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Imad Wasim came out of retirement for the T20 World Cup 2024 only to become part of “the lowest point” Pakistan cricket has hit during his career, but hopes that something good comes out of the reflections that follow because “you can’t get any lower than this”. Imad has called for a total reset in the way Pakistan play white-ball cricket, especially the mindset and approach because a side that “used to rule T20 cricket” has fallen behind the rest of the world.”I’m giving my personal opinion so don’t make these the headlines,” he said at a press conference a day before their last league game against Ireland in Lauderhill. “It’s all your mindset. What mindset do you want to play the game with? You either play fire with fire, or you play your way. I personally believe that you should play fire with fire. And even if you lose, you can sit down and say to yourself that on that day we were not good enough.”The problem is our team is so good, our players are so good, that we are good enough to play any kind of cricket. We haven’t tried that but the thing is you have to try that, you have to get rid of the fear of failure. In everything – batting, bowling, fielding, you have to get rid of fear of failure. Personnel change doesn’t change anything, just changing the mindset can change a lot of things. The same ball can be hit for a six, a four, a single, and that same ball can take a wicket and be a dot ball.Related

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“We compete with the world’s best teams. Their mindset has changed over time. We used to rule in T20 cricket. I think we have moved back a little now. Maybe our mindset [needs a change] – in all three areas. I won’t say any one area. If you change the mind of the player, you can achieve things beyond your limits. I always believe in this. You can talk a lot, but it is what it is – today, we are out of the tournament and whatever happens in the next World Cup, whoever plays, however they play, I think if we go with the right approach, the results will be better for us.”One reason for the fear of failure could be the personal attacks that follow. Imad was told about reports that he was played despite not being fully fit. He was asked if he felt the team, but in particular he and Mohammad Amir, both of whom came out of retirement, felt they have not repaid the trust put in them. He was also asked if his comeback was limited to this World Cup alone, and if he was going to go back into retirement after the Ireland game on Sunday.Despite there being a sense of “too soon” to these questions, Imad answered them calmly. He rubbished the allegations around lack of fitness, said he had not yet thought of his plans after the World Cup, and also pointed out cricket is a team game and is not won or lost by individuals. He reminded people that they were more disappointed than them, and that they should not be disrespected.Imad Wasim came out of retirement for the T20 World Cup 2024•Getty Images

“Me personally and our team, including me, are very disappointed and sad,” he said. “And the whole public is sad that we didn’t perform well and believes we are guilty. We are more disappointed than you are. This is our profession after all. But I would also like to say that we are human beings, we can make mistakes and we also get affected by these things.”Imad himself was a TV analyst when he had retired, and used to criticise his current team-mates. When asked to put that analyst hat on to review this performance, he suggested that that kind of dispassionate analysis was perhaps what was the need of the hour.”I have always talked about cricket [as an analyst],” Imad said. “I have never talked about players individually or body-shamed anyone or anything like that. Cricketers have to do their job and analyse the cricket. They have to tell you what is right and what is wrong without getting personal.”I think we should play the game the way world cricket is going. We should sort out the way we play the game, the way we should bring awareness, the way we should chase, the way we should approach the game…. We will sit and sort out our approach. Other teams also go out in early stages, but I don’t think Pakistan have exited this way. We are extremely disappointed.”But is it all about how you react after the fall? This is bad but who knows this could be big for Pakistan? We could revamp, revisit and start playing white-ball cricket the way it should be played.”

