Colombo: Sri Lanka all-rounder Sanath Jayasuriya has announced that he will retire from international cricket during this month’s tour of England.

After being picked for the Twenty20 international against England and five limited-overs matches, the veteran revealed he will play only the Twenty20 and one ODI.

“I don’t want to share the happiness of being selected to play for Sri Lanka again, but to announce my decision to end my international career of more than 20 years,” Jayasuriya, who will be 42 at the end of the month, told reporters in Colombo today.

“I consider it a privilege to have represented Sri Lanka to bring glory to my country and the town of Matara where I come from. The selectors picked me for the whole series but it was my personal decision to retire midway.”

Jayasuriya, who made his ODI debut in 1989, was originally included in a 16-man squad, despite not playing a limited-overs international for his country since December 2009, while he played his last Twenty20 match a year ago.

He was not included in Sri Lanka’s World Cup squad and failed to secure a contract with a franchise in this year’s Indian Premier League, leading many to believe he would not play international cricket again.

Jayasuriya’s one-day international record is impressive – only Sachin Tendulkar has scored more runs than his 13,428 in ODI action, while he has taken 322 wickets with his left-arm spin.

London : Four days after being demolished for 82, Sri Lanka showed commendable spirit on the opening morning at Lords, with three early wickets, having put England into bat. The home side reached lunch at 75 for 3.

In Cardiff, it had taken Sri Lanka 96.3 overs to get three wickets, but here they had them in 7.5 and England were rocking on 22 for 3.

Tillakaratne Dilshan’s decision to bowl first smacked of a captain who didn’t want to expose his batsmen to England’s tall pace attack.

At Lunch Day 1

England: 75/3 (24.0 overs) (First innings; Alaistair Cook 32*, RAS Lakmal 38/2)

Team Lineup

England: 1 Andrew Strauss (capt), 2 Alastair Cook, 3 Jonathan Trott, 4 Kevin Pietersen, 5 Ian Bell, 6 Eoin Morgan, 7 Matt Prior (wk), 8 Stuart Broad, 9 Graeme Swann, 10 Chris Tremlett, 11 Steven Finn

Sri Lanka: 1 Tillakaratne Dilshan (capt), 2 Tharanga Paranavitana, 3 Kumar Sangakkara , 4 Mahela Jayawardene, 5 Thilan Samaraweera, 6 Prasanna Jayawardene (wk), 7 Farveez Maharoof, 8 Rangana Herath, 9 Dilhara Fernando, 10 Chanaka Welegedara, 11 Suranga Lakmal

Mumbai: Sachin Tendulkar has almost every record under his belt, but the iconic Indian cricketer says he is still not satisfied.

“When you win something or score a century you say you are happy, but not satisfied. Satisfaction is like engaging the handbrake and hoping a car moves forward,” Tendulkar said. “I am not yet satisfied with my career and what I have done, not at all. I feel the moment you start to feel satisfied, it is only natural that you begin to cool down and lose it.”

“I still love cricket as much as ever. It is my job, but it is also my passion. Cricket remains in my heart and I don’t need anything else to motivate me. I dreamt of playing for my country when I was young and it is still my dream, it is still fun for me. Life without cricket is unthinkable,” the little master added. “India’s recent World cup win after a gap of 28 years was the best moment of my career for which I had waited for 22 years. I had played in the previous five World Cups, but had fallen short each time. The experience left me feeling shattered beyond words.”

Tendulkar described the experience as “a different kind of feeling, a high, like living on a different planet, it felt as though I was flying”.

On his personal records – highest run getter in both ODIs and Tests, and highest number of centuries in both formats – the genius player said, “You have to be still in your mind, and keep it blank. It is also important to avoid any needless anger. While growing up, I picked up a lot from my father, who never lost his temper, and I have always tried to follow that, so I try not to ever lose my cool.”

Pakistan: A legal firm acting on behalf of Shahid Afridi has sent the Pakistan Cricket Board a letter to resolve the ongoing dispute between the two parties, sparked by his removal from the ODI captaincy, and his subsequent announcement of a “conditional” retirement.

