USA Cricketer : New Zealand cricket

USA Cricket: New players eager for opportunity to represent men's national team

openingbat — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 13:30:00 GMT

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By Peter Della Penna (on Twitter)

In less than a week, USA will field seven first-time representatives at the senior level for during Canada’s tour to Florida as part of The Auty Cup. Danial Ahmed, Naseer Jamali, Timil Patel, Hammad Shahid, Saami Siddiqui, Nicholas Standford and Timothy Surujbally will all be traveling to Fort Lauderdale to put press their claims for a permanent spot in the USA lineup and give the selectors something extra to think about when they select teams in the spring for the ICC Americas Division One Twenty20 tournament and ICC World Cricket League Division Three.

“It was always a dream of mine to play for the country,” Standford said after being selected for the matches against Canada. Standford first came to New York from Barbados in 2004 and received his citizenship in 2011. He wants to leave an impression on US cricket in these matches in order to prevent it from being just a one and done assignment. “I’m picked now. I want to carry on. I’m 25. I’ve still got a lot of time to play some cricket. Hopefully this is the first of many tours.”

Siddiqui is another player holding the same sentiment. “I know I’ll be happy once I go there and do well,” Siddiqui said. “For me, just getting picked isn’t the end of the story. Real happiness is gonna come if I go and do well.”

Siddiqui previously represented the USA at the junior level as a wicketkeeper at the 2010 ICC U-19 World Cup in New Zealand. During USA’s qualifying phases in Canada, Siddiqui earned a Man of the Match award in a win over the Netherlands when he completed a catch, three stumpings, teamed up for a runout with Saqib Saleem and scored 18 with the bat in a 33-run win. The bond with his USA U-19 teammates is still strong as Siddiqui initially found out he’d been picked for the matches against Canada after receiving a text message from Ryan Corns, who will also be in the USA side against Canada in Florida.

Off the field, Siddiqui graduated last December from the University of California, Berkeley, after completing a double-major in Computer Science and Political Economics. He’s now working for a startup company in Silicon Valley. Balancing cricket with work is a lot easier than it was as a student for Siddiqui and he’s hoping that will allow him a chance to seriously push for a spot in the men’s side.

Image (right) - Naseer Jamali bowling against India with Saami Siddiqui keeping wicket during a 2010 ICC U-19 World Cup warm-up match in New Zealand. Two two have been picked to represent the USA men's side for the first time against Canada next week. [Courtesy: Daniela Zaharia]

“I don’t have to miss practices because of group projects or mid-terms and don’t have to miss games either,” Siddiqui said. “My schedule is more stable. It’s more manageable than it was. Also my club was about 45 minutes away from Berkeley so my time was limited.”

Of all the new players, the one who brings the most experience to the table is Los Angeles resident Patel. The 28-year-old played 38 first-class matches, scoring a century and taking two five-wicket hauls for Gujurat in India’s Ranji Trophy competition. In this year’s SCCA Division One regular season, he scored 500 runs at 62.50 with five half-centuries. Only USA batsman Aditya Thyagarajan and former Nepal U-19 captain Kanishka Chaugai finished higher on the runs list. Patel’s leg-spin accounted for 47 wickets at 9.77 in 16 matches for Vijayta CC as well. The next best bowler claimed 33 scalps.

“It’s a great opportunity,” Patel said about being picked. “My performances have paid off. It feels really good to be in the squad.”

Ahmed, 27, makes his way into the USA squad after being the leading wicket-taker in the Washington Cricket League in 2012. A left-arm spinner, Ahmed took 38 wickets at 5.89 in only 13 matches. The two players who finished behind him, former Atlantic Region U-19 player Haris Ilyas and former USA national team member Naseer Islam, took 31 wickets in 19 and 16 matches respectively. Ahmed feels that fitness will be a key aspect of the performances with USA playing four matches in four days.

“I’m very excited, ready to go, working hard in the gym, practicing hard every day,” Ahmed said.

After just missing the final 14 and being named a reserve player for USA’s last two tours, Surujbally finally cracked the 14-man squad for this event. The Trinidad native came to Florida in 2007 and has been captaining International CC in the SFCA, spending much of his time batting alongside club, league and regional teammate Steven Taylor. After dismantling bowling attacks together at the lower levels, Surujbally is hoping he’ll get the chance to work in tandem with Taylor in a USA uniform.

“I love playing with Steven Taylor,” Surujbally said. “We destroy a lot of people here. I always saying to him, one day me and him, I want to open with him on the USA team. We open bat for our club, we open bat for south Florida, we open bat on so many occasions. I think both of us, we have a good chemistry together.”

With USA’s fast bowling depth going thin since the departure of both Imran Awan and Kevin Darlington from the national team, Shahid and Jamali have been given an opportunity to develop their games and test themselves against a very good Canadian batting unit. Shahid has two campaigns under his belt with the USA U-19 team and plays in the very competitive SCCA Division One. After going to New Zealand in 2010 with the USA U-19 team, Jamali was on the fringes of selection for the USA squad that went to the UAE to the ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier. He spent the past summer playing league cricket in Middlesex, England for Uxbridge CC where he took 25 wickets, second most at the club in 2012 while bowling the most overs for Uxbridge.

Most of USA’s first choice players are missing for The Auty Cup due to work obligations. USA will play Canada in a two-day match for The Auty Cup beginning on November 14 followed by a 50-over match on November 16 and two T20s on November 17.

USA Cricket: 2012 ICC WCL Division Four Report Card Part 3 -Outlook for 2013 ICC WCL Division Three

openingbat — Mon, 24 Sep 2012 09:56:00 GMT

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By Peter Della Penna (on Twitter)

Click here for Part 1 - Team Grades

Click here for Part 2 - Player Grades

Outlook for 2013 ICC World Cricket League Division Three

Find a committed coach for USA

Next year’s ICC WCL Division Three in Bermuda is scheduled for April 28-May 5, right smack in the middle of the IPL. This means that Robin Singh will not be available, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Despite being paid a fee rumored to be five figures per tournament to chaperone USA’s players, the results have been mostly unconvincing for Singh in his efforts at women’s, junior and senior level for USA. Most alarmingly, USA’s fielding has been dreadful at all three levels when he has been in charge despite a reputation staked as a player on fielding excellence.

Outside of a handful of days spent with the USA U-19 team in Florida in February and July 2011, Singh has not spent any time on U.S. soil doing any sort of coaching with USA’s teams. For Division Four, he flew into Malaysia the night before the first match and somehow thought all he had to do was snap his fingers to make magic happen. If Singh doesn’t fly into the Mumbai Indians camp on the night before their first match in the IPL to begin coaching them, why should it be acceptable for him to do the same for the USA and expect the team to respond positively?

Image (right) - Robin Singh most likely will not be around to coach USA at 2013 ICC WCL Division Three due to IPL commitments, not that it will adversely affect USA on the field. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket.com]

Former USA coach Clayton Lambert may not have been the best tactician, but he knew the strengths, weaknesses and capabilities of all the players he went on tour with because he spent considerable time around the USA at tournaments and training/selection camps to get familiar with the players he’d be working with on tour in order to strategize the best possible batting lineups and bowling combinations. Singh has not devoted any time in the USA to get familiar with USA’s senior players and it is clear that it has negatively impacted the team based on the disjointed results USA has had under his stewardship.

Speaking on behalf of the team, vice-captain Sushil Nadkarni said that USA approached the final match against Nepal by picking what was felt to be the lineup that gave USA the best chance at winning that day rather than giving younger players an opportunity to gain experience against Nepal’s bowling attack in a match where promotion and relegation wasn’t at stake. If USA was honestly going all out for a win that day, there is no reasonable explanation for why Abhimanyu Rajp batted at number three other than to say that the man in charge of setting the batting order, Singh, didn’t have a solid grasp on the strengths and weaknesses of the players who were a part of USA’s squad on tour.

Shifting Timroy Allen up, down and around the batting order cost the team badly in the first game against Nepal. Shifting Aditya Thyagarajan, Aditya Mishra and Orlando Baker all over the place also worked to unsettle and undermine their considerable talents. Players must have defined roles throughout the tournament so they can tailor their games to maximize their output for the team.

USA needs to find a coach, whether currently in the USA or abroad, who is willing to work with the players locally in the USA in camps ahead of Division Three in order to form better plans and figure out the best combinations before the first game begins on April 28, not in the middle of the tournament as was the case at the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier in the UAE and at times during 2012 ICC WCL Division Four in Malaysia. Asif Mujtaba and Kumaran Thiru, who served separately as assistant coaches for USA in the UAE and Malaysia respectively during USA's two overseas tours this year, are both based in Texas and appear to be qualified coaching candidates with international cricket experience who would be useful if given an opportunity to assume the head coach role for USA.

Better individual accountability for fitness

USA’s players may struggle from tournament to tournament with team chemistry because the players do not play with each other year-round, but there is no excuse for players to show up unfit because they haven’t been playing with other national team players year-round. Fitness is an individual responsibility. Players in California are not responsible for running sprints on behalf of players in Texas or New York and vice versa.

Other teams at the Associate level face the same struggles that USA’s players do as amateurs in terms of getting enough time away from work to dedicate to their games. However, USA’s Associate level opponents are almost always head and shoulders above USA when it comes to their fitness levels despite being fellow amateurs. The fact that this tournament was played during the USA season means that not only were the majority of USA’s players unfit when they showed up for national team duty, it’s highly probable that they are unfit for club cricket duty on a weekly basis as well.

Instead of being the number one priority for USA’s players, it appears that for many of them fitness is something that is addressed if they get around to it. USA may have gotten away with substandard in Division Four, but that will not be the case in Division Three. Anyone who doubts this only needs to check the DreamCricket.com Report Card for 2010 ICC WCL Division Three. USA’s overall fitness contributed heavily to their downfall in the round-robin match against Denmark in Hong Kong and consequently led to them getting relegated.

Image (right) - Sushil Nadkarni's fitness on tour in Malaysia was top notch, but the rest of his teammates need to pick up the slack or else finishing in the top two for Division Three in Bermuda may be difficult. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket.com]

USA went 3-0 on the first day of back-to-back matches in Malaysia and 0-3 on the second day. A similar effort in Bermuda will definitely put USA behind Nepal and most likely put USA behind Italy as well to finish in third place and short of the 2014 ICC World Cup Qualifier in New Zealand. Quite simply, if USA puts in a similar effort in Bermuda to the one they produced in Malaysia, both individually and as a team, they will finish out of the top two and the consequences will be severe.

An eye to the future

Attempting to qualify for the 2015 ICC World Cup may be the last hurrah for many of USA’s players. Finishing in the top two in Bermuda and then the top two again at the ICC World Cup Qualifier in New Zealand would be a massive achievement and result in clinching a spot at the 2015 ICC World Cup. However, even finishing in the top six at the qualifier would be huge because it would mean that USA would be able to participate in the next cycle of the ICC Intercontinental Cup.