After their combined tally of eight runs in four innings at Perth, it proved to be a day of revived fortunes at the Gabba for two of the most scrutinised batters in England’s ranks. While Joe Root secured the plaudits for his magnificent maiden century on Australian soil, Zak Crawley’s bounce-back from a first-Test pair proved a similarly cathartic display.Though he fell when well set, gloving a pull off Michael Neser shortly after the first interval, his 76 from 93 balls was nonetheless a crucial contribution, coming as it did after his first-Test nemesis Mitchell Starc had again struck hard with the new ball, dismissing Ben Duckett and Ollie Pope for ducks in his first two overs.Crawley, by then, had already driven Starc through the covers for four, to bring up his first runs of the series, and he carried on in a similar vein, picking off a total of 11 boundaries, the majority coming when Australia’s bowlers strayed into his arc.”I did feel good, to be honest,” Crawley told TNT Sports at the close of the first day’s play. “I felt much better than Perth. I was just trying to keep it simple, just trying to score straight on the leg side, and then if it was really full, maybe on the off side. Yeah, I was happy with my knock.”Crawley’s relative watchfulness outside off was the key feature of his innings, and a tribute to the hours in the nets that England have put in (in between some notable moments of downtime) since their two-day defeat in the series opener.”I think it’d have felt a long break if I’d have got two hundreds, to be honest,” he said. “It was big old gap after a two-day game. But yeah, it’s a good chance to get some practice in. And I felt comfortable. I felt calm today, and managed to settle the nerves. So I was pleased with how I played.”I had a clear plan and I stuck to it. There were still a couple of loose shots in there, as I tend to do, but got away with them, and I played nicely down the ground as well. By trying to score on the leg side, that made me leave a bit better outside off with the extra bounce today, and then when I got in, the ball started doing a bit less.”England’s close-of-play score of 325 for 9 looked significantly more healthy thanks to an unbeaten tenth-wicket stand of 61 between Root, who finished unbeaten on 135, and Jofra Archer, whose 32 not out was his highest Test score, in just his second innings at No.11.Until Australia have batted, it will be hard to tell how good that score actually is, but after the groundstaff had given the pitch a final trim to 3mm of grass before the match, Crawley knew it had been a good toss for England to win, notwithstanding their early collapse to 5 for 2.Related

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“The last few days, it’s been really green here. So we all thought it’s going to be a green nipper again. And they obviously shaved it this morning, so it looked like a great wicket to bat on, with the overheads as well.”I was gutted to get out when I did, the pitch was just getting a bit flatter there,” he added. “But obviously we finished the day well with Rooty and Jof at the end there. So it’s good day.”At 264 for 9 with approximately half an hour of the day remaining, there had been some speculation that England might declare to insert Australia under the lights, much as they had done in their previous pink-ball Test against New Zealand in Mount Maunganui two years ago. But with Root going strong, and with memories of England’s infamous declaration at Edgbaston in 2023, Crawley said a repeat scenario had not been on the cards.”No talk of declaring,” he said. “We were talking about boys going really hard, and if they got out, then it was kind of a win-win situation. So they went hard, and they came off, and there’s a valuable 50 runs there for us.”Root will be on strike when day two gets underway, and will have the chance to extend England’s innings into the morning session, with six overs to come until the new ball is due. For now, though, he will have a chance to savour a significant landmark in his career, and one that may just confirm his credentials as England’s greatest Test batter.”I’m chuffed for him,” Crawley said, after Root’s 40th Test hundred and his first in Australia. “He hasn’t been speaking about it at all to us, that’s just the outside noise. He’s just very focused on just getting whatever score is needed on the day, and proved to be a hundred today.”But he’s the best player I’ve ever played with, or probably against as well. And he’s a champion bloke. I’m chuffed to bits for him.”

A restructured FairBreak has promised to create “the Wimbledon of cricket” in partnership with Saudi Arabia, which will see 90 women’s players from both Full Member and Associate teams compete at an elite level in a multi-team T20 event. The tournament, which has its roots in the FairBreak Invitational, has, through Saudi Cricket, applied for ICC sanction and will run for five years starting in 2026.”It’s an event played in one city, one stadium, with one hotel where everybody stays and it’s over in two weeks,” Ramasamy Venkatesh, FairBreak’s MD, told ESPNcricinfo. “It means that every day at breakfast, women across different countries and teams will be mixing, chatting, and forming relationships. Then you get players contacting their heroes like Shabnim Ismail and Katherine Sciver-Brunt and asking them questions as they continue playing. That kind of relationship-building and feedback is invaluable.”FairBreak, which was founded in 2013 by former Australian captain Lisa Sthalekar and her manager Shaun Martyn, seeks to champion the cause of gender equality in cricket and democratise the space for women across the playing spectrum. After several invitational fixtures, it launched its first tournament in 2022, which included six teams.Related

