خاض فريق ريال مدريد الإسباني 6 مباريات بمرحلة الدوري لبطولة دوري أبطال أوروبا موسم 2025-2026، وتتبقى له مواجهتين في هذه المرحلة.

والتقى ريال مدريد مساء الأربعاء مع مانشستر سيتي، ضمن مباريات الجولة السادسة لمرحلة الدوري بدوري أبطال أوروبا.

وشهدت المباراة هزيمة ريال مدريد بهدفين مقابل هدف، وقد فشل في الحفاظ على تقدمه أمام مانشستر سيتي الذي حسم المواجهة بالفوز.

ويملك ريال مدريد في رصيده 12 نقطة، بالمركز السابع بجدول ترتيب دوري أبطال أوروبا، في حين أن مانشستر سيتي رفع رصيده لـ13 نقطة وصعد للمركز الرابع.

وتتأهل الفرق من المركز الأول إلى الثامن مباشرة لدور الستة عشر في دوري الأبطال، والفرق من المركز التاسع إلى المركز 24 تخوض مباراة ملحق، بنظام الذهاب والإياب، حيث تجرى قرعة أولاً لتحديد المواجهات.

ثم تلتقي الفرق المتأهلة من نظام الملحق مع الفرق المتأهلة مباشرة، في منافسات دور الـ 16، وذلك مع إجراء قرعة. مباريات ريال مدريد المتبقية في دوري أبطال أوروبا ريال مدريد وموناكو

يستقبل ريال مدريد خصمه موناكو الفرنسي، بالجولة السابعة، يوم 20 يناير 2026، على ملعب “سانتياجو برنابيو”. ريال مدريد وبنفيكا

يحل ريال مدريد ضيفًا على بنفيكا البرتغالي، وذلك يوم 28 يناير 2026، في الجولة الثامنة لمرحلة الدوري بدوري الأبطال.

The Red Sox will leave no stone unturned in their pivotal Game 3 matchup against the Yankees on Thursday night.

When speaking with reporters ahead of first pitch from Yankee Stadium, manager Alex Cora revealed how Boston will use its bullpen behind 23-year-old starting pitcher Connelly Early—and they're using an all-hands-on-deck strategy.

Despite Brayan Bello starting Game 2, a 3-2 loss to New York, the 26-year-old will be in Boston's bullpen and available to pitch. Additionally, relief pitcher Garrett Whitlock—who threw a season-high 47 pitches across 1 2/3 innings on Wednesday night—will also be ready to roll.

"There's guys that are feeling it, but they're ready to go," said the skipper. "Let's put it that way."

Cora also didn't fully shut down the idea of ace Garrett Crochet taking the bump if necessary: "We'll see, but probably not."

Despite a willingness to bring in just about anyone from the bullpen, however, Cora also sounds like he has confidence in Early to give them a respectable outing from the jump.

"I think we're in a good place regardless,” he said. "Hopefully he goes deep into the game and we don't have to make too many phone calls to the bullpen."

Here's a look at who Boston will start in the field behind Early:

Red Sox Lineup for Game 3 vs. Yankees

1. Jarren Duran – LF
2. Trevor Story – SS
3. Alex Bregman – 3B
4. Masataka Yoshida – DH
5. Ceddanne Rafaela – CF
6. Nathaniel Lowe – 1B
7. Carlos Narváez – C
8. Wilyer Abreu – RF
9. Romy Gonzalez – 2B

Game 3's first pitch from Yankee Stadium is set for 8:08 p.m. ET and will air on ESPN.

The stigma of fixing will never go away, but Saleem Malik the batsman mustn’t be forgotten

