Mason Greenwood's loan club Getafe have been hit with a three-game partial stadium ban by the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF).
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The left-arm quick didn’t open the bowling for the first time since September 2014, and Australia’s captain said the move had nothing to do with fitness concerns
Daniel Brettig04-Nov-2018Australia’s captain Aaron Finch has revealed he abandoned the new-ball skills of Mitchell Starc as an attempt to find a way out of their recent ODI losing streak – now 17 defeats in 19 matches following a six-wicket trouncing by South Africa in Perth.Defending an inadequate total of 152, there was widespread surprise when Australia opened up with Josh Hazlewood and Nathan Coulter-Nile rather than Starc, the first time since September 2014 that he had not been called upon to use the new ball in an ODI.South Africa certainly couldn’t believe their luck, collaring 16 from Coulter-Nile’s opening over before Starc was swiftly called in for the fourth over of the innings. Finch said the decision had been to do with seeking a fresh tactical edge rather than any fitness concerns for Starc, who entered the series with Billy Stanlake as injury cover after complaining of hamstring tightness during the UAE tour.”We’d planned to go in with Coults and Josh with the new ball,” Finch said. “It didn’t work out for Coults in the first over today, then we went to Starcy pretty quick. It’s just a tactical thing to be honest. Sixteen out of 18 losses in a row, 17 out of 19 now, we’re looking for something to try, to try some new things, something different.”If you keep doing the same thing over and over it’s the definition of insanity, isn’t it? We’re looking for a combination, looking for a method. Obviously, a few more runs would be handy as well.”When you’re defending a low total it feels like you have to over-attack. It’s almost like the quicks can’t settle in to their work. They’re always searching for something.”The choice of Coulter-Nile and Hazlewood over Starc reflrcted an Australian set-up that is straining every sinew to find new and better ways of performing, perhaps even to the point of overthought. Reacting to the result, Finch intoned his belief that the wheel would turn. In his position it is impossible to publicly conclude anything else.”It will turn,” Finch said. “The way that we’re training, believe me, the way that we’re training and preparing the wheel will turn and it will happen quickly. It might not be tomorrow, it might not be the next day. But I think if we keep improving and keep practicing as we are it will turn.”You’d say guys at times are probably doubting themselves. When guys are not performing as well as they can do and have done in the past there’s always going to be a little bit out of doubt. When South Africa bowled as well as they did today you have to be at your absolute best to get through that.”We can’t question the way anyone’s been training or preparing. It’s been spot on. It’s just one of those things. You’re only one good shot away from feeling on top of the world again.”
Manchester United supporters have been left fuming after seeing their Premier League clash with Brentford scheduled for 8pm on Easter Saturday.
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Man Utd host Brentford on Saturday nightFans annoyed by kick-off time Train problems due to Easter shutdown WHAT HAPPENED?
Manchester United have seen their Premier League clash with Brentford on Saturday moved to a late kick-off. The two teams will meet at the Gtech Community Stadium at 8pm local time on Easter Saturday. This is the fourth time this season that Manchester United fans have seen their team play away from home at 8pm on Saturday, more than any other team in the English top flight.
AdvertisementGettyTHE EXPLANATION
The problem for visiting supporters is that train services between London and Manchester are facing disruption over the Easter weekend. The last train from London Euston to Manchester Piccadilly on Saturday leaves two minutes before United's 8pm kick-off. Engineering work means there will be no services between the two cities on Easter Sunday. All of this means that Manchester-based fans who want to watch the game face having to spend the weekend in London, unless they fancy a 410-mile round trip by car.
WHAT MAN UTD FANS HAVE SAID
A spokesperson for the Manchester United Supporters' Trust told : "For the fourth time this season, United are away from home at 8pm on a Saturday which just goes to show the blatant disregard the TV companies and football authorities have for match-going fans. During Covid they said that football without fans is nothing – it’s time for the football authorities to show they meant it."
Chas Banks, secretary of the Manchester United Disabled Supporters’ Association, also hit out at the scheduling and called for change. He said: “I don’t travel to away games anymore. After years watching United home and away, it all became too much as the years passed – I’m in my 70s now and a disabled wheelchair user – and the football authorities clearly didn’t give a flying one about the problems it causes to fans when they schedule kick-offs at crazy times.