Being in the Intercontinental Cup would not only provide increased funding from the ICC, but would present tremendously valuable opportunities for some of USA’s younger players to gain experience and develop their skills in multi-day cricket on turf wickets against other top-tier Associates without the pressure of promotion and relegation being at stake. Having a bigger and more consistent schedule of matches for USA’s players to participate in might also open the door for several players to be given central contracts for the first time, a major step toward professionalizing the game in the USA.

Conversely, if USA does not achieve these things and with participation virtually non-existent for Associates in a 10-team 2019 ICC World Cup, it is conceivable that many of USA’s senior players would step aside if they failed to reach the 2014 ICC World Cup Qualifier and/or the 2015 ICC World Cup in order to allow a younger nucleus to form and focus on qualification for the next several ICC World Twenty20 events which are due to have 16 teams in 2014 and 2016.

Neil Maxwell to replace Keith Wyness as Cricket Holdings America CEO

openingbat — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 11:19:00 GMT

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[Cricket Holdings America Media Release]

Cricket Holdings America today announced that Neil Maxwell would assume the position of CEO as the project enters its next phase.

Neil will take over as the CEO from Keith Wyness who will retain a strategic advisory role for the project going forward.

Neil Maxwell said: “We are very grateful to Keith for his creative leadership in the initial phase of this project and in helping us achieve the crucial first phase of funding to allow the project to move forward. He will continue to be a very important advisor to us in many areas and we look forward to a long relationship as the project moves through the operational phase to reality.”

Keith added: “I have been pleased to add my experience to this start up and get one of the most exciting sports projects moving from the drawing board to reality”.

Cricket Holdings America will be starting a series of T20 matches on a franchise based competition from June 2013.

USA Cricket: Squad ready to do battle at 2012 ICC WCL Division Four in Malaysia

openingbat — Sun, 02 Sep 2012 20:41:00 GMT

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By Peter Della Penna in Kuala Lumpur (on Twitter)

Nineteen months after the heartache of a last place finish and relegation in Hong Kong, USA will attempt to reestablish a positive presence in 50-over cricket on Monday at 2012 ICC WCL Division Four in Kuala Lumpur, the next phase of qualifying for the 2015 ICC World Cup in Australia and New Zealand. USA needs a top two finish to advance back into ICC WCL Division Three, which will take place next year in Bermuda from April 28-May 5.

USA captain Steve Massiah makes his return to the squad after missing the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier when his travel was restricted after a November arrest in connection with an alleged $50 million mortgage fraud scheme. Speaking publicly for the first time since November, Massiah said at the captains’ press conference on the eve of the tournament that he doesn’t feel he let the team down at all for having to miss the tour to the UAE.

“I don’t think I’ve let the team down,” Massiah said. “Due to certain personal circumstances I wasn’t able to make it. I’m here to do my best for the United States of America, do whatever it takes for us to achieve qualification.”

Image (right) - Steve Massiah at the opening press conference for 2012 ICC WCL Division Four in Malaysia. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket.com]

Two other players returning to the squad on this tour are Timroy Allen and Aditya Thyagarajan. Both players are making comebacks after injuries.

“It’s a pleasure to be back and first and foremost I must say I really do appreciate the selectors giving me this opportunity, helping the USA get back where we’re supposed to be. It felt really good to be back with my teammates,” Allen said. He also doesn’t want to go home regretting a missed opportunity and wants to get the event started with a win against Malaysia in the opening match at Bayuemas Oval.

“It’s a long flight here and I really don’t want to go back home without holding something so I’m really ready for this tournament. I have no doubt in my team that we’ll come out on top in this game because these guys are basically hungry for a win and we want to give all our spectators back home something to start off with and we don’t want to fall in a hole right off the top.”

Allen took 2 for 37 in 10 overs in the team’s warm-up match win over Denmark on Thursday. Massiah says Allen’s value to USA is immense because of the many ways in which he can be used.

“He performs a dual role for me in the sense that he opens the bowling and also I have the option of using him as a spinner if the wicket is conducive to it and he’s a tremendous lower order batsman,” Massiah said. “In my humble opinion he’s probably the most talented cricketer in America.”

Meanwhile, Thyagarajan top scored with 48 coming in at number four in the warm-up match against Denmark, his first match in a USA uniform since injuring his right knee at 2011 ICC WCL Division Three in Hong Kong, and says he’s looking forward to the opportunity to make his mark once more for USA.

“It’ll be a personal challenge playing six games in eight days first tournament after injury but I’m looking forward to it and positive that I’ll be able to get through it and hopefully do well for the team,” Thyagarajan said. Allen says he’s extremely happy to make a return to the squad alongside Thyagarajan.

“Aditya has always been a fighter for us,” Allen said. “It’s not like we’re gonna go out and depend on one batsman, but that’s one person you can really depend on. If he gets out, it’s not because of a crazy shot. He probably got a good ball. He’s patient and focused and I just love when he’s in the team.”

One player who looked noticeably slimmer during the team’s training session on Sunday was Sushil Nadkarni, who says he’s lost 10 to 15 pounds through a refined training regimen since the team returned in March from the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier.

“After the Dubai tour and working with Robin a little bit in that tournament, I kind of realized some of the things I needed to work on when I was putting my time in the gym,” Nadkarni said. “It wasn’t that I wasn’t putting time in the gym before, but I just realized after talking to him and others where I should be focusing or what are the different things I should be doing. So I’ve been focusing on a lot of sprinting, a lot of running. I’ve been doing some weight training as well so I’m trying to do activities that would help me optimize or maximize my performance on the cricket field.”

As far as the team composition for the first match against Malaysia, the tour management may have a difficult decision on their hands with key players Usman Shuja, Aditya Mishra and Steven Taylor all arriving in Malaysia on Sunday afternoon less than 24 hours before the start of the tournament. All three looked exhausted at the tournament’s opening ceremony just a few hours removed from more than 20 hours of flights from the USA. Massiah says their status will be assessed in the morning before a game-time decision is made.

Image (left) - USA's Akeem Dodson, Andy Mohammed, Abhimanyu Rajp, bowling coach Charlie Javed and Ryan Corns at the the tournament opening ceremony. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket.com]

“It’s the first game and we’d like to start on a winning note so probably we’ll go with our best combination for tomorrow because it’s important that we start well so this way we’re not behind the eight ball,” Massiah said. “We’ll make a game time decision tomorrow as to how they feel. But obviously it’ll take them at least two days for them to recover. Hopefully they can be fine. We trust their judgment and we’ll do whatever it takes to help the team so we just have to see how they feel.”

USA has gone through a similar situation in the recent past with poor results. At 2010 ICC WCL Division Five in Nepal, Nadkarni missed the first two matches while attending to some work obligations back in Texas, then flew in and was slotted back into the lineup straightaway against Jersey and Singapore for the third and fourth matches of the tournament. He made 1 off 7 balls and a golden duck respectively so Nadkarni is very aware of the challenge that lies ahead for Shuja, Mishra and Taylor.

“Talking about myself, it was tough,” Nadkarni said. “It was about a 25-hour flight and then a change in timings and everything. It was a little bit tough to get into the ground and play an international game the next day. Overall it does take its toll on your body and you might find yourself a little sluggish in the field because your body is trying to catch up to the time differences, etc.”

Thyagarajan knows this will be a tough event, but if they can grind out a top two finish, the path ahead will be easier in the spring at 2013 WCL Division Three where Bermuda, Italy, Oman and Uganda await the two teams that get promoted at the end of this tournament in Malaysia.

“I think this will be an extremely tough tournament,” Thyagarajan said. “This reminds me of the Division Five tournament in Nepal. Like I said then, if we get through Five, we’ll surely get through Four. I say the same thing here. If we get through Four, we’ll surely get through Three. Everybody needs to play really well.”

DreamCricket.com will have live coverage for all of USA’s matches at 2012 ICC WCL Division Four beginning with the team’s first match on Monday against Malaysia from Bayuemas Oval. Each match is scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. local time, 10:30 p.m. EST and 7:30 p.m. PST the previous day in America.

USA Cricket: Abhimanyu Rajp's journey leads him from the land of Ludhiana to the USA National Team

openingbat — Sat, 01 Sep 2012 11:01:00 GMT

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By Peter Della Penna in (on Twitter)

It’s the second match of the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier for USA and the game is five overs old when the captain decides to toss the ball to the debutant off-spinner. Under normal circumstances, it might be cause for feelings of nervousness to overwhelm a new bowler. Gripping the ball too tight could result in a half-tracker, clammy hands could cause the ball to slip out too early and result in a full toss, either ball probably winding up as a four or six for the batsman. Abhimanyu Rajp might have been a little nervous when bowling his first ball at the senior international level for USA, but he didn’t show it simply because he didn’t have the time.

“Normally you’re told, ‘You’re up next over,’ but Sushil didn’t do that,” Rajp said, referring to the moment his captain in the UAE, Sushil Nadkarni called his number. “He just tossed me the ball and said, ‘Abhi, come on.’ I was taken a bit by surprise so I didn’t have much time to think about anything.”

Moments later, Rajp landed one of his sharp spinning off-break deliveries right where he wanted it. The batsman, Italy’s Andy Northcote, played over the top of the good length ball and was struck on the pads.

“I think all of Abu Dhabi heard my appeal. As soon as I delivered that ball and hit Northcote’s pads I knew that I had him. That was really special.” It’s a moment Rajp says he’ll never forget, getting his first wicket on his very first delivery for USA. It’s just one of many special moments in the cricketing journey of Rajp.

Rajp was born in Ludhiana in Punjab, India, and like most kids took to the streets to play the game with his friends.

“When you’re growing up and you’re six years old, you don’t know who Sachin is or who Gavaskar was. You’re just playing for the fun of the sport. I had a good friend in my neighborhood and we were always just playing this game every day.”

One of Rajp’s older sisters says that as far as she can remember, she would always see him walking around with a cricket bat in his hands.

“When he used to go to the cricket camp, the willow bat used to be taller than him,” Milli Rajp said. “He was that tiny when he started.” While Rajp is known for his off-break deliveries now, he claims he began his cricketing career as a seam bowler who also kept wicket, but shifted to bowling spin in a fateful match while representing the Ludhiana Cricket Association in an U-12 tournament.

“We were playing on a pitch where the ball was turning square and our main spinner had finished all his overs,” Rajp said. “We wanted someone to spin the ball and I was keeping at the time. So I said I’ll take off my gloves and give it a try. I ended up being the second highest wicket-taker of that tournament bowling off-spin and that’s where I discovered I can spin the ball and should be a spinner and not a wicketkeeper.”