Osman Samiuddin02-Apr-2020Come to Think of ItYou’re not going to like this, not one bit. To many of you it won’t matter because what you’re about to read happened too long ago. But the world is in a rare pose of reflection – really its first ever. If not now then when to think deeper about, and beyond, accepted wisdoms and established truths: that is the central thrust of this series.Which is how comes the opportunity to remember that before Saleem Malik the fixer there was Saleem Malik the batsman; and that he wasn’t any batsman, he was one, more emphatically than is now recalled, capable of genius.See, you don’t like it. Why remember Malik as anything other than a fixer? Australian players called him the Rat and no one ever outraged much. Such is the stain he left that remembering him as we do is the perfect punishment, more robust than Justice Qayyum’s life ban.And sure. That will stick forever, unlike the ban, now overturned.ALSO READ: Come to Think of It: Was Greg Chappell really a terrible coach for India?But forever needs stories to fill it, so here we are telling the one about when Malik first came to notice, way back when the ’80s began, as the next big thing in Pakistani batting. These days, when we can finally say that fast bowlers come and go but a Babar Azam is forever, we can truly appreciate and understand how big a deal Malik’s arrival must have been.It happened just as one of Pakistan’s most celebrated batting orders was breaking up. Sadiq and Mushtaq Mohammad and Asif Iqbal had gone, Majid Khan was done, and Zaheer Abbas hadn’t long left. Javed Miandad, flourishing, needed company.So landed Malik, a prodigy, with a first-class hundred in his second game, and a star and captain of Pakistan’s Under-19 set-up. A hundred on Test debut – in a makeshift side ripped apart by a rebellion against Miandad’s captaincy – set the seal on this potential.England was a happy hunting ground for Malik. He made close to 1000 Test runs there at over 20 points higher than his overall career batting average•PA PhotosLooking back now he was very much a sportsman of his era. He cut a shapeless figure, ungainly in a very middle-aged, subcontinental-male way. Not avuncular, exactly, but we all know an uncle like him: a little paunchy, a little curvy, a little bottom-heavy.That doesn’t mean he was a liability. On the contrary, he was an outstanding boundary fielder – not in the same way Jonny Bairstow is, but his throws were the work of a sniper, sleek, efficient and lethal. What, after all, do we remember of his contribution to the entire 1992 World Cup other than the throw from deep midwicket to run out Phil DeFreitas? Closer in, check out this catch – it’s 1984; it could be 2024.Bat in hand, waiting for action, the uncle didn’t vanish. But once in play, here was a handsome batsman. The easy drives, the light feet, the rubbery whip of the blade whenever he went square either side, even as small an action as the shuffle to the off when he set up to drive had a pleasurable quality to it.In toto, it could culminate in a range that matched Miandad’s, only it played out on vastly different pitches. Miandad had Sharjah but Malik had Eden Gardens. Imran Khan promoted Abdul Qadir and Manzoor Elahi above Malik in the chase, so frustration and a teensy bit of anger, maybe, drove Malik. Rage could have helped a chase of 78 at over ten an over. But Malik was ice-cold, which, as a response, was much more calculating and complex and compelling than dumb old anger. He went hard at an injured Maninder Singh’s SLA and dealt with the very mediumy pace of Madan Lal and Kapil Dev with the abruptness and lack of decorum that only a 23-year-old can conjure. Plus, a late chop through point off a Kapil yorker wide of off stump, having moved outside of leg stump to create the room, was the future.ALSO READ: Come to Think of It: Were South Africa really unlucky in the 1992 World Cup?Once he got ahead of the rate, he made sure to retain strike over the last couple of overs, picking up doubles and singles. He wasn’t going to waste this. Here was Miandad’s nous in killing the chase, but something altogether more formidable in setting it up.Just as good was another, lesser-recalled gem, the 41-ball 66 in the Nehru Cup semi-final against England. Not just by numbers, in nature both innings were more aughts than ’80s.At another end stand three of the finest, most underappreciated Pakistani Test innings of the era: 99, 82 not out, 84 not out. All three came at Headingley across two Tests when swinging Headingley was a mean little hell for batting. The three innings showcased patience and technique, of course, but also sharp judgement and game awareness, especially the first of them: ground out over a day, alternating between steadying the batting and forging ahead, eventually setting up a famous innings win.In that time only Queen’s Park Oval was tougher to bat at. And Malik’s only Test there? Sixty-six and 30, and the half-century was the only one from either team in the first innings. Khan once implied that Malik was a flat-track bully but Khan was sometimes off on his player assessments, just that we only remember the ones he got right. Malik was anything but.The sweet smell of Sharjah success: Saleem Malik, Imran Khan, Wasim Akram and Javed Miandad celebrate with the Austral-Asia Cup trophy in 1990•Ben Radford/Getty ImagesKhan’s ambivalence towards him was curious. Khan loved good body language, that most deceitful quality, which explains a little: Malik was no lion in the field. But Khan also loved men who stood up in crisis, and enough of Malik’s best innings came in those moments, right under Khan’s nose.And somehow Khan rarely factored for one of Malik’s most remarkable innings, when he batted one-handed, his left arm in plaster, against the toughest opponents of them all, West Indies. Forty-one minutes, 32 team runs, and enabling Wasim Akram’s first Test fifty. A reminder not only for Imran but for us that humans are not binary creatures: one can be corruptible but also brave, selfless and committed when situations demand.What Malik did seem to lack was the raw hunger of more driven, consistent players. He could and did go missing, as during the 1992 World Cup, or for the two and a half years and 19 Tests with just three fifties in the mid-’80s. He also ended with a single fifty in his last 13 Test innings.The mood had to strike him, that much is true, and only he controlled when it did. When he became captain, for instance, and was afforded the respect he felt he deserved, he couldn’t stop scoring. Early in his leadership he reaffirmed the depth of his quality, swatting away early-peak Shane Warne (Warne would dismiss him just once in five Tests, across which Malik averaged 71). Less remembered but a true-blue classic was his other 99, as captain, at the Wanderers – another tough venue, against a spiteful pace attack.Captaincy suited him to the extent that it forms one of Pakistan’s great what-ifs – how good might he have been? He took over a team, remember, much like the one he had debuted in, torn apart by factions and rebellions. He inherited one of the game’s spikiest ego clashes, between the two Ws, and massaged it to a degree that both took nearabouts six wickets per Test each under him. Akram – who gravitated to Malik’s charisma, not Miandad, after Khan’s exit – had a better average under no other captain; Waqar Younis averaged better only under Miandad (among captains who led him in more than two Tests). And to think that initially not only were they not talking to each other, they weren’t talking to Malik either because he had assumed the post they most wanted.Captaincy, sadly, was the undoing; all that power and success merely grease for the ride down. And it’s entirely plausible that even if Malik hadn’t succumbed as he did, he might have ended up squeezed out between the two great pairings that overlapped and overshadowed his career: Khan-Miandad and Akram-Younis.That he ensured he’ll never be forgotten is, let’s wager, no consolation. Come to Think of It

Rajasthan Royals’ head coach talks about goals, challenges, and the advantage of multiple World Cup winners in the squad

Interview by Andrew Miller14-Sep-2020It’s your first big IPL assignment, albeit in very unusual circumstances. How are you feeling ahead of the challenge?
I’m just grateful for the opportunity to play cricket in the current landscape, to be quite honest. The BCCI and the cricketing community have done a fantastic job to get this tournament up and running, and it’s so far so good in terms of the preparation. Everyone’s got here safely so far, and we’re just waiting for the international players to join us from the England bubble and complete our full roster.Clearly there are some decisions to be made about quarantine periods, if there are any, and whether those guys [group of players from the ongoing England v Australia series] are going to be available for the first game. But we’ve got a few plans in place – with and without [them] – and we’re preparing for both scenarios.The mental side of the game could be especially important this season after such a prolonged lockdown.

Tournaments are won and lost on and off the field at the best of times, but this year off the field is critically important. We will need to create options within the restricted confines of the bubble, and keep our guys balanced and sometimes get their minds away from cricket.We’ll look to have gatherings at certain times and give the guys different stimulus, in and out of the bubble, to create the sort of environment that they normally have, where they can get away from the game and aren’t just switched on to cricket all the time.That’s one challenge for us. The other will come once the first team is picked. At that moment, there will be 14 players who aren’t involved and 11 who are. Managing those guys to keep them ready and prepared is a great challenge in any tournament, but more so in this one, to my mind.