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What makes it distinct from other franchise competitions is that there is no auction and squads are decided by a panel of between four and six selectors. Each squad composition is the same, with half the players coming from Full Members and the other half from Associates. Players are paid across four salary bands ranging from US$20,000 for category A to US$5,000 for category D (category B players earn US$15,000 and C players US$10,000). These signature features will remain in place for the upcoming event.All six teams will be owned by FairBreak, with the option to partner with a corporate sponsor for brand rights. Previous sponsors included the Barmy Army, and FairBreak intends to procure others, especially as that could impact players’ remuneration.”Our interest is always to increase the compensation to the women to make it more remunerative for them because we want the girls to be paid equally as men. That’s our long-term vision,” Venkatesh said. “If we get enough sponsorships to support an increase in pay, the first thing we’ll do this time is to increase the pay for the women.”The event has previously featured players from 35 countries, but none from India as the previous editions clashed with domestic tournaments in India. With FairBreak eyeing a September-October window that will fall after the Women’s Hundred and before the WBBL – both events that Indian players participate in – it is hoped there will be no obstacles to Indian players taking part this time. While only retired Indian men’s players can get NOCs to play in overseas leagues, active Indian women’s players have been involved in T20 leagues around the world, and FairBreak and Cricket Saudi are hopeful of achieving the same for this tournament.Chiefly, FairBreak’s focus is on casting the net as wide as possible to involve as many ICC members as they can. That will include Saudi Arabia, where there is a significant expat sporting community and women mostly play tape-ball cricket. “Right now, Full Member nations are getting a good amount of cricket, especially India, England, New Zealand, South Africa, Australia,” Venkatesh said. “Our aim is to make sure Associate nations can also take the step up to the higher levels. Today, women’s cricket is the fastest growing segment of cricket.”Shizuka Miyaji of Japan also played in the FairBreak tournament•FairBreak Global

Recognition of this growth is growing after the ICC launched an Emerging Nations Trophy for women last month and confirmed the expansion of the Women’s ODI World Cup. FairBreak, while not part of the ICC, works in the same area of development and aims to continue to partner with member countries to raise the profile of the women’s game, especially as their organisation has come through a period of uncertainty to find stability.After their inaugural event in 2022 in the UAE, FairBreak held a second tournament in 2023 in Hong Kong and appeared to be growing. They were due to hold a third event in 2023 in the USA which was initially pushed back to 2024 and then postponed indefinitely. Venkatesh explained that the logistical challenges of hosting the 2024 event with the Women’s T20 World Cup in October that year and several other tours prompted the organisation’s decision to hold off as they also faced internal changes.In 2026 too, the new FairBreak tournament will face the challenge of a calendar clash with the women’s Asia Cup, which is also scheduled for mid-September to early October as of now, along with bilateral tours such as England touring Ireland for six white-ball matches in September and West Indies hosting Zimbabwe for eight white-ball matches mid-September onwards.Martyn stepped down in January 2024 and Venkatesh, who is also the founder of a multi-national healthcare group Gencor and an ICC Development Panel umpire, was confirmed the MD in September this year. By that time, talks on another tournament were in full swing and FairBreak had identified the Middle East as a potential region for an event. They began negotiations in the first quarter of 2025 and believe they have signed a deal that will ensure their “sustainability” into the future.

