signing AC Milan’s Mike Maignan, gathering information on the player and the chances of a deal.

The report states that Villa have taken an interest in Maignan and could now make a concrete approach to sign the France international this summer, as he will enter the final 12 months of his contract at San Siro. Maignan has agreed a new contract with Milan in principle but has yet to sign the deal, so he could be moved on by the Italian team this summer, but would still cost around £67 million.

Villa, who already have Emi Martinez between the sticks, are not the only team from the Premier League to take a close look at the shot-stopper, as Chelsea are also interested, despite having several goalkeepers on their books.

Manchester United are also keen on Maignan and are said to be preparing an offer to bring the Frenchman to Old Trafford as a replacement for Andre Onana. Maignan, who has been hailed “incredible” by former Republic of Ireland manager Stephen Kenny, was asked about his future on Saturday after Milan’s 2-2 draw with Fiorentina.

Apps

154

Goals conceded

163

Clean sheets

55

The Frenchman was unwilling to talk about his contract situation at AC Milan: “As I said, I feel good at Milan; I give everything for the shirt every time I put it on, every day. At this moment, I tell the truth; I don’t want to talk about the contract; I want to talk about football.

“Milan deserves more; we want more. My personal case is not the most important thing at this moment.”