Steve Smith is clearly the captain, but it’s great to have other guys in supporting roles, with the ability to think on their feet when things don’t go to plan…we’ve got Sanju [Samson], who thinks differently to Smudge, who thinks differently to [Robin] Uthappa. And there’s Jos [Buttler]…Andrew McDonald on Royals’ leadership group

Rajasthan has positioned itself as the ‘English’ IPL franchise in recent seasons. How helpful will it be to have a range of overseas players who have got meaningful match practice under their belts?
Definitely, match-hardened players will have an advantage. We’ve had to be creative to overcome the restrictions on practice games, but with a significant percentage of our group having already played, it positions us quite well. Then again, they’ve had the challenges of the bubble in England already, so when they come into another bubble, that might well be something that we need to manage along the wayThis tournament is going to be all about managing the individual. The collective team goal is at stake, obviously, but we will have to assess all 25 players, and tailor their individual programmes for individual needs, and individual time away. And that includes the coaching staff too. Sometimes we forget that coaches are going through exactly the same thing, so we’ll need to have an understanding of where everyone’s at throughout the tournament. If we can manage that well, it might give us a slight advantage. Who knows?ALSO READ: Interview with David Miller: ‘I want to finish games like Dhoni does’There’s doubt about Ben Stokes’ involvement in this year’s IPL. Quite apart from the personal issues he’s going through, that’s a big hole to fill in your middle order?
First and foremost, thoughts with the Stokes family. It’s a difficult scenario, so we’re giving him as much time as he needs, and connecting with him as best we can. So yeah, we’re not sure where Stokesy’s at right now, but once it has played out, then we can make our decisions from there. But I don’t want to second-guess what will happen with him just yet.How about Steven Smith? He missed two Australia ODIs with concussion. Is that a concern for the squad right now?
Steve Smith is a bit more clear-cut, I think. He needs a little bit of time, it was a short turnaround between game one and two where the concussion happened, so I’d imagine there were some lingering side effects. They’ll be erring on the side of caution, so hopefully [they will] see him out there again on Wednesday [for the third ODI against England in Manchester].You’re going to have other moving parts throughout the tournament. There will be injuries, fatigue, all sorts of things. So while there’s speculation around where Smudger’s at, and Stokesy, we feel we’ve got some good coverage to be able to play different ways.We’ve added some depth in terms of our left-hand batting, in particular in [Anuj] Rawat and [Yashashvi] Jaiswal among the home-grown players, so we think we’ve got some options there. The way we set up at the auction, we feel we can structure our side up to three or four different ways.4:47

Will Yashasvi Jaiswal be breakthrough star for Rajasthan Royals in IPL 2020?

And what about David Miller? As the England-Australia T20Is showed, it’s increasingly difficult for middle-order players to hit the ground running. He’s got a proven ability to do just that.

He’s definitely one of the most devastating finishers in the game, but it’s a really thankless task too. We critique and criticise those guys probably a bit too much. They’re the guys that either fail or succeed at the end there, and there’s a lot more failures than successes within that role. We understand that and, yeah, we’re gearing David up for that role but potentially other roles too, depending on the surfaces and the opposition.He’s got great flexibility. He was at Kings XI [Punjab] for a long time, so I’m hoping that that change of environment sparks his best form. He’s really fitted into our environment well. He was the first overseas player to land, which is great because usually you don’t get access to the overseas guys until 10 days out or sometimes less. He’s been nothing but fantastic so far for the group, helping our young left-handers in particular, and just creating energy around the group. And his fielding is second to none.ALSO READ: Royals’ Yashasvi Jaiswal among promising uncapped Indian batsmenIt feels like a big tournament for Yashasvi Jaiswal. Is he ready to make the step-up from his starring role at the Under-19 World Cup earlier this year?
The step from Under-19 cricket to first-class cricket and the IPL is still a significant one and we’re not sure how that will go for him. But everything he’s done on the training ground and in the first practice game suggests that he will make that leap.But not everything is on him. There’s other guys as well – Anuj Rawat, Manan Vohra is an experienced player who’ll be in and around that as well. Shashank Singh has had a fantastic training block as well. But definitely Jaiswal’s one to watch. We’re excited if he does get exposure in this tournament; we feel like we’ve got one for the future there, no doubt.We’re not sure where we’ll bat Jaiswal yet. As a left-hander, he could maybe go at the top, or in the middle against spin, because last year we had that run of right-handers which was very easy for the opposition to prepare against and play against. We feel as though that we’ve got some left-handed options that can disrupt the tactics of the opposition, so it’s really about where we place them, and at what time.What do you make of your leadership group? There seem to be plenty of candidates to lead the side, particularly if Smith or Buttler are absent.
Steve Smith is clearly the captain, but it’s great to have other guys in supporting roles, with the ability to think on their feet when things don’t go to plan. We’ve got some really good minds out there, and they’re all different as well which is great. If you’ve got guys that all think similarly, then sometimes you probably get the same result.But we’ve got Sanju [Samson], who thinks differently to Smudge, who thinks differently to [Robin] Uthappa. And there’s Jos, a fantastic player who’s had a fantastic summer for England, and there’s no surprises in him performing at the level that he does.Andrew McDonald, Rajasthan’s head coach, with Zubin Bharucha, head of cricket•Rajasthan RoyalsThere’s a predominance of right-arm seam in your attack, albeit boasting a range of different styles. Are you happy with the variety you can bring to your best XI?
I think so. Obviously, there’s Jofra [Archer] – there’s not two of him, there aren’t many similarities between him and other bowlers in the world. Oshane Thomas can do a role up front, in particular with steep bounce and serious ball speed.Then we’ve got Tom Curran, who, in every game, he wants the ball at the death and he’s got good yorkers and variations. And then there’s AJ Tye, a guy who was coming off a long-term injury. He might have been touch-and-go for the original tournament, but potentially Covid gave him a little bit of extra time.ALSO READ: Preview: Combination questions for Royals with Stokes doubtfulYou mentioned the left-arm angle and left-arm quicks, they are scarce in the marketplace, so we feel as though we’ve got a good one in JD [Jaydev Unadkat].You go into each auction and you look at the left-arm quicks, there’s not many out there so, yeah, it’s supply and demand really. Would we like more depth in that area? Potentially, but we’ve got some good complementary skill sets in Varun [Aaron] and [Ankit] Rajpoot, who we traded for. We feel as though he’s got some good variations and skills, and those two right-armers in particular are quite different. So it gives us more flexibility and then also we’ve got Aakash Singh, who’s our left-arm guy who we potentially can develop, hopefully if he’s fast-tracked, in this tournament. Yeah, he may surprise a few towards the middle and back end of the tournamentAnd there’s [Kartik] Tyagi as well, coming out of the Under-19 World Cup. It’s a little bit of the unknown stepping up from that U-19 level into the IPL, but so far so good with those two young bowlers, Tyagi and Aakash. And Aakash, a young left-armer, so that’s a premium; [he] gives us back-up to JD if something were to go wrong there.How exciting is it to see Jofra’s white-ball form? He’s been at the top of his game against Australia.
He lights it up, doesn’t he? There’s moments in games where he senses it and he goes for it. He’s exciting; you never know what you’re going get with great fast bowlers and although he’s got a long way to go to be in that sort of conversation, he’s stepping his way towards that, isn’t he?How much of a lift will it give the squad to be able to take the field with potentially three of the key architects [Stokes, Buttler, and Archer] of England’s World Cup victory last year?