“The letter has gone into some depth in explaining the history of Afridi as a player, his contributions to Pakistan cricket and his global standing as a player. The Hampshire issue has also been raised, the player’s manager, Umran Khan, said, though he refused to reveal the name of the legal firm.

Afridi has been summoned to appear before a three-man disciplinary committee formed by the PCB on June 8 in Lahore, to face charges that he has breached two clauses of the code of conduct, with his retirement announcement and subsequent criticism of the board. Afridi, in his first response to the show-cause notice, accepted that his comments were a violation of the code but Khan clarified that no apology had been made. “He accepted the violations, he did not offer an apology,” Khan said. He did confirm that Afridi would be appearing before the committee.

Afridi has appealed directly to Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, who is also patron of PCB. On Thursday, Rehman Malik, the country’s interior minister, also tweeted he would try to resolve the dispute, and it is believed that pressure has been applied from his quarters on the board to do just that.

A handful of parliamentarians have expressed their anger at the handling of the situation. On Thursday, the sports ministry had been asked by the offices of the Prime Minister and President to submit an independent report on the dispute within a week.

Colombo: Former Sri Lanka captain Arjuna Ranatunga has said the BCCI’s financial might has turned the ICC into a “toothless tiger”. Ranatunga, who led Sri Lanka to the 1996 World Cup triumph, said the ICC has become a body which is constantly under the BCCI’s pressure.

“The ICC’s job is to protect the game. They don’t have to favour anyone. The game has been nurtured by honourable men of the ICC for decades, but at present, ICC looks to be under the thumb of India,” Ranatunga said.

“Not too long ago, we had individuals like Malcolm Speed, Eshan Mani and Malcolm Grey, who stood against India. But the current ICC is weak and they simply give in. The ICC is becoming a toothless tiger,” he said.

Ranatunga praised former England captain Tony Greig for stating that the ICC needs to shake off India’s influence on it to make right decisions. “SLC is like a puppet on a string. The job of the ICC is to protect the game rather than any individual country,” he said.

Ranatunga said he feared for the future of Test cricket due to the IPL as players seemed to be gravitating towards the league instead of the traditional format. He blamed the absence of cricketers from the ICC’s top decision-making body for the scenario.

“One fault that I see with the ICC at the moment is that most of the directors haven’t played the game and the main decisions are taken at the Directors’ meeting,” the former skipper remarked. “If you take most of the CEOs of cricket boards, they are past cricketers, but when they come up with suggestions for the well-being of the game, the directors need to support those decisions rather than rejecting them.”

Mumbai: Since the World Cup win, MS Dhoni and his warriors  have been in focus wherever they go. Tuesday evening was no different – the 2009-10 BCCI awards night in Mumbai was well attended by present and former luminaries of Indian cricket.

The 15 men took center-stage at the awards function, held at the beautiful lawns of Taj Land’s End, Bandra.

“The most important thing is to go ahead and enjoy the game. Give it your best shot, but it is important that you enjoy your art,” the legendary Kapil Dev exhorted the young pacers during a dinner-table conversation.

The whole evening was dominated by the sweet aroma of victory from that incredible night of April 2 at the Wankhede Stadium. As promised by the Board then, each and every member of Team India was handed out a cheque of Rs 2 crores each, while the entire support staff got a handsome reward of Rs 50 lakhs each.

For the record, former all-rounder Salim Durani was handed over the lifetime achievement award while Sachin Tendulkar was named Indian cricketer of the year for 2009-10.

The glorious evening ended with an audiovisual presentation of the memorable moments of Team India’s 2011 World Cup campaign.

It was a Thursday afternoon and the crowd was packed at Sardar Patel Stadium, backing their team in the numbers. Australian Captain Ricky Ponting won the match and elected to bat, probably due to the dry pitch and India’s history of chasing targets. India had brought Raina into the side to strengthen their middle order in place of Yusuf Pathan.

Australian batsmen Haddin and Watson began the proceedings. It was a watchful start. Each team seemed to have done their homework. Ashwin, who had played well in the previous game, was brought in early into the attack. The faith of the captain on him paid off when he took the first wicket, of Watson. Watson attempted to play an offensive stroke, misjudged the ball, which went on to hit his off stump.

