Virender Sehwag and Rahul Dravid struck centuries in contrasting fashion as India racked up 329-3 on the opening day of the first Test against New Zealand yesterday.
Sehwag hit 24 fours and a six in his 199-ball 173 and also shared 237 runs for the second wicket with Dravid, who scored a patient 104 off 222 balls with 14 fours.
Sachin Tendulkar, eyeing his 50th Test ton, was 13 not out with Venkatsai Laxman on seven when stumps were drawn for the day at the Sardar Patel Stadium in Ahmedabad.
Top-ranked India dominated their rivals, who struggled in batsman-friendly conditions and dropped three easy chances after losing the toss.
Sehwag brought off his 22nd Test century in style, dancing down the track to loft left-arm spinner Daniel Vettori for a four over mid-off.
India are the favorites to win the three-Test series against the eighth-ranked Kiwis after beating Australia 2-0 at home last month.
The second Test will be played in Hyderabad from next Friday to Nov. 16 and the third in Nagpur from Nov. 20 to Nov. 24. The Tests will be followed by five one-day internationals from Nov. 28.
AUSTRALIA VS SRI LANKA
REUTERS, SYDNEY
Ailing Australia need to forget about the upcoming Ashes series and concentrate on getting back to their best form in the one-day series against Sri Lanka, vice captain Michael Clarke said.
Clarke stood in for skipper Ricky Ponting in the first of three matches against Sri Lanka at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Wednesday when a record ninth-wicket stand helped the tourists fight back to claim a remarkable victory by one wicket.
It was the sixth straight defeat for Australia in all forms of cricket and Clarke was particularly upset with his team’s inability to close out the victory from a strong position.
“The Ashes is great, everybody’s looking forward to it, but we need to be focused on what’s in front of us, because right now we’re not playing our best cricket and we need to be,” Clarke told the Cricket Australia Web site.
Ponting, who missed Wednesday’s match to attend his grandmother’s funeral, will be back for the second one-dayer against Sri Lanka in Sydney today.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but