We’re very, very fortunate to have such players within our set-up. Steve Smith, in 2015, is another. It gives you great confidence that their skill-sets held up under such extreme pressure. To be the favourites heading in their home tournament, to have a slight wobble, and then to forge a way through, shows great character but also skill, because character and temperament are one thing, but that group [England in 2019 World Cup] was highly skilled as well.Hopefully they can share those experiences, because that’s the great thing about the IPL. If you think back to the first tournament in 2008, the merging of all those different nations and the ideas that were shared, helped to accelerate the game. So I hope that the young players tap into that experience and talk about those World Cup moments, and learn from them and take away some significant information that will help them forge their careers as well.

ESPNcricinfo’s staff picked their Test, ODI, T20 and women’s T20I teams of the year. Do they resemble yours?

Matt Roller30-Dec-2020Even including the three Boxing Day fixtures, there have been fewer men’s Test matches played in 2020 than in any year since 1991, and the same is true of men’s ODIs. Even still, that hasn’t stopped ESPNcricinfo’s staff from completing an annual ritual: testing our ability as selectors and picking our teams of the year. Don’t forget to let us know where we’ve got it wrong.Girish TS/ESPNcricinfo LtdOnly four teams played more than three men’s Tests in 2020 before our Christmas cut-off date, so it is no surprise that their players dominate the team of the year. England lead the way with four players included, and three New Zealanders, two Pakistanis, a West Indian and an Australian join them.Dom Sibley is an automatic selection, having scored more than twice as many runs as any other opener in the year, while Shan Masood joins him at the top thanks to hundreds at home against Bangladesh and away in England. Kane Williamson slots in behind them, following his masterful 251 against West Indies, while Babar Azam and Ben Stokes, who had prolific years, are in at No. 4 and 5. Zak Crawley, whose 267 against Pakistan was the biggest innings of the year, is a notable omission.Jos Buttler’s place in the England side was under immense scrutiny back in January, but he put doubts over his Test credentials to bed with a superb series with the bat against Pakistan. He also led the way for most dismissals behind the stumps, helping him earn selection ahead of Quinton de Kock in this side. Jermaine Blackwood would have seemed an unlikely candidate for this XI at the start of the year but he earned a West Indies recall thanks to four-day runs for Jamaica, and played two of the most entertaining innings of the year: a match-winning 95 in England, and a counter-punching 104 in New Zealand.The three front-line seamers were easy picks, all averaging around 15: Stuart Broad passed the 500-wicket mark in Tests, dominating the English summer after being left out at its start, while Tim Southee and Kyle Jamieson tore India and Pakistan to shreds. In a year dominated by seamers, Nathan Lyon takes the spinner’s berth despite only playing two Tests.Girish TS/ESPNcricinfo LtdAfter losing series to India and South Africa at the start of the year, Australia have been dominant in post-lockdown ODIs, winning both in England and at home against India. As a result, their players make up the majority of this team, with Aaron Finch and David Warner in as openers.It speaks volumes about Virat Kohli’s lofty standards that even in a year in which he has seemed to underachieve, he still managed five half-centuries in nine ODI innings and averaged a shade under 50 to slide in at No. 3 in this side, while Steven Smith and KL Rahul were both popular selections in the middle order. Glenn Maxwell brings his power-hitting to the No. 6 role, with a strike rate of 145.26 and an average above 70 in 2020, while Ravindra Jadeja slides in at No. 7 to balance the XI.Adam Zampa is the leggie to complement Jadeja and Maxwell’s fingerspin, leading the wicket charts for the calendar year with 27, and he is joined by his two closest competitors on that front in Alzarri Joseph and Josh Hazlewood. Jofra Archer played only three ODIs, but terrorised Warner sufficiently to earn a place in this side.Several players’ cases would have been stronger if the pandemic had allowed them to play more games, with South Africa’s Heinrich Klaasen, Bangladesh’s Liton Das and Oman’s Aqib Ilyas all impressing with the bat in their limited number of games.Girish TS/ESPNcricinfo LtdWhile there was a Covid-induced pause in the otherwise relentless calendar of T20 tournaments, almost all major leagues were held at some stage in the year, meaning this XI did not suffer from a small sample size to the same extent as the others.Look away now, Pakistan fans: there is no place for Babar Azam in our side. He was beaten to the opening slots by only a couple of votes. In his place, de Kock takes the gloves after a stellar year for both South Africa and the Mumbai Indians, while Buttler made up for his hit-and-miss IPL with some belligerent innings at the top of the England batting order.Rahul’s orange-cap-winning IPL and consistency for India pushed him ahead of Mohammad Hafeez for the No. 3 slot, while AB de Villiers, Nicholas Pooran and Kieron Pollard’s middle-order fireworks form the side’s engine room, from No. 4-6.Shadab Khan’s breakthrough year with the bat combined with his wicket-taking threat sees him picked at No. 7, forming a mouth-watering legspinning partnership with Rashid Khan, the year’s standout spinner as usual. Haris Rauf may have been the leading wicket-taker for 2020, but his relatively high economy rate means he misses out to three seamers who form a compelling trio: Shaheen Afridi and Archer take the new ball, with Jasprit Bumrah doing the heavy lifting at the death.Andre Russell, Mushfiqur Rahim, Marcus Stoinis and Dawid Malan are among the honourable mentions with the bat, while Sandeep Lamichhane, Samit Patel and Kagiso Rabada had successful years with the ball.Girish TS/ESPNcricinfo LtdWith a T20 World Cup at the start of the year and most nations frustrated by a lack of playing opportunities since, performances in that tournament, unsurprisingly, carry plenty of weight among these selections. Six Australians from their World Cup-winning side make it to this team, with three of them – Alyssa Healy, Beth Mooney and Meg Lanning – forming the top of our batting order.Sophie Devine averaged 54.66 and scored 492 runs in the year – comfortably twice as many as any of her New Zealand team-mates – but she moves into the middle order thanks to the quality of Australia’s top three. Heather Knight, a transformed T20 batter in recent times, slots in at No. 5, following her best year in the format by a huge margin, and the middle-order batting is rounded off by Ashleigh Gardner, who edged out Nat Sciver by a single vote.With the ball, Katherine Brunt and Megan Schutt form an enticing new-ball partnership after leading the wicket-taking charts among seamers for the year, while Sophie Ecclestone and Jess Jonassen with 19 wickets apiece, are both picked as left-arm spinners. Poonam Yadav’s beguiling start to the T20 World Cup – and her four-wicket haul against Australia – earned her inclusion as the main legspinner.Fellow leggies Sarah Glenn and Amelia Kerr are both unfortunate to miss out, after finishing the year with 18 and 14 wickets respectively and economy rates below 5.5. Despite India’s run to the final, Yadav is their only representative in the XI, with Smriti Mandhana and Shafali Verma both overlooked.More in our look back at 2020