Ponting, who had scored only 100 runs in his past 5 innings, walked in next. Haddin, Ponting having spent time on the pitch, was looking quite comfortable and provided Ponting time to settle in. They built a moderate partnership and were starting to look dangerous at 100/1 by the end of the 20th over, when Yuvraj Singh got back in action once again, this time with the ball. He took Haddin’s wicket and the runs dried up post that.

Indian spinners then made the Australian batsmen toil for their runs. Also, the fall of wicket at regular intervals kept breaking any momentum being built.

The highlight of the match was Ricky Ponting, who looked like a man on a mission. He silenced his critics with his gameplay, finely crafting 104 of 113 balls. This helped Australia get to a reasonable total of 260. Among the Indian bowlers Singh, Ashwin and Khan took two wickets each. Zaheer Khan became second leading wicket taker in the tournament with this game.

It was a fifty-fifty situation when the next innings began, with Tendulkar and Sehwag walking in to the crease. The atmosphere was electrifying, with the crowds roaring to the shots played by the batsmen. Australia was up to its old tricks again, using the short ball against the Indian batsmen. And the tricks paid dividends too, with Sehwag getting caught while trying to pull a bouncer. The little master took responsibility on his shoulders to ride his team through built a partnership with Gambhir. Gambhir looked shaky initially but soon gained confidence.

The match seemed to be tilting in India’s favour, when Tait bowled a smooth delivery tricking Tendulkar, who nicked it on its way to the keeper. Tendulkar, however, had done some damage till thenand also reached 18,000 runs and 94th ODI half-century in the process. Post Tendulkar’s dismissal, Kohli and Gambhir continued the momentum, with Kohli playing a cameo innings of 24 runs.

A number of partnerships in the middle order helped India take control of the game And it was not until the freak run-out of Gambhir that the match turned back in favour of the Aussies. Ricky Ponting used all the tricks in his bag to build pressure on the Indians and Lee dismissed MS Dhoni next, bringing the Indians down to 5. Was this the beginning of another collapse?

With still 70 runs left to get and 12 overs in hand for India, it could have been anyone’s game at that point of time And it was uptoYuvraj Singh and Raina to set things straight for their team. Yuvraj was back for his side as he had been in earlier matches in the tournament. He went on to score his 3rd half-century of the tournament. Raina too showed that the selectors had made the right choice by selecting him. Both the batsmen played a number of splendid shots without taking many risks. No Australian bowler was able to pose a serious challenge to the the two beyond a period of time. Australia seemed gravely in need of another Shane Warne.

Yuvraj finally wrapped things up for India, booking a place for his team in the semi-finals against Pakistan on Wednesday, March 30 2011. The Men in blue were jubilant about defeating Australia- a kind of retribution against the defeats they have suffered at the hands of Australia prior.

Match Summary:

India 261(Y.Singh 57, Tendulkar 53, D Hussey 1-19) by 5wickets beat Australia 260 (Ponting 104, Haddin 53, Y.Singh 2-44) .

Man of the Match: Yuvraj Singh

Nagpur: The stage was set in Nagpur for one of the most competitive ties in the world cup so far. Host India (ICC ODI ranking 2) took on South Africa (ICC ODI ranking 3) as part of the group B fixture. Till now the two teams have played against each other in the world cup twice and both the times the result had been in favour of the Proteas.

Up until the match, India had been sitting pretty at the top of the table, though all its wins had come against associate member teams. South Africa, on the other hand, were fourth on the table and were under intense competition from Bangladesh who were behind only because of the net run rate.India won the toss and elected to bat. The Indian spectators walked in to a packed crowd anticipating an entertainment-filled thriller for the weekend. And that is exactly what Sehwag and Tendulkar gave them. They dismantled and almost ridiculed each bowler of the Proteas bowling attack, leaving the South African captain Graeme Smith bemused and confused.

Smith tried every bowler he had to stop this Indian tornado. India had already notched 142 runs when F du Plessis finally gave the Proteas some relief by dismissing Sehwag (73, 66b, 4×12, 6×0). After Sehwag, who had played a supremely classy and attacking innings, Sachin Tendulkar kept the momentum going, and soon Gambhir joined the party. The master blaster reached yet another ton, his second of the world cup.