“They sit safe in the knowledge that whatever bonkers changes they made to the fixture list, the United away supporters would find a way to get there somehow. The scheduled kick-off changes seem even crazier if, like me, it takes three hours to get from your bed to actually leaving the house to begin your journey. As time has passed it really did start to feel like they were doing their absolute damnedest to stop me and other disabled United fans from watching my club playing away from home.”
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Getty WHAT NEXT FOR MAN UTD
United fans will head to London fresh from a thrilling 4-3 win over rivals Liverpool in the quarter-finals of the FA Cup last time out. Manager Erik ten Hag said afterwards he hoped the victory could be a "turning point" for his team after what's been a difficult campaign for the Red Devils.
Sarfraz and Imad scored fifties in the chase, but the rising asking rate was too much to overcome for Pakistan
The Report by Danyal Rasool07-Nov-2018
It’s a complete dozen, now, and really, there was no need to wonder if it might have been any different. New Zealand’s 12th successive win against Pakistan was sealed comfortably, despite the visitors playing largely ordinary cricket for much of the contest. Kane Williamson’s men started poorly, fell away towards the end of the innings, and dropped in intensity in the last half of the second innings. And yet, but for a few fleeting overs when Sarfraz Ahmed and Imad Wasim put together a damage-control partnership, the result today was never in doubt.It was a 130-run partnership between Ross Taylor and Tom Latham in the first innings that set New Zealand on their way to 266, the kind of score that Pakistan have struggled to run down in the UAE. And then a scintillating hat-trick in the third over of the chase from Trent Boult – fresh from paternity leave – ripped chunks out of Pakistan’s top order and effectively killed the game off. The wounds he inflicted on Pakistan were ultimately destined to prove fatal, and condemned Pakistan to a slow, painful death over the 47 overs that followed. Pakistan limped on towards 219 before New Zealand put the official seal of approval on a win that had been several hours in the making.Taylor and Latham – whose record in Asia stacks up with the best – had turned the tables on Pakistan with their century partnership. But all that changed when Shadab took three wickets in an over, and was desperately unlucky to miss out on a hat-trick of his own. Imad followed by removing Taylor for 80, and from being set up for a big finish, the visitors suddenly found their tail-enders trying to bat out the overs. Only a partial recovery, thanks to big-hitting by Ish Sodhi and Tim Southee, got New Zealand over 260, but they still ended up slightly short of what they were set for half an hour earlier.That they didn’t have to pay for it was thanks to the heroics of Boult. After the out-of-form Fakhar Zaman played on, Babar Azam edged behind trying to reach for a wide yorker. Reduced to 8 for 2, Mohamad Hafeez walked out to find Boult – who had arrived in the UAE just three days prior – on a hat-trick.That’s when he chose to produce the best delivery of the lot, an inswinger that crashed into Hafeez’s pads. He burnt a review, trying to deny the left-armer the hat-trick to no avail, and Pakistan had lost their top order cheaply in face of a daunting chase.From there onwards, there were a number of workmanlike efforts by a number of batsmen who tried to revive Pakistan, but they were simply too far off the pace. Shoaib Malik and Imam-ul-Haq put on 63 before falling within an over of each other, and when Shadab Khan was erroneously given out (he missed the ball by almost a foot) caught behind, it brought Imad and Sarfraz Ahmed together for one last hurrah.To their credit, they did about as much as they could have, given the circumstances, but the scale of the task they had been left was simply insurmountable. Not even a 103-run