Rajp continued progressing through Ludhiana’s age group teams as a spinner. While his parents emphasized the importance of schoolwork, especially since his mother worked as an English teacher, both his mom and dad fully supported his cricket ambitions and paid for him to participate in summer cricket camps. Then in 1999, the family’s green card application was approved and in the summer of 2000 Rajp arrived in the USA as a 14-year-old.

But rather than have his cricket dreams dashed, they only seemed to grow stronger. The family settled in California’s San Fernando Valley with the cricket fields at Woodley close by in Van Nuys. Rajp joined Ventura Cricket Club the following spring and began playing with them for the next five seasons in the Southern California Cricket Association.

Image (right) - Abhimanyu Rajp bowls against Scotland at the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier. [Courtesy: ICC/Ian Jacobs]

Rajp went to try out for the USA U-19 team in 2003 prior to the squad traveling to the ICC Americas U-19 tournament, but was ineligible for selection because he did not meet the ICC’s four-year residency requirement. In the meantime, Rajp got connected with Ashok Patel’s US Cricket Academy and began going on tours with them to the Caribbean which provided valuable learning experiences for him over the next several years.

“I played a lot on those tours and you learn a lot,” Rajp said. “A cricket player has all this knowledge about what to do and how to do it, but the main thing is when to do it, when to apply that knowledge to the best of your abilities. It was just about when to set what kind of fields, what works for what bowler and for yourself, how can you do better against this batsman, what kind of field you should set for him, basically trying to understand all aspects of the game. You have coaches there but it’s your first time getting exposure to real turf and real stadiums. We had not played in those kind of facilities in the USA. Playing in your age group, the best way you can learn is playing with other players who don’t know anything. For young players, that’s the best experience you can get. You don’t know anything and they don’t know anything so you’re all learning together and trying to understand the game as a unit and that helps a lot.”

Rajp also gives a lot of credit to former USA player Reggie Benjamin for coaching him and other youth players locally in Southern California when there wasn’t a lot of activity going on at the national level for junior cricketers.

“Having Reginald Benjamin on my side over here, who used to be one of the main youth guys when the youth movement started, he was always here and he’s the one who started coaching us with the help of Nazim Shirazi,” Rajp said.

In 2005, Rajp went to another tryout for the USA U-19 team and this time managed to be selected. However, there was a lot of doubt whether or not he would get to play any games for USA since USACA had just been suspended by the ICC and the U-19 team’s participation at the ICC Americas tournament was in doubt.

“The communication was very hazy at that time. Nobody knew whether we were gonna go or not. A week before the tour we found out it was on. We’re going. The tickets are coming. The tickets came a couple days before we had to fly and then we went to Canada.”

Despite the hectic leadup to the tournament, Rajp says the team felt okay about their chances entering the first day of the 2005 ICC Americas U-19 tournament against defending champions Canada because most of the USA players had played with each other on the US Cricket Academy tours.

“The camaraderie had started a lot earlier than the 2003 tour so by 2005 everybody had a good idea of who was capable of what,” Rajp said. “When we landed, we basically had one day of practice and it was basically for the guys people hadn’t seen before and for the coach Larry Gomes to find out who was gonna be the off-spinner, the leg-spinner, the batsmen, the slip fielder.”

USA defeated Canada in the first match by 39 runs and never looked back on an undefeated run to the tournament title, clinching a spot at the 2006 ICC U-19 World Cup in Sri Lanka. Rajp was the standout bowler in Canada, taking a tournament best 11 wickets which included five-wicket hauls against Argentina and Bermuda.

In Sri Lanka, Rajp finished tied for the team lead in wickets with eight, which included 5 for 61 against New Zealand. Among the scalps he claimed in that match was future Test batsman Martin Guptill. USA also faced off against West Indies, Australia and South Africa in the group stage, whose squads contained numerous future senior international representatives including Kieron Pollard, Kemar Roach, Sunil Narine, Craig Kieswetter, Richard Levi, Usman Khawaja, Matthew Wade and David Warner.

“It was a real eye-opener for myself and my ability to bowl against the likes of David Warner and guys who are now at Test level,” Rajp said. “It was a surreal experience for us. By no means could we say we were better than them or as good as them in our ability, but we can say that if the players in the USA play every day like those players play then there is no reason why we can’t beat them. But because we are weekend cricketers, we got beaten at the end.”

“We were playing the West Indies with Kieron Pollard, Kemar Roach, William Perkins and we have them 8 for 2 in the first two overs and a dropped catch off William Perkins and we are feeling on top of the world because we are doing some major damage and after that catch was dropped [Perkins made 133]. Every game, we were in it for a certain amount of time because every team took us lightly. They thought, ‘USA? Who the hell is USA?’ but when we got on the field and started playing and started giving them heart attacks, that’s when they started getting serious that this is a team to be reckoned with and they had to play with more responsibility and not think it’s just an easy 50 or easy 100. That’s when the game got away from us because their talent was better than ours but our determination was probably better than theirs to get them to those points in those games.”

“If you analyze all three of those group games, we had 140 in 25 overs for the loss of two wickets against West Indies. What more do you want from an Associate team chasing 300? That doesn’t happen. South Africa we had them 101 for 5. We needed two more quick wickets and we could’ve had them out for 150. Australia we scored [148] against them and we had them 53 for 4 so a couple more wickets and we might have had them, but almost doesn’t count. That goes to show that we only played weekends. If we played every day, we could have beat some of these guys.”

Rather than be demoralized about losing all but one match in that tournament, Rajp says he came out of it gaining more confidence from the experience because of those moments when USA was able to stand toe-to-toe with the heavyweights.

“The one thing I took away from that tournament was that we belonged. We can do it at that level. Every time I think about that tournament, it’s made me realize that yes I can do it. I can bowl against these guys and get them out. I can get a five-wicket haul at a World Cup stage against a Test nation. I can do good.”

Despite his personal success at the junior level in Sri Lanka, Rajp had to bide his time before breaking into the USA senior side. He stayed on the outside looking in for six years and says he kept his spirits high after receiving encouragement from several national team players.

Aditya Thyagarajan, who has been a teammate with Rajp on South West Region teams and plays against Rajp’s Cosmos CC side regularly in the SCCA Division One competition, says that Rajp has become a more complete bowler in recent years after altering his approach to batsmen at the senior level compared to what he was doing at the Under-19 level.

“Over the last two or three years he has really improved and he’s understood the value as an off-spinner to bowl the ball consistently on one spot,” Thyagarajan said. “Like any talented youngster, he was trying to take a wicket every ball and that just doesn’t work at the senior level, especially when you’re an off-spinner or finger-spinner. So I kept talking to him over the years about how you need to improve your consistency. I think over the last two years I really saw him take that advice really well and the results have been very clear.”

In 2010, Rajp was the leading wicket-taker in USACA national tournaments including 7 for 35 in one match at the USACA Western Conference tournament in September of that year at Woodley as he hovered around the national team selection radar. However, he was passed over for both of USA’s squads at ICC tournaments in 2011. Rajp tried to be philosophical about it and remained patient.

“I am the kind of person who does not keep any expectations. Any time I’m playing cricket, I’m not playing to get selected for another team. I’m playing to do well for my team on that day,” Rajp said. “I never went out and said, ‘Why are they not picking me?’ I always think that when the time is right, it will happen. I didn’t take it in a bad way when they didn’t call me or select me because in the back of my mind I was always thinking this is not my time yet.”

Rajp’s time finally arrived in March when he got selected to go to the UAE for the ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier. He delivered from the moment Nadkarni first tossed the ball his way against Italy right through to the end of the event as he finished tied with Muhammad Ghous for the team lead in wickets as both off-spinners took 10.

Image (left) - Rajp bowls against Italy in his first tournament match in a USA senior uniform this past march. [Courtesy: ICC/Ian Jacobs]

“I think Abhimanyu’s addition to the team has been fantastic,” Nadkarni said at the end of the ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier. “I think for a long time we had Ghous who made an impact as soon as he came into the team. Now I feel like we have another bowler who can support Ghous and who is a wicket-taking option so I think Abhimanyu is a great addition to the team.”

Although he had the experience of playing against future Test players at the ICC U-19 World Cup in 2006, Rajp says playing in the ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier was a completely different experience.

“It was a real eye-opener. The level of competition is so much harder and higher than what we’re accustomed to playing in US club cricket culture,” Rajp said. “You have to be on the ball from ball one. There is no margin for error. You miss and they hit.”

“When you are coming in to bowl you better bet on your eye that the guy who is batting in front of you is ready to launch your first ball for six. If you are coming in to bat, you can bet that the first ball is either coming at your head straight to take your helmet off or to break your toe off. The intensity and focus that’s required is so much higher than you’re used to. You have to be completely focused.”

“I learned a lot from bowling against almost everybody. The quality of opposition that we were playing was obviously great quality. Bowling against them, every game I was learning more and more stuff about my bowling and how to bowl to such batsmen as Ed Joyce and Kevin O’Brien. I’ve never in my whole life bowled around the wicket. It was the first time in my life bowling around the wicket to Kevin O’Brien because I had taken the advice from Robin Singh and Mark Johnson telling me to try to come around the wickets to see if the batsman has a little tough time against you with those angles because I do get a lot of turn. That’s one thing I tried that worked and I never tried that. Small things like that make a huge difference at that level.”

Even though it was a Twenty20 tournament in March, the experience gained from bowling to players like O’Brien and Joyce will serve Rajp well as he gets ready to make his 50-over debut for USA at 2012 ICC World Cricket League Division Four next week in Malaysia. He continued his good overall form by claiming 3 for 33 in 10 overs in USA’s warm-up match against Denmark on August 30 and will look to keep it up in the live matches beginning on Monday against Malaysia.

While Rajp has experienced a tremendous amount of success on the field throughout his cricket career, he says none of it would have been possible without the support of his family. From the time he represented Ludhiana to his exploits for the USA at the junior and senior levels, they have been his biggest fans.

“Whatever I’ve achieved so far has been the blessing of my mom and my family,” Rajp said. “They’ve really supported me and helped me in a way that a family can. My dad, my mom, my sisters have been really influential in my whole life.”

Away from cricket, Rajp graduated from California State University, Northridge in 2010 with a degree in finance and began working for biotech company Amgen that same year at the company’s headquarters in Thousand Oaks. He also has a singing alter ego, recording under the name Musafir Ludhianvi as part of Suvah Entertainment whose other members include Brainstorm and Apartment E. The songs are sung in Punjabi and Hindi.

“Musafir Ludhianvi means a lone traveler from the land of Ludhiana,” Rajp says. “It’s a fun thing. I write my own songs and I sing. I’m not a good singer, I’m ok and the producers help me out a lot. We spend one day a week, we have a dedicated day that we go into the studio and have our sessions, whether it’s studio recording or writing lyrics or working on tracks or perfecting a track. All of us work. All of us have other commitments plus music doesn’t pay. It’s something that we are passionate for. Other than cricket, there’s another passion I have which is singing.”