India looked at posting a mammoth total, and virtually finishing the game by the innings play. They were 260 runs at the loss of one wicket, with 10 overs in hand. A team couldn’t have asked a better start from its openers. But what followed was chaos! Dale Steyn, who had been bruised in his first spell, went like a battering ram and took out half of the Indian batting side in a matter of few overs. The Indian team crashed faster than any company on a Dalal street trading day. Captain MS Dhoni tried to bring order into things but his efforts could not stop his team from getting bowled at 296, just 28 runs ahead of what had presented a completely different picture. The initially discouraged Proteas went into the dressing room with a match on their hands.

At the end of the innings, Pat Sympcox was asked what the chances of his team winning this one were. He merely grinned and said the average score on the ground was 319 and 296 still was a competitive total,  and that it would require sincere batting from the Proteas to bag the two points.

South African batsmen gave exactly what the doctor ordered. Hashim Amla seemed in a fine nick, and his record against the Indians so far compliments this one. He was looking dangerous even before Dhoni latched on to a top edge off of Amla’s bat. The middle order of South Africa delivered; this is probably what differentiated the two sides at the end of the day. Kallis had built a partnership with Amla and post his wicket continued playing well. Though the Proteas were losing wickets at regular intervals, they did not lose their cool and had the run-rate in control throughout the game.

Turbanator Harbajan Singh revived Indian hopes in the 40th over, taking out two of the set-in batsmen, AB de Villiers and Duminy, with the help of Captain Dhoni, giving the visitors a target of 58 more to get from 42 deliveries. The match got incredibly close as overs of dot balls and run scoring passed by. The last over went on to decide the fate of the match. South Africa were required to score 13 runs of the last over. There was much debate over who should bowl the last over. Nonetheless, it was Ashish Nehra. A four! and a six! off Nehra’s first few balls by Peterson sealed the game for South Africa.

South Africa strengthened its group position with this game. With minnows to play in the rest of its games, it might even go on to top the table by the end of the group matches. India has lost another close one. Though still on top of the table, much improvement is required from the team. India will need to fire as one cohesive unit if it wants to make it to the final 4.

Match Summary:

South Africa 300 (Kallis 69, Amla 61, Singh 3-53) beat India 296 (Tendulkar 111, Sehwag 73, Steyn 5-50) by 3 wickets.

Man of the Match: Dale Steyn

India’s captain MS Dhoni won the toss and elected to bowl. The Irish did not get the start they were looking for. Zaheer scalped the wickets of Paul Stirling and Ed Joyce, leaving the minnows struggling at nine for two. Then, a 100-run partnership between Porterfield and O’Brien helped the Irish get a grip on things. These runs came at a fairly moderate rate, thus making it possible for the Irish to pose a challenging total to the Indians. However, good fielding by Virat Kohli and collection by wicketkeeper MS Dhoni helped break the partnership between the two. Post that Irish were never able to gain momentum against the Indian spin attack.

Even the pitch had some spin in it, which was making it difficult for the Irish batsmen to get some runs on the board. Yuvraj Singh was especially lethal with his left-arm spin as he took 5 wickets, giving away only 31 runs in his 10 overs. This was his career-best bowling performance. The Irish were bowled out in the 48th over for a meagre 207 against a team whose batting is its strength. William Porterfield (75, 104b, 6×4, 1×6) was the only batsman who was able to stick against the Indian bowling. But he was not able to convert it into a big one though, getting out by giving an easy catch to Harbhajan Singh.

The Indian openers seemed relaxed playing against a capacity crowd in Bangalore under lights on this Sunday evening. They had reason too, considering their previous games were run fiestas. This match merely asked them to achieve a target, which asked for a run-rate of less than 4½ an over.

Virendra Sehwag, who had got out cheaply against the English repeated his act, giving a simple catch to bowler T Johnston, who seemed elated about taking his wicket. Gautam Gambhir too, fell quickly, with a late cut straight into the hands of A Cusack. T Johnston scalped this one as well. He would have continued to make the Indian batsmen uncomfortable if not for an injury to his leg which forced him to retire post his fifth over. His figures were 5 overs 1 maiden 16 runs for two wickets.