Jake Weatherald’s last bid to push for the opening Ashes Test was undone by a brilliant Fergus O’Neill delivery after centuries to Campbell Kellaway and Marcus Harris put Victoria in the driving seat at stumps on day three against Tasmania at the Junction Oval.For the second time in the match, Tasmania’s openers were forced to negotiate a short new-ball burst before the close after a long day in the field. For the second time in the match, Weatherald was undone by a superb delivery with O’Neill pitching on middle and nipping away to catch Weatherald’s outside edge. Will Sutherland held the low juggling chance at first slip.Related

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It left Weatherald with scores 0 and 12 in the match, after three half-centuries in his first four innings of the summer, ahead of the first Test squad being picked next week. It also left Tasmania at 28 for 1 needing a further 327 to win on the final day.Victoria set the visitors 355 on the back of an excellent 195-run partnership between Kellaway and Harris. Kellaway, 22, continued his rise to becoming one of the best domestic openers in Australia over the last 12 months with a third Shield century in 18 innings since moving to the top of the order for Victoria 11 months ago.Since the start of the 2021-22 Shield season, only Test opener Usman Khawaja averages more in Shield cricket as an opener than Kellaway’s 46.11, with Cameron Bancroft (42.37), Weatherald (40.51) and Daniel Hughes (38.20) the only others to average above 35.”I think my game is pretty well set up to play against the new ball,” Kellaway said after play. “I like to try and bat for a long period of time, so I like having that role of being the guy to try and anchor for the side.”Harris posted his 33rd first-class century, his eighth at the Junction Oval, but his first at No. 6 having slid down the order after experiencing some back tightness prior to batting on the third morning.Marcus Harris celebrated his eighth century at the Junction Oval•Getty Images

“It’s probably just got a bit worse in the last week, just wear and tear and old age,” Harris said. “I think it’s dad back. Hanging onto the kids too much.”The pair came together with Victoria struggling at 91 for 4, leading by 115 with only six wickets in hand, after Tasmania’s bowlers threatened to break the game open in the morning session.Nightwatcher Mitchell Perry edged Gabe Bell to second slip for the first breakthrough of the morning. Peter Handscomb battled to 3 off 20 balls before Riley Meredith exposed his defence. Handscomb showed all three stumps batting outside leg and got an outside edge to a ball that would have missed leg stump and nicked it into the top of off.Ollie Peake then nicked a beauty from Brad Hope which angled in and seamed away to leave Victoria struggling. But Kellaway and Harris then put together a chance-less stand to rip the game away from the visitors.Kellaway was impressive throughout, remaining disciplined in the face of some excellent bowling. He absorbed pressure and then pounced when the bowlers strayed, striking 16 fours and two sixes in his 268-ball knock.”I thought he batted brilliantly today,” Harris said. “Tricky little half an hour last night, and started really well today. He works really hard on his game.”And then I think you saw the shots he can play once he’s in. He’s got good game. He’s played well on one-day cricket. He’s a good package.”Harris meantime thrived in a different role in the middle-order having spent so much of his career grinding against the new ball.”I’ve done it a fair bit in one-day cricket,” Harris said. “I’ve done it a bit in county cricket. I’ve enjoyed it a little bit.”After Kellaway and Harris set the game up, O’Neill and Perry put Tasmania’s top three under enormous pressure with some high-class new ball bowling. Weatherald tried to be positive but was undone by an outstanding delivery. O’Neill was unlucky not have more, beating the bat several times and even hitting the stumps when Tim Ward pulled out of a delivery very late, but it was ruled a dead ball.Perry was equally unlucky at the other, beating the bat three consecutive times at one stage. But Ward and Caleb Jewell survived to set up a fascinating chase on the final day

