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No sooner had Todd Astle been grasping a rare opportunity in Test cricket than he has been hit by injury

Andrew McGlashan28-Mar-2018No sooner had Todd Astle been grasping a rare opportunity in Test cricket than he has been hit by injury, a side strain ruling him out of his hometown match in Christchurch as New Zealand target just a fourth series win over England.Astle took 3 for 39 in the second innings at Eden Park, but scans the following day showed he had picked up the injury. He had a previous side strain earlier in the season and this one means he still has yet to play consecutive Tests after single outings in 2012 and 2016.”Through some incredibly hard work, Todd’s already overcome some injuries this summer, so for this to happen now is a cruel blow,” coach Mike Hesson said. “Todd played a major role in helping us win the game at Eden Park, so it’s disappointing for Todd and the team that he’s forced to the sideline ahead of Friday.”With Mitchell Santner sidelined by a long-term knee injury, it has opened up the chance for fellow legspinner Ish Sodhi to resume his Test career having not played the format since September 2016 against India in Kanpur. If New Zealand maintain the same balance of attack, rather than going all-seam with Matt Henry, Sodhi will come into the match and high on confidence at that. He took career-best match figures of 12 for 62 against Wellington in the Plunket Shield last week, which included a 7 for 30 in the first innings, and 7 for 98 against Otago in the outing before that.”It was good to get the chance to bowl some overs in the middle so you go into the Test, if I play, with a bit of momentum. It was the ideal scenario,” Sodhi said. “As a young spinner learning your art, the best way to do it is to bowl as much as you can and bowling in the nets is so different to bowling in the middle in games. You have to take the chance with both hands.”It’s awesome to get the opportunity to be part of a winning team. The last game was fantastic and boys got up a great spectacle with the pink-ball Test so to be part of it is fantastic but I feel sorry for Toddy. He’s work very hard in the last game, performed well so it’s heartbreaking.”Astle’s absence will lengthen New Zealand’s tail unless they take a cautious approach and opt to play an extra batsman. Martin Guptill is in the squad but, on Tuesday, Hesson said the team would not go into the match looking for a draw despite the carrot of the series win.On the other hand, spin has only taken 14 wickets in four Tests at Hagley Oval. New Zealand didn’t play a spinner against Australia in 2016, and in Tests against Pakistan and Bangladesh, they used a grand total of four overs with Santner not bowling a ball in the Bangladesh contest.Sodhi hasn’t played a first-class match at the ground since 2015 – and in three matches has a return of 3 for 256 – but believes the surface could offer him something. “It’s normally hard and bouncy and if you gave me the option, and the turn was slow, I’d rather have the bounce so hopefully can extract something out the wicket.”The prize for a win or drawn Test is significant for New Zealand: to join the team of 1983-84 as the only series winners against England on home soil, and the 1986 and 1999 sides who achieved the feat in England. They will be favourites going into the match after dismantling England for 58 in Auckland and overcoming the rain to win in effectively little more than three days, but getting carried away is not the New Zealand style.”I think we saw in the second innings what they are capable of and we expect them to be a lot tougher in this match,” BJ Watling said. “They are a quality outfit and we’ll have to on our game.”

Em Arlott and Emma Lamb awarded skills contracts for the first time

ESPNcricinfo staff03-Dec-2025Linsey Smith has earned her maiden full central contract with England Women, seven years after making her international debut, while Em Arlott and Emma Lamb have been awarded skills contracts for the first time.On the list of 17 full contracts for 2025-26 announced by the ECB, a total of 10 players received one-year deals with a further seven entering the second year of their current two-year terms.Joining Smith on one-year deals are Tammy Beaumont, Maia Bouchier, Alice Capsey, Sophia Dunkley, Lauren Filer, Mahika Gaur, Danielle Gibson, Sarah Glenn and Freya Kemp.Entering their second year of existing contracts are Lauren Bell, Charlie Dean, Sophie Ecclestone, Heather Knight, Amy Jones, Nat Sciver-Brunt and Danni Wyatt-Hodge.Related