Rajp became a US citizen in 2007 and while his music is a way for him to maintain a strong connection to his Indian roots, he is proud to be able to represent the USA on the cricket field. He’s still just 26 and if he continues the strong start he had for the senior team earlier this year, he could be representing USA on the cricket field for many years to come.

“Obviously this country has given me a lot so I owe a lot to this country, from cricket to making me as a person who I am today,” Rajp said. “You don’t get some of these opportunities back in your motherland, although I do love my motherland, but there’s pros and cons to everything. I still love India but there’s a lot that I owe to the USA and I’m very grateful that I’ve landed here and gotten through so many different feats in my life in the United States. Being able to represent the United States is also a privilege and an honor and a gesture for me to give something back to this country also by doing good for this sport in this country for this country. It’s my country and that’s what I want to do.”

WICB announces ticket prices for pair of T20I matches against New Zealand in Florida

openingbat — Wed, 16 May 2012 22:35:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Peter Della Penna (on Twitter)

The West Indies Cricket Board has announced ticket prices for the two Twenty20 International matches to be played against New Zealand on June 30 and July 1 in Florida. Reserved chairback seats at the Central Broward Regional Park in Lauderhill will cost $30 while general admission tickets to sit or stand on the grass embankment will cost $20.

The prices are in similar range to the cost of tickets for the pair of Twenty20 matches two years ago at the same venue between New Zealand and Sri Lanka. The prices at that event, The Pearls Cup, were $35 for reserved and $22 for general admission for the first match which took place on a Saturday while Sunday ticket prices were $27 for reserved and $17 for general admission. A total combined attendance figure of 8,600 across two days wound up being the turnout.

Image (right) - The Central Broward Regional Park stadium in Lauderhill, Florida, is the venue which will host two Twenty20 Internationals between New Zealand and the West Indies on June 30 and July 1.

The WICB release stated that tickets will go on sale two weeks prior to the first match at each venue for the New Zealand tour. In addition to the two Twenty20s in Florida, New Zealand and the West Indies are scheduled to play five ODIs beginning on July 5 – two in Jamaica and three in St. Kitts – followed by two Test matches. The first Test will be in Antigua from July 25-29 before returning to Jamaica for the second from August 2-6.

New Zealand and West Indies to play pair of Twenty20 matches in Florida this summer

openingbat — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 01:15:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

New Zealand Cricket Media Release

West Indies Cricket have released the schedule for the upcoming BLACKCAPS tour with Twenty20 matches on 30 June and 1 July at Lauderhill in Florida launching the series.

The five One Day Internationals will be shared between Jamaica and St Kitts, with the first match on 5 July and final fixture on 16 July.

New Zealand will then face a West Indies Selection in a three-day warm-up match in Antigua ahead of the first Test on 25 July, before returning to Jamaica for the final Test on 2 August.

Image (right) - Central Broward Regional Park stadium in Lauderhill, Florida.

NZC Chief Executive David White said he was delighted the West Indies were able to take the Twenty20 component of the tour to the USA.

“Playing matches in Florida is great for the profile of cricket as Cricket Holdings America works towards forming a professional Twenty20 league and think West Indies Cricket should be commended for the hard work that has gone into scheduling the matches,” said White.

“We’re excited about the potential impact of this series for the development and growth of cricket in the USA.

“I’m thrilled that the BLACKCAPS and the West Indies can help increase exposure and show the locals how exciting Twenty20 cricket is.”

USA Cricket: Mishra aims to cultivate winning & welcoming culture in squad

openingbat — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 01:10:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Peter Della Penna (on Twitter)

A little less than two years ago, several thousand cricket fans descended upon Fort Lauderdale to watch what was billed as a landmark event in US cricket: The Pearls Cup. Most people remember the occasion for the two Twenty20 matches played between Sri Lanka and New Zealand, matches that were shown in America on ESPN3 and broadcast around the world on ESPN Star.

Aditya Mishra remembers the weekend a little differently. Compared to the attention given to Sri Lanka and New Zealand, USA was practically invisible as they played in front of several hundred people that same weekend at the Central Broward Regional Park stadium with no television audience for their set of three matches against Jamaica. Perhaps no person in USA’s squad felt more invisible that weekend than Mishra.

Sushil Nadkarni and Rashard Marshall were due to tour with USA a week later for the team’s trip to the ICC Americas Division One tournament in Bermuda, but both players had to withdraw from the Florida leg because they couldn’t get enough time off work. That opened the door for Mishra and Clain Williams to be added to the squad at short notice. But when Mishra showed up to join the team in Fort Lauderdale, he hardly felt like he was part of the group.

“When they were distributing clothes, I was patiently waiting for my turn to get my US clothes. I take a lot of pride in doing that, playing for USA,” Mishra told DreamCricket in an interview ahead of the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier which starts March 13 in the UAE. “I didn’t get anything. The trousers which they gave me didn’t even have a US logo. It was as if they forgot to bring clothes for me. They got clothes for the people who were selected for Bermuda. They had an extra trouser with no logo which they gave me. The shirt they gave me didn’t have my name and I had to put my number using white tape. Then I started picking the US practice shorts. They said, ‘Everybody pick one.’ I went to pick and somebody held me back and said, ‘That’s not for you.’”

“That was it. In all these years I’ve scored runs and not scored runs, but I’ve never been treated like that on a cricket field or outside. It was unbelievable that I felt that. I felt insulted as a player. That is one thing which I will never forget. That keeps me going.”

Image (right) - Aditya Mishra file photo. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket]

Mishra scored 18 runs in two innings that weekend against Jamaica, but it was the locker room slights from senior players that stung much more.

“There were some incidents that were not very good,” said Aditya Thyagarajan, who was Mishra’s roommate on the team that weekend in Fort Lauderdale. “He was disappointed obviously in the evening that he’s not being treated with respect. He’s a former first-class player having played Ranji Trophy in India. All I told him was just use this as motivation. Sushil and myself did that. We felt we were also left out of the US team for at least one or two years prior to making an entry. I just said when you get a chance, make sure you do really well. I think he took it positively. He went and got a trainer, started working hard and got into the US team purely on merit.”

At the end of that weekend in Fort Lauderdale, Mishra came back to New Jersey determined to work hard on his game so that nobody could ignore him in the future. It paid off when he turned in a brilliant performance for the Atlantic Region, scoring 87 off 49 balls against Steve Massiah’s New York squad at the 2011 USACA Twenty20 Nationals last June in Newark to force his way back into the USA squad the following month.

The Central Broward Regional Park stadium was mostly empty for the ICC Americas Division One Twenty20 tournament in July, but Mishra was no longer invisible. He finished third on the team with 98 runs in four innings at an average of 32.66. Another confident showing in January’s USACA selection camp saw him named the vice-captain for the USA squad currently touring in the UAE in an attempt to qualify for the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka.

Mishra’s journey began in New Delhi, where he was born and raised on a steady diet of cricket. He played his junior cricket in Uttar Pradesh and was coached by Manu Kumar in the town of Meerut, the home of numerous cricket bat factories.

“My father was a first-class player,” said Mishra. “My uncle was captain of a university team. So cricket was always in the family and that’s the game I’ve always played. I remember as a child I never played with any toys. The first thing I had when I could walk was a cricket bat, a plastic cricket bat.”

When it was time to go to university, Mishra weighed his options and narrowed them down to programs in Mumbai and Bangalore. He wanted to go to a good engineering university but also a place with good cricket.

“In the end I chose Bangalore for weather, I think people are a little bit more milder and it’s a bit more fair than certain parts of India in terms of politics,” said Mishra. “I thought that I’d stand a better chance if I played cricket with good people.”

Mishra played league cricket and captained his university side, MS Ramaiah Institute of Technology. He eventually caught the eyes of the Karnataka selectors and was brought into the state’s U-22 and U-25 teams, allowing him to train with and learn from players like Anil Kumble, Rahul Dravid and Venkatesh Prasad. He eventually made his debut with the senior side in 2002 at the age of 20. However, he got caught up thinking about his future, specifically whether or not the quality of life for a state cricketer was something he wanted to accept if he never made it to the national team.

“At that time there was no IPL. We didn’t used to get paid that much playing Ranji Trophy,” said Mishra. “I saw a lot of players who were playing Ranji Trophy for x number of years and who didn’t play for India. They would probably end up with one scooter and a one bedroom house with a very low salary.”

“Sadly, my engineering finished after my first year of Karnataka Ranji Trophy and in the end, everybody needs to get a job. Then came the sad part of leaving cricket because I got a job in Samsung which was in Delhi, got transferred officially from Karnataka Cricket Association to Delhi Cricket Association to play Ranji Trophy for Delhi. However, my company sent me to South Korea and that was the end of cricket for me.”

After spending two years going back and forth from Delhi to South Korea working as a business analyst, Mishra decided to move to the USA in August 2004. He wanted to pursue his MBA at George Washington University but also came to America to reconnect with his college sweetheart Smriti. He knew cricket was played around the Washington, D.C., area, but he wanted nothing to do with it.

“For me, I’m the kind of person who will go all out or won’t do it, especially with cricket,” said Mishra. “To keep going back and forth would always remind me of those memories, which I didn’t want to remember. Cricket never crossed my mind. I had a break up with cricket. It was always my first love. It will remain my first love. It hit me pretty bad that I had to leave cricket so I just completely left it. I didn’t want to play anymore.”

“Those were tough times for me. I distanced myself from any cricket player from Karnataka. Venkatesh Prasad, Anil Kumble, even Robin Uthappa who took my place in the Karnataka team as an opener. I never spoke with anybody in Bangalore. I distanced myself, which is pretty bizarre now that I think about it and pretty immature but I was very young and I was not happy that I had to leave cricket, something which I always thought defines me. It’s a part of my life. I had to find ways to live with it and one of the ways was to go into complete withdrawal.”

He had friends in Washington, D.C. who knew about his time playing for Karnataka and they tried to cajole him into coming out to play. He finally agreed to show up and was a bit stunned at what he saw when he did.

“I went to the ground, I saw them play and it was very different,” said Mishra. “People were smoking on the ground, something which is unheard of. I saw people drinking beer on the boundary lines, people fighting. There was thick grass, no turf wicket and at that time it was a shock for me. All those were big no-nos for me at cricket.”

He showed up a few more times, but wasn’t terribly interested in coming back. It wasn’t until 2008 when he moved to New Jersey that he considered attempting to play on a regular basis in club cricket. He wasn’t interested in the politics that tend to interfere with the experience even at club level and so Smriti set about doing the investigating for him, trying to find a club where he would feel comfortable.