Hampshire 154 for 3 (Albert 37*) lead Surrey 147 (Sundar 3-5, Abbott 3-27, Fuller 3-46) by seven runsSurrey were rolled out for 147 to all but snuff out their Rothesay County Championship title-winning hopes, as Hampshire boosted their chance of remaining in Division One.The defending champions went into the last round 14 points behind Nottinghamshire – whom they lost to last week – but after they collapsed, their hopes of a fourth successive crown dwindled further.Kyle Abbott led the rout with three for 27 – taking his 50th Championship scalp of the season in the process – with James Fuller and Washington Sundar also picking up three-wicket hauls.Hampshire had eased themselves into a first-innings lead, picking up three vital bonus points in their fight for safety.Surrey chose to bat first and gave 17-year-old Ralphie Albert his first-class debut. The all-rounder wasn’t even born when Hampshire’s Liam Dawson made his professional bow.Surrey were massively depleted with Gus Atkinson, Ollie Pope, Jamie Smith, Sam Curran, Will Jacks, Tom Curran, Jordan Clark and Cam Steel all unavailable, but even still their display was surprising.Dom Sibley had already been dropped at second slip before he was lbw to Abbott, before the South African drew a loose drive out of Ryan Patel to celebrate his 50th wicket of the season.It is the sixth Championship campaign that Abbott has reached the landmark, and he would later add No. 51 when he bowled Albert.Fuller also grabbed three wickets to gut the rest of the top order, as Rory Burns wafted to a juggling Sundar at first slip before Ben Foakes was bowled by a nip backer and Dan Lawrence skied an attempted pull – the latter walked before the ball was caught having scrapped hard for his innings-high 36.The back end of the innings saw wickets fall to spin. Indian international Sundar was particularly wily in his 20 balls, in which he only conceded five runs while taking three wickets.Ollie Sykes went back to one that skidded into his stumps, Matt Fisher was undone by a stunner that ripped across him and into off stump, while compatriot Rahul Chahar guided to first slip. In the middle of it, Tom Lawes was caught and bowled by Dawson.Surrey were bowled out for 147 inside 44 overs – their lowest total of the season at the least opportune moment as the title slipped away from them.The pitch had offered a fair amount of movement, but not excessive, and wickets were mostly down to batting errors and high-quality bowling rather than the elements.Hampshire further suggested a poor pitch wasn’t to blame as Ali Orr glided through the opening overs.He smashed 18 of the second over of the innings and by the fifth over had already secured a partnership higher than anything Surrey had managed in their innings – their best being the 32 between Lawrence and Sykes.Orr’s fast start was undone by a careless swing down leg side but Fletcha Middleton and Nick Gubbins put on 50 to set the sort of foundation that the visitors couldn’t lay.Both the bowled Gubbins and leg-before Middleton fell to Lawrence – who ended the day with two for 12 after an exceptional nine-over spell of off-spin.But Hampshire avoided any serious wobble as Toby Albert and Ben Brown stayed cautiously positive to take them to close with a lead – despite 13 wickets falling on the opening day.