partnership, achieved in relatively quick time, was enough to put Pakistan in the ascendancy, and as soon as Sarfraz dragged de Grandhomme on, the contest looked all but over.Batting first after winning the toss, the early wickets of the openers immediately consigned New Zealand to grinding out the middle overs, and Kane Williamson did that for a while with Taylor. The spinners were being negotiated well enough, and with Imad not as menacing as he had been in the T20Is, they found a regular outlet to keep the score ticking along. But then Shadab bowled a most un-Shadab delivery, a long-hop, only to see Williamson play an equally uncharacteristic shot to give short midwicket an easy catch. It was awful cricket all round, but the hosts came out of it chuffed with themselves.Taylor struggled to get going initially, and his frustration manifested itself in controversial fashion after he seemed to question if Mohammad Hafeez was bending his arm beyond the legal limit after his first over. It unleashed outrage from Sarfraz, who complained to the umpire and engaged with Taylor several times. The batsman wasn’t willing to let go as Sarfraz persisted with Hafeez, who chose not to get involved, and for a while there was real edge to the way the game progressed.With Taylor and Latham in control and a slew of big hitters to come, Shadab found turn and trapped Latham and Henry Nicholls in front of successive deliveries, with Pakistan’s kryptonite Colin de Grandhomme edging to first slip two balls later. Imad then bowled Taylor in the next over to deprive New Zealand of recognised batsmen in the last seven overs, and Pakistan swarmed all over the visitors.Pakistan should have polished them off soon after, but Ish Sodhi – who had before today averaged 2.16 in ODIs – bailed his side out with an unlikely cameo. Three glorious sixes off arguably Pakistan’s best death bowler Hasan Ali by the pair gave New Zealand 23 off his last two as they undid some of the damage caused by Shadab. Sodhi scored 24 (until today he had a total of 13 ODI runs), and even Trent Boult smashed Junaid Khan for six off the last ball to haul New Zealand to 266. It required 50 runs off the last five overs by the tail against a fearsome bowling line-up.It was more than enough to do for Pakistan, who were hoping to show what transpired in the Asia Cup was a one-off. Instead, Pakistan will be desperate to ensure it doesn’t come across as if the real one-off was the Champions Trophy 17 months ago.
ESPNcricinfo’s live blog of the first round of the Ranji Trophy 2018-19 season
Shashank Kishore02-Nov-2018
Matt Parkinson, the Lancashire legspinner, has been ruled out of the England Lions tour of the UAE after routine scans found a stress fracture in his back.Parkinson enjoyed a stellar season in all formats last summer, claiming 59 wickets all told, including 18 in the Royal London Cup, the most by any bowler, and a further 25 in the Vitality Blast.On the strength of those performances, he was earlier this month named as one of Melbourne Star’s signings for the 2018-19 Big Bash, an opportunity that could now be in jeopardy depending on the seriousness of his injury.”It’s a real shame for Matt that he’s forced to miss the tour,” said Andy Flower, the England Lions head coach. “He had a fine summer for Lancashire and his selection was just reward for the ability that he’s shown.”He’s been shut down from bowling and he’ll see a spinal specialist this week as we try to determine the full extent of his injury.”Parkinson will be replaced in the England Lions squad by Sussex slow left-armer Danny Briggs.It is the second time in as many winters that a young England legspinner has been diagnosed with a stress fracture, after Hampshire’s Mason Crane was ruled out of the tour of New Zealand, having made his Test debut at Sydney during the Ashes.Crane made a comeback to county cricket in the summer but was ruled out for the rest of the season after helping Hampshire win the Royal London Cup final against Kent in June.