“I used to live near a cricket ground,” said Mishra. “Me and my fiancée at that point, now my wife, we would drive past a cricket ground. I would stop my car and watch cricket. She’d seen me in school and she’d seen me play and she’d seen me live that life. She could see in my eyes that I loved the sport.”

“She forced me. Somehow she convinced me to join a club, but when I looked around, she did all the research for me for which club I should join. Either the club was a totally Pakistan club or a totally Indian club or a Gujarati club. I didn’t want to play cricket like that where people are regionalized or by country or by region in India and that’s how they play. I’m not that kind of a person and it was a big no-no for me. Suddenly a team’s name popped up named Gymkhana. It had a good mix. When I read the names it had Muslims from India, Muslims from Pakistan, people from all over India, north India, south India.”

Once he had overcome the hurdle of getting back to cricket on a regular basis, Mishra’s next task was to find a way to get past the frustration many cricketers in the USA face on a regular basis: finding a way to not compromise one’s technique in spite of the conditions at the grounds.

“Things were a little bit difficult because I was not really into the game mentally and I was always fighting the conditions,” said Mishra. “Wickets are not good, grounds are not good. If you play in the Chinnaswamy Stadium, you don’t play in the air. Here if you play along the ground, you will not even get one run because the grass is so thick.”

He wasn’t playing with any sort of vision in mind to get into the USA squad, but things started to change in 2009. He was having a good club season with Gymkhana CC in the Cricket League of New Jersey and was picked to play for the Atlantic Region for the first time at the USACA Eastern Conference Tournament in Washington, D.C.

“I think one person who basically pushed me into this competitive thing is Aditya Thyagarajan,” said Mishra. Both players had come through the Karnataka system just a few years apart and had once played against each other in university level cricket. “He knew what I’m capable of. He thought there was an opportunity and he kept pushing. He’s a very good friend of mine and he said, ‘You can do it.’ It’s different when somebody else tells you you can do it and it’s different when you feel you have to do it.”

“It’s like a Harvard University culture. If you are from Harvard you must be good. If I am from Harvard I know that the other guy will be good. So I think Aditya knew what it takes to represent Karnataka. He knew you can’t represent that Ranji Trophy team if you’re not good. So he knew that I’ve gone through the grind of playing against top people and performing against top opposition and he just wanted to reignite that thing. He thought it would help US cricket if I can motivate myself to play competitive cricket.”

However, Mishra’s entry into the national team was a short and rocky one. After that initial experience in 2010, he wanted to establish a new level of commitment. He called up his coach in India, Manu Kumar, and tried to map out a strategy to show the cricket community in America that he belonged in the national team. One part of the plan was to work on his fitness with the help of a personal trainer.

Image (right) - Mishra tees off against New York at the 2011 USACA Twenty20 Nationals in Newark, New Jersey. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket]

“That’s one thing which I can take advantage of being in America,” said Mishra. “People here may not know cricket, but… there has to be a reason why Americans do so well in the Olympics. At least the fitness part, I can go to the best trainer and they can take care of it. I can take care of my cricket. My wife was away for one year. She was doing her post doctoral work in Vancouver. So I thought that rather than going out in the evenings with friends and getting drunk, that’s probably not the best thing to do, I can focus after work on fitness and playing cricket. So that’s how I channeled my free time.”

Mishra made good use of that free time to not just get back in the USA squad, but assume a leadership position as vice-captain. Mishra’s day job is now in San Francisco as a Manager of Advisory Services with Ernst & Young. His consultancy skills have already come in handy as he’s tried to map out ways with the new USA captain Nadkarni to not just develop strategies against opponents, but create a new, more positive team culture. With so many new players coming into the team for this month’s tour to the UAE, Mishra says he doesn’t want anyone to have to deal with the same things he went through in 2010.

“It was a good learning experience how the US team functioned then,” said Mishra. “Now that I’ve been put in a role, I’m trying my very best to make sure those things never happen again. One thing we’re trying to address is team bonding. I think there was a lot of groupism in the team and we’re trying to cut across that.”

Nadkarni says that Mishra’s experience across all levels of cricket will be of tremendous value to the team and is looking forward to working with him in a leadership capacity on tour.

“With Aditya, we are pretty good friends off the field as well and I was very happy for him when the selectors selected him as the vice-captain of the team because he does have very good experience,” said Nadkarni. “He’s played first class cricket in India and he reads the game really well as well. He is a very stylish batsman.”

Mishra is arguably USA’s best player of spin bowling, confident in using his feet to come down the wicket to negate turn. On the slow tracks that will be used at the tournament, his form will be vital in determining USA’s fortunes. He’s keen to be a leader for the team both at the crease and in the locker room.

“It’s an honor to be in a leadership position for the US national team,” said Mishra. “I just want to thank everyone who has been involved to give me this opportunity.”

“He is very motivated for the tournament,” said Nadkarni. “He’s been working extra hard on his fitness like the rest of us. If he gets going and has a great tournament, I think that will really really boost our chances.”

Cricket Holdings America LLC appoints Keith Wyness as CEO

openingbat — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 13:24:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

Cricket Holdings America LLC Media Release

Cricket Holdings America LLC (CHALLC) has appointed Keith Wyness as its Chief Executive Officer in a major step towards making the dream of world-class cricket in the United States of America (USA) a reality.

Mr Wyness, 54, will be responsible for the delivery of a business plan which will include the sale of Twenty20 franchises for a league planned to start in the summer of 2013.

Mr Wyness has extensive experience in managing the business of elite-level sport, having worked on the Sydney Olympics of 2000 and as the Chief Executive Officer of two Premier League football clubs, Everton in England and Aberdeen in Scotland.

Image (right) - Keith Wyness, the newly appointed CEO of Cricket Holdings America. [Courtesy: Cricket Holdings America]

He has also spent more than a decade living and working in the USA, something that has provided him with an understanding of the country’s sporting landscape, and where cricket does and can fit into that landscape.

CHALLC is a joint venture between New Zealand Cricket (NZC) and the United States of America Cricket Association (USACA) for the development of cricket within the USA.

NZC CEO David White said: “Cricket Holdings America undertook an extensive, worldwide search to find the right person for the role of CEO and in Keith Wyness we believe we have found that person.

“What Keith brings to the role is an understanding of sport and its importance in peoples’ lives, the business of sport and the USA’s sporting landscape.

“Keith’s appointment is an important step on the road towards making regular, top-class cricket in the USA a reality, and with his leadership we look forward to moving forward with increasing speed along that road.”

USACA President Mr Gladstone Dainty said: “Keith Wyness’s appointment is a hugely positive development towards putting the USA centre-stage in the cricket world.

“USACA looks forward to working with Keith and New Zealand Cricket to make that a reality.”

Keith Wyness said: “I am delighted to take up the role of Chief Executive Officer of Cricket Holdings America.

“It is very rare for an opportunity as exciting as this to come along within sport, to have a clean page to develop what I believe will become a major sport in the USA.

“Cricket is already the second biggest sport in the world and the USA is the biggest commercial market for sport.

“My role is to marry those two factors together and there is plenty of potential and opportunity to do that.

“Cricket is already played extensively across the USA with close to 50,000 regular players and it is the world’s second biggest consumer of internet cricket behind India.

“It means there is already a platform of very interested cricket enthusiasts in the USA and now it is up to us to put together a product that will excite them and also create the opportunity to bring a whole new audience to the game.”

Global search begins for CHALLC CEO & T20 League Commissioner

openingbat — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 13:52:00 GMT

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New Zealand Cricket Media Release on behalf of Cricket Holdings America LLC

Cricket Holdings America LLC, a joint venture between New Zealand Cricket (NZC) and United States of America Cricket Association (USACA), has started a global search for a Chief Executive Officer and T20 League Commissioner.

The appointed person would be responsible for the delivery of a business plan which, with the support of the Board, will include the negotiation of key commercial rights such as broadcast rights and the sale of T20 franchises.

New Zealand Cricket CEO Justin Vaughan said the new position will help establish professional cricket in the USA and stressed it will take the skills of an experienced operator to maximise the potential of this “asset rich” company.

“The creation of the position is an exciting step forward for the organisation and provides a unique opportunity for an experienced and highly motivated professional.

“We are determined to identify the best possible candidate from around the world who can quickly get the organisational framework established and then deliver on our financial and strategic priorities.”

When outlining his vision for the organisation, Vaughan spoke with excitement about the prospect of a new Twenty20 League across the USA.

"One of the big ticket items for the new CEO/Commissioner will be to create the foundations for a national Twenty20 League and implement a franchising model for the competition.

“It is an exciting time for Cricket Holdings America and the appointment of the inaugural CEO should progress our overall objective of developing cricket in the United States.”

CHALLC Board Member and former first-class player, Neil Maxwell added: “Based out of the US and reporting to a corporate Board, the position will be linked to an attractive compensation package with significant incentives to attract prominent executives from key
sporting and business roles.”

“There is a level of excitement around the US market and this role provides an individual the opportunity to create a once-in-a-lifetime legacy of growing cricket in this receptive and hugely important market.”

Representatives of the CHALLC Board will oversee the search with a full job description available in the careers section of the NZC website.
http://www.blackcaps.co.nz/content/nzc/careers.aspx

The appointment is expected to be made by the end of the year.

BREAKING NEWS: USA Cricket inks historic commercial deal with New Zealand Cricket

openingbat — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 16:26:00 GMT

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MORE UPDATES THROUGHOUT

Comments

The point of inflection in cricket's development is finally here. On Friday, USA Cricket signed an agreement in Beverly Hills, California, which leads to the creation of Cricket Holdings America, an entity that will manage all commercial rights for cricket in USA, including T20 rights, in perpetuity. USA Cricket Association, New Zealand Cricket and several strategic investors are stakeholders in the new entity.

(L to R) Neil Maxwell, Insite; John Thickett, USACA Treasurer; Gladstone Dainty, USACA President; Justin Vaughan, NZC CEO and Rajiv Podar of Podar Enterprise sport USA Cricket caps at the conclusion of the signing agreement in Beverly Hills.

Cricket Holdings America is expected to have roughly $80 Million to $100 Million in capitalized value. This is based on the equity involvement of the strategic investors who are expected to own a sizable share of the entity. Joining at the inception as the cornerstone investor is Top Bloom and Podar Holdings.

John Thickett, the Treasurer of USACA was one of the driving forces on USACA's side. A DreamCricket.com source also said that USACA President Gladstone Dainty's support was important in keeping negotiations on track after recent events threatened to derail the deal. The same source noted that the former USACA CEO Donald Lockerbie devoted a lot of his time to bring this deal to fruition up until his departure in November. Without going into the reasons for Lockerbie's departure, the source said that his efforts leading up to the commercial deal were praiseworthy.