Not too long ago, he wasn’t considered to be T20 material. On Tuesday, he blitzed his way to deliver Pakistan’s first win on tour

Danyal Rasool22-Dec-2020It’s been a complicated few days for Mohammad Rizwan. After being named the best player of the Test series over in England in the summer, he was catapulted to levels of prominence that seemed unlikely to come his way while he served as understudy to Pakistan’s then all-format captain Sarfaraz Ahmed.He was named vice-captain of the Test side only last month, but with Babar Azam ruled out of the first Test, he is set to lead a side he has only played for nine times out in the Boxing Day Test against New Zealand. Only Javed Burki in the 1960s has played fewer Tests before being elevated to the captaincy. Rizwan’s stock has never been higher.Oddly, though entirely fittingly in the bizarre world of Pakistan cricket, the levels of criticism he endured were never fiercer either. You see, Azam’s absence in the T20Is meant someone had to do a fairly straightforward job – replacing the world’s number two T20I batsman at the top of that Pakistan order. And who did they entrust? Of course Rizwan, sent on that hiding to nothing.Having struggled to get going in the first two T20Is, he was singled out for Pakistan’s lacklustre performances, with his selection forensically scrutinised. There were calls for Sarfaraz to replace him in the side – though Sarfaraz would never have opened the innings, so that problem still remained. Either way, Rizwan walked out on Tuesday with a target on his back – and not just from the opposition.Things didn’t look much better when he struggled for fluency in the Powerplay, unable either to get his shots away or get the more belligerent Haider Ali on strike – the 20-year old faced just nine balls in the first five overs. When he did bring up his half-century off 40 balls, he had picked up the pace, but the asking rate kept mounting.Rizwan powered Pakistan’s chase with 89 off 59•AFP/Getty ImagesRizwan, however, is a patient man. He had spent two years out of the side, often not even deemed necessary to be part of the travelling contingent as the second-choice wicketkeeper, given how nailed on Sarfaraz was as captain. Some might have complained – Pakistan cricketers are not especially famous for taking prolonged exclusions in good grace. Rizwan kept his head down and trusted the process, and that, it appeared, is what he was doing for the first half of the chase.With the asking rate hovering above ten and Hafeez – the likeliest to win this match for Pakistan given his sparkling 2020 – gone, it is worth reminding oneself this is very much not Rizwan’s game. A man who wasn’t even trusted by his PSL franchise, the Karachi Kings, to so much as play for them had been was being asked to open the innings for Pakistan in New Zealand, negotiate Boult, Southee and Jamieson in the Powerplay while keeping the asking rate down, and finish off by blitzing said good bowlers at the death.Check, check, check. Half an hour later, Rizwan would walk off the Napier field having just played a T20 knock for the ages. In one of Pakistan’s finest away chases, he took just 18 balls to score his final 38 runs, all the while negotiating a steady trickle of Pakistan wickets from the other end that threatened to make things interesting again. He was unfortunate not to hit the winning runs, but it’s unlikely Iftikhar Ahmed would have had the confidence, or the opportunity, to finish things off with such aplomb had it not been for Rizwan’s unlikely, analytics-defying knock.It doesn’t take long to chip away at a player’s confidence, and head coach Misbah-ul-Haq was particularly cognizant of that in the post-match presser. “It’s always very encouraging to see Rizwan respond like that just after finding out he will be the Test captain. We know that in these conditions, that series is going to test us. But Rizwan’s own confidence will go a long way to helping the Pakistan team in the Tests.”I think it was a tough series for us in terms of preparation, the way we got only six days to prepare for such competitive cricket. It was a bit tough on the guys, but the responded well and tried their level best. We finally got a much needed win today. I’m happy with Rizwan’s performance, who was under pressure from the previous two games today. “Very pleased with this performance, and hopefully he, and all of us, can take this confidence into the Test series. It’s a great morale boost for him to be the one that gets these runs, setting an example for the team now that he’s captain.”This was a team Rizwan wasn’t a part of for several years, one that, had most had their way, he might not have been a part of even today. Perhaps there’s a case to be made this performance will end up as more an outlier than anything suggestive of a fresh trend for Rizwan’s T20I career, and time will certainly tell. But you might excuse Rizwan for not being too fussed about that one just yet. The statistics may not support him, but as Rizwan prepares to take charge of a Pakistan Test side, he may feel he has little use for likelihoods and probabilities.