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There were no surprises on the list with Kate Cross, England’s long-serving seam bowler, left out, having revealed in September that she was told her contract would not be renewed after an international career spanning nearly 12 years.In commenting on Cross’s omission on Wednesday, Clare Connor, managing director of England Women, said “the door to selection is never closed on any domestic cricketer” although Cross is yet to make any announcement on her overall playing future.Smith played nine T20Is up to the middle of 2019 before spending nearly five years on the outer before her recall for England’s tour of New Zealand in March 2024. She took a five-wicket haul on ODI debut against West Indies in May.Arlott made her international debut at the age of 27 during that home series against West Indies.Lamb, meanwhile, made her first appearance for England in a sole T20I against New Zealand in 2021 before establishing herself more firmly the following year. She represented her country just twice in 2023 and underwent back surgery last year before returning to favour under new head coach Charlotte Edwards.She and Arlott join Ryana Macdonald-Gay and Issy Wong on skills contracts, a rebrand of the development contracts traditionally given to players that the management feel can play a pivotal role for England in the future. Macdonald-Gay and Wong were both on development contracts for 2024-25.Connor said the contracts reflected “our confidence in this group of players” as Engalnd turns its focus to emulating India’s recent 50-over World Cup victory on home soil at next year’s Women’s T20 World Cup, with the final to be staged at Lord’s on July 5.”Linsey Smith, Emma Lamb and Em Arlott have all made important contributions for England across the last year and these contracts are both a reward for what they have achieved and an opportunity to develop their skills further,” Connor said.”Kate Cross misses out on a central contract after years of extraordinary service to England Women’s cricket. The door to selection is never closed on any domestic cricketer. Consistency in scoring runs and taking wickets in county cricket will always put players in a strong position to be picked in England squads.”We’re all excited about what 2025-26 brings. Witnessing India win the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup in their own country in front of their own fans is a powerful reminder of the impact that winning major events on home soil can have.”

It was Knight Riders’ second win in three games this season, and lifted them to third place on the points table

ESPNcricinfo staff24-Aug-2025It was one of those moments. Tim David, one of the best when it comes to smashing a lot of runs in not many balls, seemed to miss with a big swing against an over-pitched Mohammad Amir delivery. The Trinbago Knight Riders boys heard an edge. Nicholas Pooran reviewed. Replays showed a gap between bat and ball, but Snicko showed a spike.David had to go. That left St Lucia Kings at 113 for 4 in 14-and-a-half overs, their finisher gone in a chase of 184. Despite the best efforts from the remaining batters, they fell 18 short in their CPL 2025 game in Gros Islet.It would, however, be unfair to say Knight Riders weren’t deserving winners. Having won one and lost one that they might have won in their season so far, they came into this game determined to notch up another two points, none of them more than Kieron Pollard, who had fluffed his lines so badly in the previous game.Kieron Pollard smashed 65 off just 29 balls•CPL T20 via Getty Images

After they were sent in, Knight Riders got an excellent start courtesy their form batter, Colin Munro, despite Alex Hales’s struggles. Hales was the first to go after scoring 10 in eight balls, but Munro made sure the opening wicket was worth 47 runs in 4.1 overs, and Knight Riders ended the powerplay with 58 on the board.Munro scored 43 in 30 balls, and Pooran chipped in with 34 in 30 balls, but it was really down to Pollard’s statement innings – 65 in 29 balls – that pushed Knight Riders to what eventually proved to be a winning total.Pollard walked out at 78 for 3 in the 11th over, hammered six sixes and four fours, with David Wiese, the opposition captain, picked for special treatment – 24 runs, including three sixes in a row in the 17th over the highlight. Though Pollard fell in the 19th, in a one-run over from Oshane Thomas against the run of play, he had done enough to give Knight Riders the advantage.Johnson Charles and Tim Seifert put together 74 for the first wicket•CPL T20 via Getty Images

Kings weren’t to be outdone just yet. Tim Seifert, with 35 in 24 balls, and Johnson Charles, with 47 in 37 balls, gave the chase a rollicking start. They scored 60 in the powerplay and motored along to 74 before Seifert fell in the ninth over.They needed someone to keep the momentum going, but Roston Chase wasn’t the man for the job on the day. David might have been but couldn’t be. In the end, the onus was on the lower-middle order to do the heavy lifting.Delano Potgieter and Ackeem Auguste did play handy cameos, but Kings needed someone to bat on and finish the game. They did not come close to the finish line by the time Russell had delivered the final over.The win lifted Knight Riders to third place, with four points from three games, the same as second-placed Guyana Amazon Warriors and fourth-placed St Kitts and Nevis Patriots, while Kings were at fifth.

