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Gambhir heads Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings |
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Written by Harpreet Verma
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Wednesday, 15 July 2009 16:25 |
 Dubai, July 15 : Gautam Gambhir has become the first India batsman in over four years to head the batting rankings after a double failure by Mohammad Yousuf dropped him out of the top three of the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for Test batsmen.
Yousuf, who had returned to the batting table last week in number-one position after his century in the first Test at Galle, scored only 10 and six in the second Test and, as such, he has dropped four places to fifth position in the latest rankings which were released after the conclusion of the St Vincent and Colombo Tests.
Pakistan captain Younus Khan was able retain his second position in the rankings but by conceding 12 points following scores of 0 and 82, he has fallen nine points behind Gambhir who has gone ahead of both the Pakistan batsmen without hitting a ball for the first time in his 25-Test career in which he has scored 2,271 runs at an average of over 54.
Gambhir's 847 points is relatively low for a number-one position in modern times as usually a batsman nearer to the 900-point mark goes to the top, which reflects that he has benefited from some of the other top batsman being off their peaks.
The 27-year-old left-handed opener is the first India batsman after former captain Rahul Dravid to top the batting chart.
Dravid had briefly become the number-one batsman after hitting centuries in each innings (110 and 135) of the Kolkata Test against Pakistan in March 2005. Dravid had first achieved the top batting ranking in January 1999 and has been number-one for 36 Tests between 1999 and 2005.
Sachin Tendulkar is the other India batsman in the last 15 years who has topped the batting chart. He first led the table in November 1994 while last time he occupied the number-one position was in August 2002 after the Leeds Test against England. Overall, Tendulkar has been the number-one batsman for 125 Tests between 1994 and 2002.
The other India batsmen to have achieved number-one positions in their careers are: Gundappa Viswanath (seven matches in 1975), Sunil Gavaskar (46 matches between 1978-80) and Dilip Vengsarkar (17 matches between 1987-88).
Both the Test and ODI batting rankings are now headed by India batsman with Mahendra Singh Dhoni in number-one position of the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for ODI batsmen with Yuvraj Singh in second place.
However, with only 10 points separating Gambhir from third-placed Kumar Sangakkara of Sri Lanka, the top order is expected to change again, of course depending how the Pakistan and Sri Lanka captains perform in the third and final Test which starts in Colombo from 20 July.
The only other change in the top 20 is Thilan Samaraweera who has slipped one place to 21st position which has allowed Australia's Mike Hussey to return to the top 20.
Outside the top 20, Tillekeratne Dilshan has dropped one place to 28th, Kamran Akmal has fallen two places to 33rd and Misbah-ul-Haq has slipped eight places to 40th.
The only big movers in the latest rankings are Pakistan opener Fawad Alam, who has entered the table in 52nd position after his 168 on his Test debut, and Bangladesh's Tamim Iqbal whose century in the second innings has helped him rocket 22 places to 62nd spot.
There is also a change at the top of the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for Test bowlers for the first time in more than three years with Muttiah Muralidaran handing over the baton to South Africa fast bowler Dale Steyn.
Steyn had briefly joined Muralidaran in number-one position after the second Test against India in Ahmedabad in April 2008. However, Steyn had failed to go top of the table on his own after a disappointing third Test in Kanpur.
For Muralidaran, it is the first time that he has dropped to second position since February 2006. This is due to the due in part to him missing both the Tests of the ongoing series due to injury and a player loses one per cent of his ratings for every match he misses.
Others to make an upward movement are Pakistan fast bowler Umar Gul, who has gone up two places to 15th position, Bangladesh spinner Shakib Al Hasan (up by four places to 33rd), Sri Lanka spinner Rangana Herath (up by four places to
46th), West Indies fast bowler Darren Sammy (up by 12 places to 53rd), Pakistan off-spinner Saeed Ajmal (up by 22 places to 54th) and Sri Lanka fast bowler Nuwan Kulasekara, who has rocketed 28 spots to 56th place.