Ricky Ponting did not hold back in his criticism of the hosts, whose major troubles in approach were exposed by a clinical India

Daniel Brettig28-Dec-2020One of the more under-rated elements of Australia’s’ rise to the top of world cricket in the 1990s was the contribution of Michael Slater as a tone-setting opener, unafraid to take pace bowlers on but still sound enough of technique to handle high-quality spells.He was successful in helping Australia break away from a more obdurate opening tradition – Lawry and Simpson, Boon and Marsh – and with the complementary approach of Mark Taylor, had Australia aiming for at least 300 runs in a day.In Australia, Warner has been the main reason opposition bowlers never feel able to drop into a rhythm•Getty ImagesOnce Slater faded from the scene, Matthew Hayden and Justin Langer took things to another level with their left-handed hyper-aggression, bullying bowlers who would otherwise have felt in a most advantageous position when steaming in, fresh, with a new ball in hand. After their retirements, Shane Watson briefly played a similar role, and had fate been kinder, Phillip Hughes may well have done likewise.Since 2011, though, David Warner played this tone-setting role better than just about any of his forebears. In Australian conditions, Warner has been the single greatest factor in ensuring that bowlers never feel able to drop into a rhythm, while also easing a path for the middle-order batsmen behind him.Two years ago, when Warner and Steven Smith were banned for their Newlands transgressions, Australia’s batting tempo fell away noticeably against India, as a quality bowling attack was able to dictate terms in a way more or less unseen in Australia since the West Indies put clamps on scoring while harvesting regular wickets during their 1980s and 1990s dominance.Related

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An Australian scoring rate of just 2.64 for that series was the lowest for the hosts since 2000, and credit to detailed Indian plans and high-quality execution. This time around, it was widely thought that the returns of Smith and Warner would make it far harder for India to do a similar job – until Warner’s groin pinged in an SCG ODI and the whole balance shifted again.The outcome of Warner’s absence has been another sequence of frustration for the Australians, and a scoring rate of just 2.7 per over in the series so far, the second lowest, after 2018-19, since the year 2000. The ability to control the tempo of the game, hustling between the wickets as much as striking regular boundaries, has been almost entirely absent, underlining why Warner’s talent for top-order batting in Australia will be missed even more whenever he chooses to retire.”We know how good David’s been for a very, very long time, so it hurts having a guy out that averages nearly 50 in Test cricket obviously,” Matthew Wade said of Warner. “So we’ve done the best we can possibly do and will continue to do the same things when we’re asked it.Steven Smith is bowled as the ball just dislodges the leg bail•Getty Images”Hard to get going, they’re bowling pretty well, pretty straight, making it hard for us to score. Our intent’s to go out and score obviously as a batting group and individually, but they’re making it quite challenging at times. To be fair we haven’t gone deep enough yet to really cash in on tired bowlers late in the day, so we’ve only got ourselves to blame a little bit there, but they’ve been prettymuch on the mark from the start.”Australia’s second innings at the MCG, having started out 131 runs in arrears, was a neat case study in all the aforementioned struggles. In terms of setting the tone for the innings, the woefully out-of-touch Joe Burns and the amateur-opener-but-professional-pugilist Wade gave India plenty of hope from the start that they would be able to control proceedings.In Burns’ case, his increasingly fretful efforts simply to survive left almost all the initiative with the visitors, something that Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj were able to run with even after Umesh Yadav was forced out of action. Wade, though he fought with plenty of grit, shaking off a blow to the helmet with crazy-brave resilience, was unable to turn the strike over or find the boundary with anything like the sort of regularity that would have placed pressure back on the Indian bowlers.In the meantime, Marnus Labuschagne and Smith continued to find things as tough as they have in Test cricket in the past two years. On every meaningful occasion in this series so far, they have entered the fray under pressure, and this has shown in their inability to find early boundaries or singles to build momentum.Both have been especially well-corralled in terms of their circuit-breaker deflections to the leg side, largely through the posting of square and backward-square legs in close proximity while the bowlers have pursued straight lines threatening the stumps, in between the occasional short ball. Labuschagne made a telling admission on the opening day of this match in terms of how he and Smith have had to hurriedly reconsider their plans in the face of such well-calibrated attacks.”Something that we’re realising very quickly is people are coming up with new ways, thinking about the game slightly differently,” Labuschagne said. “Obviously today, they came out with a heavy leg-side field and bowled very straight and didn’t give us any scoring options to the off-side. So for all our batters, you’ve just got to keep rolling with the punches, learning the game, understanding what they’re doing and take that innings to innings. I think that’s the key.”Given that Smith and Labuschagne are famously the most analytical, even obsessive, members of the Australian top six, the fortunes of others were hardly likely to be much better. In particular, the travails of Travis Head have raised plenty of questions about his Test-match longevity. While Head’s susceptibility to balls angled in from around the stumps is well known, he has also maintained a maddening tendency to mix periods of shotless occupation with a flurry of back-foot-forcing strokes that, on a seaming pitch such as this, offer the chance of an outside edge.When he skewed Siraj’s first ball of a spell into the slips, having failed to find a single boundary in his 46-ball stay, Head caused plenty of furrowed brows around the ground, a year on from a century against New Zealand that had seemed capable of being the making of him. The common denominator for all these Australian struggles was a lack of balanced tempo between attack and defence, with none of the middle-order batsmen able to change the momentum of the game from the halting rhythm set by Burns and Wade at the top.Ricky Ponting, as much an adjutant coach of the Australian side as he is an analyst and a commentator, did not hold back in his criticism of the hosts, nor in his focus on the fact that, without Warner, there were major tempo troubles in their approach.”You can’t blame the pitch. The pitch has been absolutely perfect today. It’s a little bit of spin, yes, but you’d expect that. Day three of a Test Match. Very little on offer for the fast bowlers, but it’s just been poor batting. Very, very poor batting so far,” Ponting said on Seven. “Once again, this Indian attack have made it so hard for the Australians to score. This is the 55th over, 6 for 110.”It’s been one of the reasons, I think, that they’ve eventually got themselves out, playing rash shots. They haven’t been able to tick the scoreboard over on a regular enough basis. Pressure builds. When pressure builds, bad shots come. I talked about it in first innings as well particularly with the way they played Ravi Ashwin. They weren’t proactive against him. Yes, it’s been good bowling, but sometimes against the best bowlers you have to take more risks as a batsman. For the sheer fact they’re not going to bowl bad balls.”The lesser skilled bowlers you can sit on all day because you know you’re going to one or two scoring opportunities an over, but Bumrah, Ashwin, Jadeja, even Siraj to a certain degree in this game, they don’t make many mistakes. They’ve actually forced the Australian batsman into making mistakes. When you’re just sitting there waiting for good bowlers to make mistakes, you’re basically are a sitting duck.”Warner, meanwhile, continued his rehab away from the main group, batting and running in the MCG nets. His value as an opening batsman had been felt by his absence two years ago. It has risen only further this time around as his contribution to the success of Labuschagne, Smith and company has now been made crystal clear.