Pic (Right) (Seated - L to R) Neil Maxwell, Rajiv Podar, Gladstone Dainty, Justin Vaughan and John Thickett (Standing: L to R - Legal Counsels) Martin Darveniza, Raman Sharma, Gordon Alphonso, Stephen Cottrell and Richard Grant

In a USACA press release, Gladstone Dainty, President of USACA was quoted as saying: “I am delighted the hard work has resulted in a well-resourced outcome that provides USACA with the ability to grow the game from “grassroots” to the elite level. We are very excited about this partnership. It should open the door for private investment into cricket in America, one of the more exciting new market opportunities for the ICC.”

"This partnership will provide cricket in the US two very clear benefits. Importantly, it will provide a sustainable revenue stream for the development of the game and secondly, we shall be supported by the knowledge and expertise that comes from a Full Member country like New Zealand. These two compelling benefits will assist us to give cricket a strong foothold in the United States,” Dainty added.

According to the USACA press release, the ICC has endorsed the initiative, praising both USACA and New Zealand Cricket for forming the partnership that it hopes will provide cricket the best opportunity to thrive in the United States.

ICC Chief Executive, Haroon Lorgat advised, “The ICC has long considered the United States as a strategically key market for the growth of the game. We are extremely supportive of the new partnership and their efforts to grow cricket within the United States. We wish them all the best.”

John Thickett, USACA’s Treasurer noted “This is a historic day for the development of cricket in the USA. This partnership has the potential to bring both funds and know-how to US cricket and provides a robust long-term development plan for the world’s second most popular sport in a major market. I am absolutely thrilled at the opportunities it will provide USACA’s stakeholders.”

Nabeel Ahmed, who was a member of the Commercial Opportunities Committee, said in an interview that appeared yesterday on ESPNcricinfo that he supported the deal despite his differences with USACA leadership.

Justin Vaughan, CEO of New Zealand Cricket, played a vital role in the evolution of the deal. New Zealand Cricket demonstrated throughout the year that it was willing to invest in America.

Pic (Right): Justin Vaughan, CEO of NZC. NZC is a stakeholder in Cricket Holdings America.

NZC walked the talk by contributing the necessary expertise and by securing ICC support. NZC's involvement began in December of 2009 with the arrival of Hamish Barton and Dipak Patel in Florida to assist with USA's preparation for ICC U-19 World Cup. Following that, in January, the U-19 squad trained at NZC High Performance Center in Christchurch ahead of the World Cup. New Zealand Cricket was the catalyst for a historical international T20 series between Sri Lanka and New Zealand in USA - the Pearls Cup.

Through these activities, New Zealand Cricket showed its keenness in becoming a willing and able partner in the development of cricket in USA. NZC was keen that these early steps for betterment of American cricket be seen as part of a long-term investment. Ahead of the Pearls Cup, Vaughan told The New Zealand Herald: "The series will run at a loss. The US is a market that needs to grow to love and appreciate cricket before you can start really trying to run profitable events." Adding that, "In the long term it could be a really good deal for us."

As part of the partnership, NZC will contribute a range of management, development and coaching resources. In addition, the NZ BLACKCAPS will play an agreed number of matches in the United States as well as make NZ players available to participate in any future T20 Leagues.

This commercial deal with USACA gives NZC access to a new audience that could potentially be harnessed through long-term commitment. As recently as November 28, 2010, Justin Vaughan wrote on the Black Caps website about the need for NZC to search for new revenue opportunities. "The relationship with the United States of America Cricket Association and the opportunity to play games in Florida [was] one example of this – and through which we learnt good lessons. Innovation and an entrepreneurial approach are required as we look to further grow a more diversified revenue base."

Vaughan shed more light on his vision in a conversation with Sydney Morning Herald yesterday: "With a population of four million, New Zealand is a limited marketplace," Vaughan said. "We have historically punched above our weight through leadership and innovation. [Cricket Holdings America] is a significant step in diversifying our long-term revenue base, and in the process, growing a new market."

Pic (Right): Rajiv Podar, Cricket Holdings America's cornerstone investor

The strategic investor Rajiv Podar, the Managing Director of Podar Enterprise, is no stranger to cricket. Rajiv Podar is director of Sports Education Devlopment (India) Ltd. which operates the Cricket India Academy. More significantly, he comes from an illustrious family of industrialists and reformers.

The Podar Enterprise's commerical interests include products like fertilizers, mineral resources, textiles, and electronics. Beginning with Shri Anandilal Podar, who was Mahatma Gandhi's associate, the Podar family is widely recognized in Mumbai where three roads and over forty educational institutions and hospitals carry the Podar name.

Speaking about the deal to Sydney Morning Herald yesterday, Mr. Podar said: "We are very excited about [the US] market," adding "With the support of the ICC, more and more people will take an interest in this game [cricket]. America has people of many backgrounds, and we want to involve them all.''

For Neil Maxwell of the Australian sports marketing firm - Insite, who brought all the stakeholders together, this deal is one of many that he is involved with in cricket's emerging areas. He is one of the masterminds behind Cricket Australia's version of the IPL, which is scheduled to begin in 2012.

Earlier this month, he was in India to discuss $60 Million in private investment in two Australian T20 teams - NSW and Victoria. He is also the agent of several well known cricketers including Michael Hussey, Brett Lee and Marcus North.

Pic (Right): Neil Maxwell of Insite Organisation. Insite brokered the deal.

In a telephone conversation with DreamCricket.com, Maxwell said: "I am happy that the negotiations have concluded in a positive light and all the partners are equally excited." He emphasized that the deal had ICC's and New Zealand Cricket's full support. "All parties are looking to a professional and transparent relationship as we take this forward."

USACA President, Gladstone Dainty added, “It is also worth noting that the US broadcast market has huge potential. It has historically been the second highest rights payer behind India. By growing cricket in our country we are not only benefitting Cricket Holdings America LLC but all ICC Member nations.”

New Zealand cricket Captain Daniel Vettori commented, “The thought of taking the game to the US is extremely exciting, particularly from a player’s perspective. I would love to play in New York followed by a match or two in Miami or LA!”

In New York, Steve Massiah, the USA Captain, stated, “It is fantastic. Such an agreement could not have come at a better time when our senior men’s team is looking to make greater strides into the international cricket arena and our women’s team is heading to Bangladesh next November for the Women's Cricket World Cup qualifier.” adding, “It would be a morale booster for all of our players to enjoy more training camps and added facilities.”

Pictures courtesy: PodarEnterprise.com (Rajiv Podar), ICC (Justin Vaughan), CricketEdu.com (Neil Maxwell), USACA (Beverly Hills signing)

USA cricket on the verge of a funding announcement

openingbat — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 15:59:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

At the USACA Annual General Meeting in Dallas in April, Don Lockerbie, CEO, said that his goal was for USACA to attain an annual budget of $3 to $5 million for 2011 and an even larger amount the year after.

When asked where the money was going to come from, Lockerbie said that the worldwide tender attracted 106 expressions of interest and 42 serious proposals from 16 countries. Of those, he said that nine proposals were short-listed and two programs were "currently being considered." It was said that a deal was in legal review and felt that USACA could potentially make an announcement within days.

At first, these pronouncements led to a lot of hope. For a while, it appeared that the USACA machinery was producing results. Pearls Cup, the historic first international T20 series between New Zealand and Sri Lanka, was successfully conducted despite its share of nay-sayers. For the first time, a major international event was imagined and executed in USA. Some months later, when USA reached Division 3, it helped to re-energize the troops.

But as days turned to weeks and then months, and nothing more was heard about the commercial deal, the hope dwindled. Positive news dried up and selection woes and accusations of favoritism once again came to the fore. Poorly organized domestic tournaments and constant changes to tournament schedules did nothing to enhance USACA's reputation. And the political tension surrounding the suspension of Western Region's representative only helped to add to the distrust.

The commercial deal is once again a hot topic and the person that should get credit for it is Ahmed Jeddy.

In an interview with DreamCricket.com last week, Jeddy attributed the lack of progress in his region to lack of funding and to a lack of support from his team. “When we had the USACA Western Conference in Houston two years ago, I singlehandedly went out and contributed a lot of funds to stage the tournament. So between USACA, HCL (Houston Cricket League) and myself, we were the sole financers of that tournament,” Jeddy said. "Obviously, it is not a hidden fact that USACA has not been able to secure funds," Jeddy reportedly told CricInfo. "How long can we keep telling people that we are going to get funding, we are going to get funding," he asked.

That may have led USACA to break its silence on the subject. In the same article that appeared in CricInfo, John Thickett, USACA's treasurer shed some light on the 'eight figure' commercial deal involving New Zealand Cricket. The deal is expected to bring in millions of dollars into USA cricket vastly increasing the funding available for developing the sport in the regions.

Repeating what was said at the AGM earlier this year, Thickett promised that the deal was close. "I think we're getting pretty close to finalizing it all," Thickett told CricInfo adding that it had taken a year to negotiate. Regarding the CEO's role in negotiating the deal, he said "Don has been the biggest driver. He's done a very good job of representing US cricket, as have the other directors who have worked on negotiating it." Talking about a timeframe, Thickett said that he expected an announcement to be made in 4 to 6 weeks.

DreamCricket.com sources indicated that the pace of negotiations has intensified over the last several months but as the old saying goes - 'it ain't over 'til the fat lady sings.' Jeddy is right when he says "Promises only last so long and after that people do start questioning."

Will USACA make good on its word this time?

2010 Pearls Cricket Cup: New Zealand and Sri Lanka share honors, leave US with praise and advice

gchakravarthy — Mon, 24 May 2010 20:46:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Gokul Chakravarthy

A lot has been said and written about the two-match Twenty20 International series between New Zealand and Sri Lanka and its effectiveness as an “advertisement for cricket in the USA”.

The thing about advertisements is that there needs to be a product first that can be sold and there needs to be a market to sell that product to. This weekend was a first step in announcing that product – “[World-class] Cricket in America”. Where many previous cricket boards, individual entrepreneurs and business conglomerates have had little success, the current bunch of people behind the Pearls Cup have been able to give that product an initial shape and feel their market.

Photo (left): The jumbotron announcing the match, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

This product, no doubt, requires a lot of shaping and evolving. After all, the very first iPod looks almost unusable by today’s standards. But there is no doubt that the product itself has its merits and it has its market.

In fact, it is only now that advertisements should be worked on as the product itself evolves. New Zealand’s leader, Daniel Vettori agreed, saying “It [The Pearls Cup] has certainly given USA cricket a profile and I think that’s the biggest thing to come from that.”

As matters unfolded in the second of these two matches, New Zealand had “assessed the conditions and adapted to those pretty well" the previous day as Sri Lanka’s captain Kumar Sangakkara himself put it.

Sri Lanka might have been a day behind on that learning curve, but by the time the last of the 2-match T20 series ended, they had leapfrogged New Zealand. A magic over from Nuwan Kulasekara, where he took 3 top-order Kiwi wickets, and tentative batting from New Zealand led to the Pearls Trophy being shared by the two teams.