In an exclusive interview with ESPNcricinfo, the newly elected PCB chairman spoke about the need to revive bilateral cricketing ties between India and Pakistan
ESPNcricinfo staff16-Oct-20184:32
‘The people want India-Pakistan cricket, and you can’t go against their will’
Ehsan Mani, the newly elected PCB chairman, has termed India’s stance on playing Pakistan “hypocrisy”. In a climate of political tension between the two countries, India have not played a bilateral match against Pakistan in any format since January 2013, but have met them 10 times since then in multilateral events.In an interview with ESPNcricinfo, Mani said it was the “will of the people” that cricketing ties between India and Pakistan resume, and added that sporting contact would improve relations between the two countries.”The main thing is that we play cricket against each other. When we play cricket, especially in our countries – when we go to India or when they come here – helps in increasing people-to-people contact. Indian fans come to Pakistan. Lakhs of fans have come to Pakistan from India and everyone goes back happy.”There’s no better way to improve the relations between countries than having sporting contacts, cultural contacts. For me, that is far more important than any amount of money that comes into the game.”Indian public obviously love to see India and Pakistan playing, and so does the Pakistan public. Rest of the work is of the politicians and frankly, once India is in the lead-up to its elections next year, so I don’t think there will be any softening in their attitude. But in the long term, the people want it and you can’t go against the will of the people forever.”There is a lot of hypocrisy at the moment. India plays an ICC event against us but doesn’t play a bilateral series. That is something that we need to address.”India-Pakistan matches, Mani said, had the “highest value financially in the world”, but he maintained that the PCB’s desire for the resumption of ties was about more than money. When asked if Pakistan cricket could survive without bilaterals against India, he had a one-word answer: “forever.””Money isn’t the issue, it’s more about the game,” he said. “There are more viewers for an India-Pakistan match than any other match in the world. So, if the Indian government decides to deprive its own citizens of watching an India-Pakistan match then that is their choice.”Mani’s predecessor as PCB chairman, Najam Sethi, was instrumental in moving the ICC to set up a dispute panel to resolve the impasse over India-Pakistan bilateral cricket. The PCB and the BCCI are currently awaiting the panel’s verdict.Asked if he would have chosen the dispute-panel route, Mani said he would have preferred dialogue with the BCCI and the Indian government, and recalled his role, during his tenure as ICC president, in convincing the Indian government to green-light the first full India tour of Pakistan in 15 years.”I would have preferred for there to be board-to-board discussions and board-to-government decisions,” Mani said. “I was ICC [president] in 2003 and India and Pakistan were not playing each other then.”I went and met the Indian government and I took with me the people that were leading the Indian cricket board at that time – Mr. [Jagmohan] Dalmiya, Mr. [IS] Bindra, Mr. Rajsingh [Dungarpur] – and we went to the different ministries concerned with India-Pakistan cricket relations, and they spoke more in favour of resuming cricket between India and Pakistan than I did as a Pakistani.”I had to be slightly neutral since I was with the ICC. But I didn’t have to say anything – they were the ones saying we want to play against Pakistan. There is always some political interference in India but the Indian government has said, ‘Look, at the end of the day, it is the BCCI’s decision to play or not play against Pakistan, but they have to come and present a case to us,’ and I took them on face value.”It took us about a year but they came in 2004 because I kept going back with people on the Indian cricket board and I was going as the ICC President and not as someone representing Pakistan.”For all that, Mani said he wouldn’t keep trying to persuade India to play Pakistan beyond a point.”I don’t intend to ask India to play us at all,” he said. “If they want to play they tell us, if they don’t want to play that’s fine. But we are not going to go after them, we are not going to beg them. It’s good for the game if India-Pakistan play each other but it will be on equal terms.”
Of course there is pressure when you are the No. 1 ODI team in the world. Of course there is widespread expectation to beat a Sri Lanka in some disarray. But so what, asks Jos Buttler. After decades of being expected to be swept aside in the format, especially when playing in South Asia, it’s nice to go in to a series the much more fancied team.”I like being favourites – it shows we’ve been doing good stuff,” Buttler said on the eve of the first ODI in Dambulla. “It’s been tricky in the past for England sides to come here. But we are full of confidence, we look forward to adapting our play.”There’s always pressure being No. 1. Once you get there, I think that’s when the hard work really starts. You’ve got a bit of a target on your back. It’s down to you to keep improving and try to stay there. That’s the challenge and it has its own pressures. I think in the dressing room we have a good understanding of what that is and who we are as a side, and know that we need to keep improving and pushing the boundaries, and putting no limitations on what we’re capable of. That should stand us in good stead. A lot of the guys enjoy the pressure in the dressing room.”So many of the major trepidations that England teams of yesteryear had, are simply not a worry for this ODI outfit. A relatively modest spin contingent, for example, will have worried previous England captains, but not this lot. In Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid, England almost certainly have a better-heeled slow-bowling outfit than Sri Lanka, for whom Akila Dananjaya has been a consistent performer, but Lakshan Sandakan and Amila Aponso have been sporadic ones.ESPNcricinfo Ltd
“In England if you look at the two guys who have played well consistently for us are usually the two spinners,” Buttler said. “Adil takes a lot of wickets, Moeen is economical, and they’re a big strength of the side for us, even in home conditions. Seam is going to have a big part to play as well. Maybe there are few different roles for the seamers and the spinners, but the guys are excited for that.”And the conditions may not be overly spin-friendly anyway. During the South Africa series, Sri Lanka made the decision to play on good batting tracks at home, to better prepare themselves for the challenge of next year’s World Cup, and the New Zealand and South Africa ODI series on the horizon. Whatever the conditions, England are confident they have enough know-how in their squad to tackle them.”A lot of the squad have been a part of the IPL and experienced that,” Buttler said. “Not just for the conditions, but touring this part of the world and the chaos that comes with the IPL – stuff like weather and not allowing it to impact your performance and preparation. Guys have travelled the world a bit as well. Hopefully you’ll see some return on investment on guys have been part of that competition.”