Lyon debuted after Australia tried 11 spinners post Shane Warne, and is now among the most successful spinners

Andrew McGlashan14-Jan-2021August 2011: First ball
Introduced in the 16th over of Sri Lanka’s first innings by Michael Clarke, Lyon landed the perfect offbreak from around the wicket to Kumar Sangakkara, finding the edge which the captain grabbed at slip. Here’s how our ball-by-ball commentary recorded the moment:Lyon would finish with 5 for 34 in the first innings to help set up a victory that would ultimately give Australia the series.November 2011: First home Test
A few months later, Lyon made his first appearance on home soil and claimed seven wickets in the match against New Zealand at the Gabba.February-August 2013: In and out
Lyon had been a consistent performer, including getting 12 wickets in the last two Tests on a tour to West Indies in 2012. He revealed late last year in an interview with the that that tour had included a heart-to-heart with Justin Langer, then the team’s batting coach, about the realities of making it as a Test cricketer. “That was probably the biggest for me, that ‘this is real’,” Lyon said. “That the honeymoon was officially over.”A first tour to India in early 2013 would be a big challenge and it was there, in the months to come, that he suffered the most uncertain part of his career amid some curious selection decisions. He was dropped after the first Test in India where he had been battered by MS Dhoni to the tune of 3 for 215 in Chennai, but returned later in the series and claimed 7 for 94 in Delhi. However, come Australia’s next Test – the first of 2013 Ashes at Trent Bridge – Lyon was left out in favour of Ashton Agar. But two Tests later, he was back and has not missed a game since.Nathan Lyon’s 100th Test wicket came the MCG in December 2013•Getty ImagesDecember 2013: 100th wicket
The first milestone wicket, as Lyon brought up his century, came during the Boxing Day Ashes Test against England. It wasn’t a huge scalp in itself – Stuart Broad caught at slip – but it was part of his first five-wicket haul on home soil as his 5 for 50, including the wickets of Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell, ensured Australia’s quest for 5-0 remained on track.December 2014: Matchwinner at home
An emotionally charged Test in Adelaide, in the wake of the death of Phillip Hughes, ended in Australian victory when Lyon grabbed his 12th wicket of the match to finally end a brave India chase. He claimed 7 for 152 in the second innings – including M Vijay for 99 – to end a stand of 185 with Virat Kohli which had put India on course to hunt down 364 on the final day. He then spun through the middle order, which included having Kohli taken at deep midwicket.June 2015: GOAT
A nickname that remains to this day became official in Jamaica when Lyon claimed his 142nd Test wicket to become Australia’s most successful Test offspinner ahead of Hugh Trumble. “I’ve got a lot of learning to do and I’m really enjoying it and hopefully it’s just the start,” he said.July 2016: 200th wicket
The double century was brought up in the country of his debut – when he had Dhananjaya de Silva caught at mid-off in Kandy – but this time it was not part of victory as Australia lost by 106 runs and were whitewashed in the three-match series.March 2017: Career-best
What remains Lyon’s best haul to date came when he bowled out India on the opening day in Bengaluru with 8 for 50. However, it could not bring victory as despite a lead of 87 in the first innings, India fought back to defend 188. It was, though, a period of considerable success for Lyon as he took 41 wickets across six Tests – 19 in four Tests against India and 22 in two matches in Bangladesh – that followed later in the year.Nathan Lyon’s ten-wicket match haul at the SCG, his home ground, came against New Zealand in January 2020•Getty ImagesNovember 2017: That run out
To move away from the bowling for a moment, Lyon had a major say on the opening day of the 2017-18 Ashes in the field. With England going well on 145 for 2, James Vince, who was on 83, dropped the ball into the covers and set off. Lyon swooped, collected, threw off balance and hit the stumps direct.March 2018: 300th wicket
The moment of Lyon becoming the sixth Australian to 300 Test wickets was well and truly overshadowed by the drama unfolding around the ball-tampering incident. For the record, it was Kagiso Rabada having a big charge and getting stumped on Tim Paine’s first day as Australia captain.August 2019: Spinning to an Ashes win
Lyon took 6 for 49 on the final day of the opening Test at Edgbaston – a ground where Australia had not won at since 2001 – to secure a 1-0 series lead that would go on to help them retain the Ashes in England for the first time in 18 years. It wasn’t all smooth sailing for him, however, with his missed run out chance at Headingley one of the defining images of an epic tussle.January 2020: Ten on home turf
Lyon’s home venue, the SCG, has not always been his happiest hunting ground. But that changed a year ago when he claimed ten in the match against New Zealand. It left him on 390 Test wickets. However, that last climb to 400 is proving a little tougher than many may have been expected.

For England it’s been about all-out attack for a while; India seem to want to adopt more of that approach for more of their innings going forward

Sidharth Monga23-Mar-20212:54

Manjrekar: Amazing how Dhawan has added shots to his repertoire

The World Cup is still two years away and India have been on the record saying that ODIs are their lowest priority this year, so it is not surprising for this ODI series to have the feel of a space filler before the IPL. However, there was enough on display on Tuesday to see two sides working on how they want to play this format.England are the leaders of change in this format. India are not quite aping them but they are looking to catch up without taking the kind of risks that can result in the kind of defeat England tasted on the night: a collapse from 135 for 0 in 14 overs to 251 all out when some might call for a more circumspect approach to chasing a sub-par total.The difference between these two teams is stark, and best summed up by the opening combinations. England’s is a once-in-a-generation dream team of Jason Roy and Jonny Bairstow. Their opening partnership averages 60.45 and goes at 7.04 an over. They are an upgrade on the only two other opening combinations who managed to average 50 and score at over a run a ball: Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir (50.54 per dismissal and 6.42 an over) and Brendon McCullum and Jesse Ryder (50.9 and 6.4).More importantly, Roy and Bairstow are well above their contemporaries, giving England a significant head start. The two came together as openers in September 2017. During the Roy-Bairstow era, India have been among the top three ODI sides, but their openers – Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma – average 41.88 and go at 5.29 an over.Consequently England kill many ODIs early in the game. During this period, their average 10-over score has been 60 as against India’s 50. The difference is starker when the sides are batting first, which is trickier than ever when you run the risk of aiming too low. England’s average 10-over score when batting first has been 59 as opposed to India’s 46. With a target guiding them, India close this gap: it’s 53 India and 62 England when chasing.India tend to take fewer risks early, like to take games deep and then score big at the end. England spread the attacking duties and want to break open games earlier than in the final overs. In this ODI, 39 for 0 in 10 overs from Dhawan and Rohit was in part owed to tricky conditions – Dhawan said the ball swung and seamed early – but it is not like India were going to bat the way Bairstow and Roy did later in the day. However, there were signs later that India are looking to shed the conservatism.Virat Kohli is the most efficient run machine in ODI cricket: he has finetuned his game to score reasonably quickly while taking no risks at all. That is why he has a great conversion rate and is destined to go past Sachin Tendulkar’s record of 49 ODI centuries. He tends to leave his aerial hits to the end, but here he tried to slog in the 33rd over, perishing for a typically efficient 56 off 60. He could have sleepwalked to a run-a-ball hundred here, but that would have risked what India have been criticised for in the past: leaving runs out there.In Kohli’s approach was acknowledgement that India are looking to change the way they are playing ODI cricket and that the start had been slow. Kohli still said the 317 they got despite a sensational 112-run stand between KL Rahul and Krunal Pandya in 9.3 overs was sub-par.Related