While the Man of the Match choice was obvious, Daniel Vettori’s name on the Man of the Series award must have been a nuanced choice. He had indeed batted with an alarming fluency over the weekend, not the type that we are used to seeing from a Sangakkara or a Mahela Jayawardena, but in his own ‘not pretty, but effective’ kind of way.

“I think my game is [that] I can play spin and in these sort of conditions you’re going to face a lot of spin bowlers and lot of medium pace bowlers. Over the last few years, I’ve tried to develop that style of my game. So I just have a comfort level and a confidence in those sorts of conditions,” he was to explain it later.

As captain, for a second day in a row, he had not hesitated to bat first. But the difference this time was that Sri Lanka had picked Kulasekara to be the #2 bowler with the usual suspect for #1, Angelo Matthews. This was to end up being THE difference between the two teams. Sangakkara opined that “This is the type of wicket that assists Kulasekara very well. It is low and had a bit of zip in the morning, not pace, but just a bit of movement that he exploited very well. [We are] pretty grateful to him for giving us that start that allowed us to apply the pressure.”

Photo (right): Nuwan Kulasekara celebrating (left in the background) celebrating the last New Zealand wicket with Sanatha Jayasuriya, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

The only other person Kulasekara needed assistance from was the umpire. He opened that over by hiting Aaron Redmond’s (1) leg before the wicket. He finished it with a double-strik; first bowling Brendon McCullum(1) to a gem that just swung out, leaving McCullum playing for his customary in-swinger and missing and then, in the last ball of the over, removing RJ Nicol (0) who was also adjudged LBW by umpire Ian Gould.

Their skipper, who further promoted himself bravely up the order to #5 in this match, said of all this mayhem, “Kulasekara, in particular, bowled straight and probably did enough with it and he got wickets with really good balls. As a batting unit, sometimes you just have to accept that the bowling unit is on top. When we were 3 for 4 wickets and 13 for 5, it was always going to be difficult to come back from then and post a competitive total.”

And difficult it was. If New Zealand had scrapped their way to 120 the previous day, they crawled to 81 in this match, thanks largely to fighting scores from Vettori (27 from 24 balls) and Nathan McCullum (36 from 39 balls), the hero with the bat of their nail-biting WT20 victory over Sri Lanka. When Vettori was adjudged caught behind to a ball that he missed and hit the ground instead, one could hear the last gasp from the dying New Zealand innings.

A defeat for Sri Lanka chasing 81 was not improbable - they had imploded to 96 in their chase of 120 earlier.

Mahela’s fluency returned in the first 3 overs and he scored 17 out of Sri Lanka’s 18/0. There were boundaries and even a 6 with ‘Mahela” written all over it. That shoved Vettori and his wards’ already faint possibility of winning into the realms of impossibility. When Mahela got out and Thissara Perera walked in and waltzed his way to a couple of meaty blows himself, all Vettori could expect to save was face. Perera was particularly severe on Tim Southee whom he took for 15 runs in one over.

The demons that seem to have taunted the Kiwis were absent when Sri Lanka batted. None of their bowlers really troubled the Lankans as they shared the honors with an easy win in the end. It had been expected that the series would be a contest among equals and it ended with a result that fit the bill, 1-1.

Photo (left): Tillakaratne Dilshan swatting a ball as Daniel Vettori looks on, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

An announcement was made, at the end of the match, of a completely out-of-the-left-field “Super Over” type of tie-breaker to decide the winner of the Trophy. But just as the assemble crowd started salivating at the prospect of seeing some big hits, the organizers apologizes and reneged.

For those familiar with and facing on a daily basis the various factors that have been holding US cricket back, May 22nd and May 23rd of 2010 shall be a symbolic victory. They will feel a combination of release and relief. A relief that they no longer require to engage in a leap of faith to believe that world-class cricket can belong within these United States.

How long that sense of relief shall last now depends on the ones that are entrusted with directing the momentum from this event into a meaningful direction. They had some good advice from Vettori and Sangakkara.

Vettori:
“I think they [the US cricket team] need to get some games together because they are spread so far and wide and then they disappear for a month and don’t see each other and don’t see the coaches. If they are able to get together more as a team and be coached more, it’s going to be a real positive step for them moving forward.

Sangakkara:
The final vindication of cricket in any country is that the country owns it. They feel that they are an intrinsic part of it. They have that pride in and that feeling of “this is my team these is my players who are walking out playing for us”. So, it’s very important to make sure that more cricket is played and to make sure that the rules, the intricacies, the strategy: it’s all made an awareness program that spreads the word of cricket right throughout the US. Those are the things that really matter at the end.

Post Match Interview with New Zealand players, 2nd T20, Pearls Cup, New Zealand v Sri Lanka from Peter Della Penna on Vimeo.

Post Match Interview with Sri Lankan players, 2nd T20, Pearls Cup, New Zealand v Sri Lanka from Peter Della Penna on Vimeo.

2010 Pearls Cricket Cup: New Zealand vs Sri Lanka - New Zealand scrap to victory in front of swooning fans

gchakravarthy — Sun, 23 May 2010 12:10:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Gokul Chakravarthy

Match Scorecard

The very first official international match in the USA opened with a lot of fanfare and "fan fare". The crowd had been building up all through the morning, even as the USA played against Jamaica in the 1st T20 of the day at the Central Broward Regional Park.

The colorful Sri Lankan fans grossly outnumbered the Kiwi supporters. In fact, one friend pointed out how there were more Indian supporters than New Zealand supporters in the ground. But that didn’t deter a trio of the loyal “beige brigade” from showing up in their unmistakable gear in support of Daniel Vettori and his men. Nor did it deter the New Zealand cricketers themselves in playing to their best.

Photo (left): Sri Lanka and New Zealand pose in front of the Pearls Cup, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

Vettori was to say later that “Leading up to it, there was a little bit of that exhibition feel, once both teams got on to the park, there was a real desire to win and to pick up, I suppose, from where we left off in the WT20. We wanted to finish a long season on a high note and to win a game here would do that.”

Daniel Vettori didn’t have any hesitation in choosing to bat first. The thought of chasing any score on a slow pitch against the Sri Lankan slow bowlers must have been a huge, if not the only, reason for this choice.

Brendon McCullum and Aaron Redmond opened the batting for them. McCullum hit some lovely stroked to the boundary, one even going over the boundary prompting the PA announcer at the stadium to ecstatically acknowledge that it was the “first international six on US soil”.

Photo (right): New Zealand fans cheer their team at Lauderhill, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

But that sort of hitting was not going to be possible on a consistent basis on this pitch. Most of the other New Zealand batsman found that out the hard way. Angelo Matthews took a blinder to get rid of him in the 4th over with the score on 25.

Sri Lanka’s fielding and bowling was quite intense and Ross Taylor narrowly escaped a run out appeal against him soon after he got in. A free stroke-player like him couldn’t survive too much longer in any case, especially when he felt he had to resort to quick and risky 1s and 2s. His eventual score of 27 from 30 balls was a great indication of that. The Lankans didn’t miss the second time when Nuwan Kulasekara and wicket-keeper, Kumar Sangakkara colluded to run him out. He had walked even before the 3rd umpire could pass his verdict.

It wasn’t until Vettori himself marched in, at the fall of the 4th wicket of Scott Styris. He had pushed himself up the order above Martin Guptill. He started a little bit of the recovery act, more so in terms of the run-rate, than anything else. His ability with the bat has often spared New Zealand’s top order severe embarrassment and, in some cases, even won them matches. When asked about how he had gone about constructing his innings, “Straightaway, I thought 120. We weren’t sure it would be enough, but we knew it would be competitive. But we kept losing wickets and so it made it difficult and it was hard to hit from this [The Pavilion] end because of the wind and the boundaries. So we were set to scrap for everything and in the end 120 was enough today.”

Even though Scott Styris and Martin Guptill didn’t score too many runs themselves, their respective stays at the crease with Taylor and Vettori respectively played a big role in their team reaching that score.

Photo (left): Daniel Vettori walking back after giving his team something to defend, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

For Sri Lanka, their fielding and catching, was quite a highlight. Their bowlers just had to avoid offering full-length deliveries or pace that the New Zealand batsmen could use to score boundaries. Led by Lasith Malinga and Ajantha Mendis, they did that quite effectively.

In defense of his 120, Vettori opened his attack with pace on both ends – Kyle Mills from the Pavilion End and newcomer Andy McKay, who the coach and captain had spoken of quite highly in the lead-up to this series, from the other end. This meant that his tendency to open with Nathan McCullum, which would have fit this pitch like a glove, had to be quelled and the batsmen would get enough pace from the deliveries to play their strokes – a luxury Sri Lanka didn’t bestow upon their own batsmen.

Mahela Jayawardena’s initial WT20 form had given way to 3 poor scores in his last 3 matches at that tournament. His vicissitudes wouldn’t let go in this match as he edged the 2nd ball of his and his team’s innings to leave the field for a disappointing duck. Tillakaratne Dilshan used it to good effect, though. He played some aggressive shots, along with regular one-down, Sangakkara. But much like Taylor, he found out that on this pitch he was not going to be able to play his own game. But unlike Taylor, he refused to try and adapt. Kyle Mills’ subtle change of pace, beat his defenses and brought his wicket down.

Andy McKay was replaced by Tim Southee and Mills by Nathan McCullum. After just 1 over of Southee, Vettori brought himself on from the Makeshift-TV-tower end.

The pair of Sangakkara and Angelo Matthews was the only one that gave Sri Lanka any hope of a win. Matthews extended his streak with the bat beyond the WT20 and top-scored for Sri Lanka. Even though the scorecard would reveal that he had done almost exactly what Taylor had done for his team, what it conceals is his much more fluent stay at the crease. He, along with Sangakkara, was the only batsman that was able to time the ball consistently on the surface on offer.

Photo (right): Mahela Jayawardena walks back after the 2nd ball, even as the jumbotron replays his dismissal, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

Scott Styris came and plugged the scoring so much that even the well-set Angelo Matthews, who had taken Nathan McCullum out of the attack, could not hit him clean. He holed out to a safe Jacob Oram at long on, who was on for most of the innings for Martin Guptill.

Whereas New Zealand had the services of Vettori at the bottom of their order, Sri Lanka had no such resistance from theirs and capitulated to a mare 92 on the penultimate delivery of their innings.

“On this track, we should have been a bit smarter the way in which we batter. We had severe setbacks in the first 6 and right through the middle overs. We got to make sure tomorrow we’ve got a different batting plan, individually,” is how Sangakkara was to sum up his team’s woes on the day.