Without Cook’s 80 off 186 balls, Essex would have fared a good deal worse as Somerset trail by 184 runs

David Hopps at Chelmsford23-Jun-2019Only three counties have never won the Championship, but once again the perception is growing that this finally can be Somerset’s year. Their lead is already 24 points, stoking optimism that the south-west’s roll of honour will no longer be restricted to the three unofficial titles that Gloucestershire won in the 1870s.It was a time when WG Grace was in his prime, still young enough to write that he was observing “a little care in my food” before cutting the sentence when presumably realising that the sentence risked either years of abstinence of endless ridicule.On a day when another great west-country servant, Marcus Trescothick, dropped down to Somerset’s 2nd XI in a search for form (he has only 86 Championship runs at 10.75 this season), Somerset arrived at Chelmsford for a test of their mettle. Essex have won three home matches, enough to place them third, within six points of Hampshire who they trounced here last week.The core of this contest, one suspects, will be how Somerset fare with the bat against the offspinner, Simon Harmer, who already has 42 wickets at 17.07. But they began well enough with the ball, dismissing Essex for 216 after they had been 126 for 1. For once it had appeared Harmer would no longer have to feel sorry for Essex’s batsmen – his comment last week after he twice rolled Hampshire on a difficult batting track – but there must have been the odd tear of sympathy by the time the last wicket fell.Somerset lost Azhar Ali before the close, but their captain, Tom Abell, who had taken responsibility for the opener’s role in Trescothick’s absence – the dashing limited-overs batsman Tom Banton was another option – survived the 16 overs to the close.Without Sir Alastair Cook’s 80, from 186 balls, Essex would have fared a good deal worse. Cook has not become easier on the eye since retiring from international cricket, but one sensed that he was relishing the battle, strikingly animated between deliveries and with hints of majesty during them.His defence was solid, he looked in command square of the wicket and he remained imperturpable when batting was tough under afternoon clouds. When he survived a tough caught-and-bowled chance to Jack Brooks on 64, the ball fading low to his left, a second hundred of the season looked likely. But Tim Groenewald had him caught in the gully off bat and pad on 80 and, had bat not been involved, he would surely have been lbw.Jamie Overton appears to have returned in good order from his loan spell at Northants, although as ever with Overton that judgment is only provisional. He brought one back to strike Nick Browne’s off stump before lunch and contributed to Essex’s loss of five wickets in the afternoon session as the weather became muggier, finding pace and bounce to defeat Tom Westley’s pull shot and having Ryan ten Doeschate lbw on the back foot.This Somerset season always includes a contribution from Lewis Gregory, who is arguably the best uncapped allrounder in the country, and who had Dan Lawrence lbw and ended Ravi Bopara’s uncertain stay courtesy of an uncertain leg-side whip. Bopara looked perplexed.Essex have recalled Peter Siddle for this game, after resting him during the Hampshire match because of a niggle or two, filling the vacancy left by Sam Cook who will miss the next six weeks with a side strain suffered in the previous match against Hampshire.

Former Australia all-rounder to be joined by Daniel Vettori on the coaching staff

ESPNcricinfo staff19-Jul-2019Andrew McDonald has been confirmed as the men’s coach of Birmingham Phoenix with Daniel Vettori as his assistant, as first revealed by ESPNcricinfo last month.McDonald, 38, has a growing reputation as a coach, after leading Melbourne Renegades to their maiden Big Bash League title this year. He has also taken Victoria to two Sheffield Shield titles, and a domestic one-day crown.He has also held roles in the IPL, where he was Royal Challengers Bangalore’s bowling coach, and in county cricket with Leicestershire.Trevor Bayliss had previously been linked with the role after Paul Farbrace, his deputy for most of his tenure as England coach, was appointed as director of cricket, and as many as eight candidates were shortlisted, but McDonald came out on top.Vettori has previously coached Royal Challengers, Middlesex, and Brisbane Heat with limited success, and will be assisted by Warwickshire and Worcestershire’s coaches Jim Troughton and Alex Gidman.”The Hundred is a tournament that’s generating interest across the globe,” said McDonald, “and the opportunity to be part of it as Head Coach of the Birmingham team is something that I’m relishing.”From behind the scenes talking to players at the Renegades and from talk in the IPL, players around the world want to be a part of it,” he said.”The players that have a clear schedule at that time of the year want to be nominating to be a part of it. It’s an exciting new format and they get to put their footprint on it.”

England white-ball captain has not featured since T20 World Cup due to calf injury

Matt Roller25-Aug-2024Jos Buttler is targeting Lancashire’s T20 Blast quarter-final at Sussex for his comeback from the calf injury which ruled him out of the Hundred.Buttler, who has not played since the T20 World Cup, has been backed to continue as England’s white-ball captain by managing director Rob Key after Matthew Mott lost his job as head coach. He will work alongside interim coach Marcus Trescothick – his former Somerset team-mate – during September’s T20I and ODI series against Australia.After sustaining a calf injury while preparing for the Hundred, Buttler has returned to training and has been working with England physio Craig de Weymarn in Bristol. “Another good session in the bank,” he wrote on Instagram this week, adding in another post: “Picking up injuries as a professional sportsman is always frustrating and I was gutted to miss the Hundred this year.”