Teenager Ben Mayes gave a glimpse into the future with a match-winning 62 not out as Hampshire kept Metro Bank One-Day Cup men’s competition progression in their own hands.England Under-19 star Mayes, just 17, mesmerised with a catalogue of power, guile and switch hits for his second List A fifty.Mayes put on 111 in 72 balls with James Fuller (54 off 39) to take Hampshire to their fifth win in the competition, after fifties for Fletcha Middleton and Ben Brown.Derbyshire Falcons had been in control after posting 339 thanks to 98 for Caleb Jewell and 76 for Brooke Guest but they were eliminated from the One-Day Cup, and are still yet to win a List A match at Utilita Bowl in seven attempts.Hampshire now know a final fixture win over Gloucestershire will see them into the knockout stage for a fourth straight season.Mayes and Fuller had joined at 206 for five, with Derbyshire boasting a tight grip on the match.Ali Orr and competition top-scorer Nick Gubbins had leaned into the chase with relish, finding boundaries with glee to put on 55 in the first seven overs.But fell in quick succession to Aitchison. Gubbins ended a 257 run, across three innings, without being dismissed when he was bowled and two overs later Orr chopped on.Middleton and Brendon McMullen straightened things back out with a flowing 66-run stand, but McMullen tamely chipping back to Joe Hawkins, drew the Falcons back to favourites.Middleton and Brown both posted their first fifties in the One-Day Cup but neither kicked on but just as Hampshire’s hopes were fading, their wonderkid arrived at the crease.Having scored four off his first 11 balls, he got moving with a cut boundary before a ludicrous reverse paddle found his groove.Mayes scored a fifty on his debut against Glamorgan to stick his name in the limelight, and played off that with a masterclass of modern shot-making. His second half-century came in 39 balls.At the other end, Fuller used brute power to clear the ropes four times in his 38-ball fifty before he was caught and bowled by Hawkins and Felix Organ was bowled.Andrew Neal took out the jitters by middling through midwicket as the hosts took the four points with five balls to spare.Derbyshire were given the first go on a batting paradise, and despite Kyle Abbott’s miserly opening spell, found runs flowed easily throughout.Jewell was the sparkle in the innings as he lusciously and repeatedly drove through the covers during a 99-run stand with former Hampshire batter Harry Came.It was just the start of a series of bulky partnerships that underpinned the visitor’s hefty 339 – stands of 46, 44, 94 and 39 all delivered in quick time.Wickets came in decade intervals, and when they did it often required either magic, or batter error.In the former category, Came was sensationally caught at midwicket by Nick Gubbins and Matt Montgomery had his off-stump glanced by an Abbott pearler,Jewell looked on course for a second century in the competition as he strode through 400 runs in the One-Day Cup.But having been fluently batting at a strike-rate around 120, he slowed up with the milestone in sight, and on 98 he missed a paddle sweep and was bowled by Felix Organ.Brooke Guest and Martin Andersson regained the sweet-striking momentum, the latter with an excellent eighth List A fifty but for the eighth time he couldn’t convert.Any chance of Derbyshire flittering at the end of their innings was kyboshed by Amrit Singh Basra – with 90 runs coming off the last 10 overs. The SACA graduate who signed a two-year contract this week showed off his range of shots in a breathless 15-ball 34 – but it wasn’t to be enough.

Harry Brook will not read too much into “a bit of a shambles of a night” in Cardiff as England lost a truncated first T20I against South Africa.Just 12.5 overs were possible at Sophia Gardens as persistent showers delayed the start by more than two hours. Play eventually began at 8:50pm for a nine-over match. Having won the toss and elected to bowl, Brook watched on as a powerful South Africa batting card smashed 97 for 5 from 7.5 overs before rain curtailed their innings. That downpour subsequently gave England an adjusted chase of 69 in five overs, of which they fell 15 short.Related

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England opted to remove Jofra Archer from their XI announced on Tuesday on safety grounds, after ruling conditions were too risky for their prized fast bowler. Luke Wood was the late replacement, earning his eighth T20I cap, and was the pick of the home attack with 2 for 22.”It was a bit of a shambles really, wasn’t it?” said Brook, whose 0 from four deliveries was his first duck in T20Is. “You can’t take much from that. There was so much going on. They got nine overs, we got five overs. You can’t take much from it.”It was a long, long day. I don’t think we need to make any excuses up. We probably didn’t execute as well as we should have done with bat and ball. It’s bloody hard when you only bat for five overs.”Brook stopped short of saying the match should not have gone ahead: “That’s not for me to decide, that’s for the umpires or the match referee. We just try to do what we can on the field.”However, the decision to park Archer was an admission of the risk involved, particularly given the amount of time and money invested to get the 30-year-old back playing all international formats this summer ahead of the winter’s Ashes. Brook even cited Adam Hose’s horrific ankle injury sustained during The Hundred as a worse-case scenario had Archer played.”It would have been stupid to play him with the amount of cricket we’ve got coming up,” said Brook. “If he’d have gone out in the boundary and done what Adam Hose did in The Hundred and broken his leg or whatever, that would have been a shambles.”As soon as we knew that the game was shortened, we didn’t think it was quite necessary for Jof to play. Obviously, the outfield was sodden and he’s got a lot of cricket to play in the next few months with a big series coming up. So, yeah, we, we decided to not play him.”