Sachin Tendulkar, along with Virat Kohli, brought some stability into the innings with a partnership of 50 runs. The partnership ended when Sachin was caught leg-before while attempting to play an awkward shot of G Dockrell’s bowling. Next, a misunderstanding between Yuvraj Singh and Virat Kohli led to the fall of the latter. MS Dhoni was caught LBW against the spin of G Dockrell. This decision was sent for review by the batsmen but was not changed. India was 167-5 at this point of time, causing quite some discomfort in the Indian dressing room.

Next up was Yusuf Pathan who has had a fairly low key world cup so far. He hit a few sixes as soon as he came to the crease, calming India’s nerves as he brought the target within reach. Yuvraj gave him company on the other end, scoring 50 runs of 75 balls.

In the end, India achieved the target 207 with 5 wickets in hand and 4 overs to spare. It was not a one-sided game, as most had expected it to be. Definitely an impressive effort by the Irish, who made the Indians toil for their points. The performance of some of their (Irish) players must have surely caught the attention of scouts of the Indian Premier League. India, though now on top of the table in its group, needs to review some key areas if it wants to improve its chances of winning the World Cup.

Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag and Yuvraj Singh, who had earlier earned 15 per cent more than the highest-paid player in their respective teams for the ‘iconic’ status, are also in the same bracket as Dhoni. Harbhajan Singh is the other player in the same category.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has named around 65 Indian players in the first phase, who will go under the hammer in the auction, scheduled for January 8 and 9 next year. The BCCI has split the group in five categories of base price — Rs 1.84 crore, Rs 1.38 crore, Rs 92 lakh, Rs 46 lakh and Rs 23 lakh respectively. While the lowest base price for the inaugural IPL auction was Rs 45,73,000, the minimum for IPL-IV is Rs 23 lakh.

Sourav Ganguly, who, too, earned more for being an icon player, has been kept in the third category of Rs 92 lakh along with speedster Ishant Sharma.

According to BCCI secretary N. Srinivasan, however, players can approach the IPL governing council in case they want to be placed in some category other than specified. “A player can ask for another group within the five categories,” Srinivasan said.

Wriddhiman Saha, Manoj Tiwary, Ashok Dinda, Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajit Agarkar, who have represented the Kolkata Knight Riders, are some of the players in the fourth bracket (Rs 46 lakh).

List of players up for auction:-

Andhra: Yelakka Venugopal Rao; Assam: Sridharan Sriram Baroda: Yusuf Pathan, Irfan Pathan, Ambati Rayudu, Munaf Patel.

Bengal: Sourav Ganguly, Manoj Tiwary, Wriddhiman Saha, Ashok Dinda.

Delhi: Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Virat Kohli, Shikhar Dhawan, Ashish Nehra, Ishant Sharma.

Gujarat: Parthiv Patel, Siddharth Trivedi Haryana: Joginder Sharma, Amit Mishra.

Hyderabad: VVS Laxman, T Suman, Pragyan Ojha.

Jharkhand: Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Saurabh Tiwary.

Karnataka: Anil Kumble, Rahul Dravid, Manish Pandey, Abhimanyu Mithun, R Vinay Kumar, Robin Uthappa.

Kerala: S Sreesanth.

Mumbai: Sachin Tendulkar, Zaheer Khan, Wasim Jaffer, Abhishek Raut, Rohit Sharma, Abhishek Nayar, Ramesh Powar.

Madhya Pradesh: Naman Ojha.

Punjab: Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh, Manpreet Gony, VRV Singh.

Railways: Murali Kartik Rajasthan: Pankaj Singh.

Saurahstra: Ravindra Jadeja, Cheteshwar Pujara.

Tamil Nadu: Dinesh Karthik, S Badrinath, R Sathish, R Ashwin, M Vijay, L Balaji.

Uttar Pradesh: Mohammed Kaif, Suresh Raina, Praveen Kumar, Sudeep Tyagi, Piyush Chawla, Rudra Pratap Singh.

Vidarbha: Umesh Yadav.