It is all too natural and simplistic to bash a sluggish pitch like the one at Lauderhill when not too many runs are scored, but for the 1000s of fans who showed up and witnessed this match firsthand, the type of fielding and bowling skills both New Zealand and Sri Lanka had brought to the match was a spectacle in itself. People were loudly cheering diving stops, slides a foot inside the boundary rope, diving catches, lightning-fast reflexes of the bowlers when the ball was hit back to them. These were aspects of the sport most on the US soil had never seen before up close.

One such ardent fan from Austin, Texas, Michael Gale, who also happens to be the Chairman of an Intercity Cricket Tournament in that state, felt that “US cricket has finally woken from a slumber, stretched its limbs and joined the real world of international cricket. There are individuals and entrepreneurs in the US that will start to wake up and start investing. We should see events like this as the norm going forward and not exception. I hope we can all support in a positive way to our [collective] future.”

These sentiments were echoed by many in the stands who didn’t hold back in expressing their joy.

Photo (left): Fans having great fun at the Central Broward Regional Park, Courtesy: DreamCricket.com

The players themselves couldn’t overlook this. “There were obviously a lot of Sri Lankan fans here. So it had that subcontinent feel. The crowd was entertained and the entertainment off the field was great for the game. And whilst it wasn’t as high-scoring a game as people might have wanted, it was still quite a thrilling game, as lower-scoring ones can be,” said Vettori.

“It was nice to see so many Sri Lankans here. They had flown down from a lot of places here in the States. Sri Lankans have a lot of fun when they come to watch cricket games and today was no different. We can hopefully see a better performance from them.”

Cricket-spoilt international fans and 'experts' may gripe about the pitch and the conditions but to the US cricket fans, who should have the last say on the matter, international cricket has well and truly arrived in their backyard and they can't wait to get a lot more of it.

USA messes up the chase in first T20 against Jamaica in Florida

openingbat — Sat, 22 May 2010 21:52:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Gokul Chakravarthy

Match Scorecard

The Twenty20 festival had well and truly begun when USA won toss and asked the Jamaican men in yellow to bat first at the Central Broward Regional Park in Lauderhill, Florida on a bright Saturday morning.

Photo (left): Man of the Match and ex-West Indian international, Marlon Samuels sizing up a delivery from Steve Massiah, Courtesy: Gokul Chakravarthy, DreamCricket.com

Lennox Cush opening the bowling for USA from the Pavilion End indicated a bit more of a ‘winning’ gameplan as opposed to that of gauging new players’ abilities in match situations, which was the case in the previous match. Cush went for 7 in the 1st over but showed why he was in his captain’s plans. Bilal Khan had his captain’s faith as well and kept it, opening from the “TV-tower End”.

The scoreboards, announcements and other organizational aspects around the match were also much more up to snuff from the word “go” during this match. Much like the US team’s game plan for the 50-over match on Friday, the organizers got a chance to test things out and iron out the kinks for the weekend.

USA came into the match with 4 significant changes: 16-year-old Steven Taylor, Lennox Cush, Timroy Allen and Aditya Mishra came in for Clain Williams, Moazzam Imtiaz, Muhammed Ghous and Andy Mohammad.

Yesterday’s hero Pagon stayed yesterday’s news as he went for a breezy 13. He was caught expertly at point by Mishra who had to go down low and hold the briskly slashed ball from Pagon inches off the ground. He made the catch look so ho-hum that the crowd couldn’t be blamed for thinking it was a dot ball. Cush had his first and only victim of the match.

When West Indies internationals Samuels and Hinds got together and Stanford T20 star for Guyana Cush was bowling to them, it was one of the 1st all-star matchups of the day.

At 33/1 in 6 overs, USA’s opening bowlers had done the job for their skipper by restricting the vastly experienced and skillful pair of Samuels and Hinds to a below-par T20 score coming out of the powerplay.

This start was made possible by Cush’s unwieldy brand of spin, where he jumps up to the crease and plops the ball down at almost the same point on the pitch most of the time. It is the trajectory and pace at which the ball travels to that point and hence from that point to the batsman that kept changing and ended up tying the batsmen down to just 1s and 2s, at the most.

Khan bowled a consistent line and length as well and that was his undoing as well. When in the 8th over, Wavell Hinds faced him, Khan couldn’t quite alter that line to suit the left-hander, resulting in a few wide balls in that over. Nevertheless, 43/1 in 8 overs would still count as a job well done, although it wasn’t without a fair contribution from the pitch itself.

Knowing this, Steve Massiah replaced Cush with Timroy Allen and Khan with himself. Allen’s bowling style is of the ‘moderate’ variety to Muhammed Ghous’ orthodox and Cush/ Massiah’s experimental. Allen had the Hinds and Samuels in a bit of a quandary about whether or not to take him on from his very first delivery. That indecisiveness spilled into their running and Hinds was all but gone, having backed up a long way from his nonstriker’s end and being sent back by Samuels. Massiah would not accept the generous offer. His fumble at midwicket allowed the batsman to scamper back to his ground.

At 72/1 after 12 overs, Masshaih felt comfortable enough to bring back a bit of pace into the proceedings and he was right. This was not to haunt him and his team for too long as, in the 13th over, Orlando Baker’s 1st, trying to break free from the shackles of the spin twins from both ends that had kept the a check on the scoring, Hinds spooned up an easy catch to Adrian Gordon at long off.

Massiah bowled through his overs without much damage in terms of boundaries, but the runs were being accumulated at more than a run-a-ball. Baker’s 2nd over changed that. A belligerent Danza Hyatt took deflated Baker’s dough with 2 fours and a six in that over, making the overall tally a massive 16 runs, the innings’ most fruitful.

Photo (right): West Indian international, Wavell Hinds, stroking it "Windies-style", Courtesy: Gokul Chakravarthy, DreamCricket.com

Samuels also came to the party in the last 4 overs and the duo put on close to 50 runs in that time, helped along generously by Gordon’s juicy offerings at too full or too short a length, negating the difficulties in the pitch and allowing Hyatt and Samuels to free their arms as they saw ‘hit’.

A wicket in the last ball of the innings must have helped USA go into the dressing room with their morale curve on an upward slope. 145/3 was going to be a tough score to chase on this sluggish pitch and with enough spinners and slow bowlers of his own, Tamar Lambert of Jamaica must have felt confident enough of beating the USA in their chase.

Lambert didn’t change his tactics with the ball at the top of the innings from the 50-over version. Andrew Richardson’s 2-for-28 from 6.5 overs and the best bowler on show the day before, Krishmar Santokie with returns of 3-for-11 from his 7 overs, were good enough to open the attack for him.

Massiah, on the other hand, moved Baker down in his batting order to make way for Mishra while keeping Carl Wright where he was the previous day.

One pair did not disappoint its captain while the other one did.

A maiden over from Richardson to the struggling Wright was followed up by a 2-run over from Santokie from the Makeshift-TV-tower End. Carl Wright’s tentative loft was almost caught by the mid off fielder. When he got back on strike later that over, he decided enough was enough and got well under a ball from the giant of a man, Richardson and lofted it into ‘no man’s land’ over covers for a lazily run 2. These are the finer aspects of the sport that upcoming teams such as USA would do well to grasp and do well in. It is often said that the shorter versions help in leveling the playing field between opposing teams that might otherwise have a wider gap in talent. Running between the wickets and fielding are aspects that can leverage such shorter versions to bridge that gap. What would have certainly been 3 runs for Test playing batsmen was reduced to a mere 2 by the USA openers.

They rectified that once or twice in the later overs from Santokie. Bevon Brown replaced Santokie and struck in his very first over when a hard-hit shot from Wright was snapped up by the quick reflexes of Samuels. Samuels then came on to replace Richardson and got a wicket all by himself soon thereafter. Mishra played all over one from him and was bowled for 10.

Lennox Cush, the vice-captain, joined Massiah at the fall of Mishra’s wicket and didn’t last long either as Brown caught his loft gone wrong, as a top-edge popped the ball way up over the pitch. A steady Brown set himself under the ball, waited for it for what seemed like eternity, and took the catch after its tantalizing aerial stay. What was more entertaining was his celebration after taking that catch. He moved backwards in short, Michael-Jackson-moonwalk-style, jerks keeping pace with Cush alongside him as he was walking back to the pavilion. This even brought a wry smile on Cush’ face.

But Massiah was not smiling as he and Aditya Thyagarajan got together – the former latter was given a clean chit by the coach, Imran Khan, the previous day while the former was considered to be still out of form. Aditya couildn’t repeat his batting display from the previous day as he fell for a meager 2.

Massiah struggled as he shifted between extreme caution and extreme adventure, much to the irritation of the crowd, which was well into the 4 digits. At 67/6 in 15 overs, USA’s hopes of winning the match had crossed over into wishful levels. From that point on, all the USA team did was, as Marlon Samuels later put it after winning the Man of the Match award, “worked really hard, but the Jamaican team is a much better team and executed their plans properly.”

The only bright spots for USA were the aggressive intent and execution shown by Ashhar Mehdi and the entry to the crease of USA’s first-ever home-born and youngest cricketer, 16-year-old prodigy, Steven Taylor.

Photo (left): The only 2 bright spots for USA, Steven Taylor and Asshar Mehdi (stroking the ball), Courtesy: Gokul Chakravarthy, DreamCricket.com

Mehdi’s clean hitting was well-appreciated by all assembled, not the least of which was his own skipper Massiah. His score of 28 in 20 balls was the only thing in USA’s batting that resembled anything remotely invoking the spirit of T20 cricket. Taylor’s sedate innings came to an abrupt end when he was brilliantly stumped down the leg side by the fleet-footed and even soft-handed, Carlton Baugh who has also represented West Indies in the past. This was Baugh’s 2nd such stumping of the day, the earlier one getting rid of Baker.

USA’s innings sauntered to a mere 98/9 in 20 overs. They could just about stake their claim at having played out their overs but very little more than that. When asked about his team’s game plan, Massiah was to say “We executed our plans up until the last 2 overs, but then they took the match away from us. Taking into consideration the fact that we were batting on a pitch that had been used for 120 overs, it was more difficult to bat second. There is definitely room for improvement as we move forward. They had the luxury of having wickets intact. When you have wickets in the last 5 overs, you can go hard. But I thought today was a much improved performance [from us].”

When asked about his own batting, he added “We haven’t played in a couple of months an the guys are coming out of the winter. In T20 cricket, you’ve gotta kind of improvise and hopefully throw the bowler off their line and length. The pitch was very slow and so it was very hard. So you couldn’t really go through the line of the ball. It didn’t work today.”

Photo (right): US Cricketers starstruck by the presence of one of the cleanest hitter in cricket, Ross Taylor, Courtesy: Gokul Chakravarthy, DreamCricket.com

About the crowd missing out on some entertainment due to lack of boundaries when USA batted, Massiah said “It’s unfortunate that the crowd hasn’t been able to see the best of the America talent, but it is only because we are going through a transition period.”