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The collapse that followed Kohli’s wicket might have given them reason to question the new approach, but the unlikely win in the end will keep those questions at bay. The questions instead were pointed at England. Could they have been more conservative after the start they got? For England and Eoin Morgan, the answer is no. They will keep attacking the way they did, but will just look to get better at it than on the night.”When we have bad days with the bat, it can potentially look worse than it is, but we play an aggressive brand of cricket,” Morgan said. “We just need to get better and execute better than we did today. When you look at our top seven, we all have scored 60-ball hundreds. It is something we pride ourselves on. To be able to take the attack to the opposition. And that is the way we want to play.”White-ball cricket as a rule is always on the upward slant: total scores, individual scores, strike rates are always increasing. With an eye on the World Cup, we want to continue to try and push the envelope in that regard. Sometimes that doesn’t work because we don’t get it right, but for us losing like that is way better than losing by 10 runs playing in a completely different matter that doesn’t suit us. It’s important for us to reinforce the method that has worked for us over the last five years.”Expect England to wipe this defeat from their memories and set themselves up for another assault come the next ODI. For India there are two ways to look at the result. Some might be thankful they won because otherwise they might have possibly ended up shelving their bolder approach in the middle overs. Others might have hoped for the 40-over defeat that looked likely because that might have forced a more dramatic change to their approach to opening ODI innings. The two remaining ODIs will tell us a bit about how India plan to approach their ODI cricket in the next two years.

The RCB batter says his success this season is all down to batting at a more familiar position in the line-up

Hemant Brar03-Oct-20214:21

Manjrekar: Maxwell has changed the fortunes of RCB

Harpreet Brar had conceded only ten from his first three overs. And that includes two overs against a set Virat Kohli and Devdutt Padikkal.Brar is not a mystery spinner. His method is simple and out there. He tries to hit good length with enough pace on the ball that the batter has no time to set himself up for a big shot. Such is his self-belief that whenever he is brought on and his captain asks him for the plan, he just replies, ” [You don’t worry, I won’t give runs]”.

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Now he is up against Glenn Maxwell. In the previous game between Punjab Kings and Royal Challengers Bangalore, Brar had bowled Maxwell for a first-ball duck. The batter had played back to a delivery he probably should have gone forward to and was beaten on the outside edge. On Sunday, Brar nearly pulled off a repeat. Maxwell once again went back and pushed at the ball. This time he got an outside edge but KL Rahul failed to latch on to it.By the time Brar came for his final over – the 13th of the innings – Maxwell seemed to have adjusted to his pace and length. On the second ball of the over, Brar erred a little on the shorter side, and that was enough for Maxwell to go back and across and pull it for a six. Two balls later, Brar bowled on the fuller side and Maxwell sent it into orbit over deep midwicket.Then, it was Ravi Bishnoi in the firing line, with Maxwell hitting him for back-to-back sixes. The first was a googly, which bobbled right into Maxwell’s hitting arc and was deposited over cow corner. Bishnoi went full on the next ball, only to be walloped down the ground.During his 33-ball 57, Maxwell scored only 19 off 16 balls against seamers. But against spinners, he plundered 38 off 17. In comparison, all other Royal Challengers batters scored only 27 off 37 balls against spin. In fact, this whole season Maxwell has feasted on spinners, taking 216 runs off 137 balls at an average of 54.00 and a strike rate of 157.66. So that was a match-up he nailed.Name that shot – Glenn Maxwell batted in typical Maxwell fashion against Punjab Kings•BCCIEarlier this week, against Mumbai Indians, Maxwell had used switch hits and reverse hits – against both pace and spin – to target the shorter boundary and give his side what proved to be a winning total. But that was in Dubai. This was Sharjah, where the relaid pitches have made life difficult for batters, where the average first-innings total this season had been 134, where the chasing sides had won four out of five games.So, Kohli’s decision to bat first after winning the toss wasn’t a straightforward one. And even though Maxwell seems to be batting on a different level than anyone else, he too acknowledged this wasn’t an easy pitch.”I felt probably this one was the toughest to adjust to,” he said at the post-match presentation. “It skidded on a little bit more from the spinners, which means you’ve got to be a little bit sharper at the start of the innings. The other wickets held up just a tiny bit more and gave you a bit more time on the back foot.”The ball might have been skidding on, but when Maxwell connected those sixes, it seemed to stay on his bat just a fraction of a second longer, giving his wrists enough time to whip it away. His knock propelled Royal Challengers to 164, the highest total in Sharjah this season, and eventually into the playoffs.During IPL 2020, playing for the Punjab franchise and batting mostly at No. 5, Maxwell had managed only 108 runs in 11 innings. This time, in the same number of innings, he has 407. Maxwell attributed the revival to a familiarity with the role he’s been assigned.”In T20s, I have found a nice little rhythm batting at No. 4,” he said. “It’s something I probably had for Australia over a long period of time as well, which is probably why I have success over there. Coming to the RCB, they wanted me to do the exact same role. It’s been really enjoyable to actually come into the change room and actually have to change not too much.”Maxwell has now scored three half-centuries in the last three games. If he continues his form, it could well be a first IPL title for Royal Challengers.