Those who have failed to maintain their rankings include Sri Lanka spinner Ajantha Mendis, who has slipped one place to 29th spot, Bangladesh captain Mashrafe Mortaza, who has dropped two places to 40th position, and Pakistan fast bowler Mohammad Aamer, who has fallen 10 places to 72nd position.
Jacques Kallis continues to lead the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for Test all-rounders with Mitchell Johnson of Australia in second, New Zealand's Daniel Vettori third. (ANI) |
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Real Madrid welcome Benzema, prepare to sell Huntelaar |
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Written by Harpreet Verma
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Thursday, 09 July 2009 21:11 |
 Madrid - Around 15,000 Real Madrid fans welcomed Karim Benzema to the club on Thursday night, in another spectacular presentation of its new signings.
Benzema, 21, has been signed by Real from French giants Lyon for around 35 million euros (48.63 million dollars).
Real president Florentino Perez - who has spent around 210 million euros on Benzema, Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka and Raul Albiol - introduced Benzema as the "best young player in the French league."
The young striker, who has still not been assigned a squad number, said in halting Spanish: "I am very happy to play for the best club in the world.
"I am very happy to play for the same club as my idols (Zinedine) Zidane and Ronaldo."
Zidane, currently one of Perez's advisers, and Ronaldo were two of the "Galactico" stars signed by Perez in his first spell as Real president from 2000 to 2003.
Meanwhile, sports daily Marca reported on its website that Real are poised to sell unwanted striker Klaas jan Huntelaar to Vfb Stuttgart for around 20 million euros, approximately the same price they paid for him to Ajax in December 2008.
Huntelaar has failed to fit in at Real and was not registered for the knockout stages of the Champions League.
Rival website AS claimed French club Marseille were also interested in Huntelaar.(dpa) |
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Miandad against making Test matches four day affairs |
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Written by Administrator
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Thursday, 02 July 2009 10:32 |
 Karachi, July 2 : Former Pakistan captain Javed Miandad has objected to the International Cricket Council's (ICC) idea of reducing the duration of Test matches from five days to four.
When asked to comment on the idea floated by the ICC president David Morgan, Miandad said any such step would ruin the traditional format of the game.
"To have four-day Tests played with coloured balls and under floodlights will be the sort of experimentation which Test cricket doesn''''t need," The News quoted Miandad, as saying.
Miandad said the ICC's proposal to cut short the duration of Test matches would commercialize the game only, and could prove counter-productive.
"It will not be good for Tests which I still believe is the real cricket. It should be spared of any experimentation, which I believe is being planned for the sake of commercialisation, for the greater interest of the sport," he said.
Earlier, in an interview, Morgan had said that Test cricket must be made more exciting through a series of steps, so that the oldest format of the game remains at the pinnacle.
Miandad said the popularity of Twenty20 cricket is undermining Test cricket, and termed bang-bang version of the sports as a `bad habit'.
He said nowadays hard hitters like Yousuf Pathan were more popular than other technically sound batsman.
"Take India''''s example. Players like Yousuf Pathan are more popular than most of his more illustrious team-mates because of Twenty20 cricket these days. It is just like fast food, a bad habit," Miandad said. (ANI)
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Dekker out of Tour over EPO doping |
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Written by Ajay Gupta
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Wednesday, 01 July 2009 16:06 |
 Rotterdam, Netherlands - Dutch cyclist Thomas Dekker is out of this year's Tour de France, which starts Saturday, after testing positive for the blood-booster EPO, his Silence-Lotto team confirmed Wednesday.
Dekker provided the sample at a doping control in December 2007 but the EPO was only discovered using new methods introduced by the World Anti-Doping Agency
(WADA) in May.
Team boss Marc Sergeant revealed that the 24-year-old team-mate of two-time Tour de France runner-up Cadel Evans will now not go to the start of the Tour Saturday in Monaco and instead faces suspension from his team and a likely two-year ban. (dpa) |
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Sports News 
The English all-rounder Andrew Flintoff has decided to quit the test cricket after the end of the ongoing Ashes test series against Australia on Wednesday.