The Red Devils have more than a few players at the tournament in Germany. Here's how you can follow each of their stars at Euro 2024
With a total of eight players competing at the European Championship in Germany this summer, Manchester United are well represented at the major international tournament.
Indeed, the likes of Luke Shaw, Bruno Fernandes and Rasmus Hojlund are among the Red Devils stars who will be present at Euro 2024 and each will be fighting for glory with their respective national teams.
Here, GOAL shows how you can follow each of the Old Trafford heroes present at Euro 2024.
Kalvin Phillips' nightmare loan spell at West Ham continued as his foul sparked a remarkable Newcastle comeback at St. James' Park.
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Phillips comes on at 3-1 upConcedes penalty after seven minutesHarvey Barnes equalises moments laterWHAT HAPPENED?
Phillips was substituted on in the 69th minute and then just seven minutes later conceded a penalty for a foul on Anthony Gordon. Gordon was too quick for Phillips and nipped in to poke the ball away from the West Ham player whose missed clearance took the winger out. Alexander Isak, taking his second penalty of the game, converted another the spot-kick to take his side within one goal of the Hammers. To make matters worse for Phillips and the Hammers, Harvey Barnes scored a brace to win the game for the Magpies in the dying embers.
AdvertisementGettyWHAT THE FANS ARE SAYING
Bemused by Phillips' misfortune, fans flocked to X to share their opinion on the midfielder. @UtdEra_ said: "Kalvin Phillips to West Ham could go down as the worst loan of all time. He’s shocking."
West Ham fan @alanrzepa could not believe it. He said: "Kalvin Phillips can’t play for us ever again."
@HughMurray1894 added: "I actually feel bad for Kalvin Phillips at this point."
@thomasjrennie believes there are higher powers at stake. He said: "Never, ever bring on Kalvin Phillips. He’s cursed."
Jamie Kent drew comparisons to another awful loan signing. He said: "Kalvin Phillips is having genuinely one of the worse loan spells I’ve seen since Denis Suarez at Arsenal."
West Ham's luck with loan signings has been hit and miss in the past. @JackElderton tweeted: "I don't want to see Phillips again. He has cost us so many points since joining. Roberto the only other player to have such a bad run at West Ham in my lifetime."
THE BIGGER PICTURE
Things have gone from bad to worse for Phillips, who has been dropped from the England squad since his loan move to West Ham. While he can feel unlucky to have conceded the penalty given he was unaware of Gordon behind him as he went to clear the ball, he could have reacted faster and could have no complaints when the spot-kick was given. Phillips' debut came in the 6-0 thrashing by Arsenal and in his second game he was sent off against Bournemouth for a challenge labelled 'stupid' by former referee Mike Dean. A series of calamitous and costly mistakes for the Hammers will have done little to impress England boss Gareth Southgate.
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Getty ImagesWHAT NEXT FOR PHILLIPS?
Time is running out for Phillips for demonstrate he is still good enough to play for England at the European Championship in the summer. Yet, at the moment, every time he does play his chances seem to diminish. Since his nightmare move to Manchester City, the former Leeds captain's career has been derailed and it remains to be seen if he will have any suitors come the summer.