Author: Shamik Chakrabarty

On Saturday, chief selector Ajit Agarkar was in Jaipur, watching the Vijay Hazare Trophy match between Mumbai and Maharashtra. He had his former India teammate and now co-selector RP Singh for company. Agarkar was looking relaxed. The Indian squad selection for the upcoming three ODIs against New Zealand was never going to be stressful. The meeting happened online. There was a debate on whether Ishan Kishan should be brought back to the ODI fold as well, on the heels of his T20I comeback. The Jharkhand captain started off this season’s Vijay Hazare Trophy with a blazing hundred against Karnataka, didn’t…

Beyond the Ro-Ko mania, the upcoming three-match ODI series against New Zealand offers very little in terms of preparations for the 2027 World Cup. The shortest format is the flavour of the season, with the T20 World Cup a little over a month away. From the perspective of the fans, however, it’s about getting entertained, and India boast the game’s two biggest entertainers in the 50-over format — Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli. The first game is in Vadodara on January 11. It’s already sold out. Two-thirds of India’s ODI squad picks itself. This time, however, the selectors face a…

With Manchester United chasing the game against Wolverhampton Wanderers at Old Trafford and 15 minutes to go, Ruben Amorim, the manager, replaced the lively Ayden Heaven, a centre-half, with Leny Yoro — a like-for-like. Yes, Amorim was seriously stretched with his attacking options, with several first-team players missing due to injuries and AFCON, but Shea Lacey and Chido Obi, the two young attackers, were still on the bench. Amorim’s in-game management could be a case study, how it defies logic. Worse, he started with a back-five — three centre-halves — against Wolves, unarguably the worst-ever Premier League side, who so…

Without a timely intervention from a very famous cricketer, Yashasvi Jaiswal probably would have been plying his trade in domestic cricket for Goa this term. He had reportedly fallen out with the Mumbai team management and all but made up his mind to move to Goa to play domestic tournaments for the state in 2025-26. Jaiswal communicated his intention to the Mumbai Cricket Association (MCA), just stopping short of putting forward a formal request for a no-objection certificate (NOC). Then the phone call came from the senior cricketer, widely respected in the Indian and Mumbai dressing room, asking him to…

Shreyas Iyer’s attempts to return to the Indian team for the upcoming ODI series against New Zealand has faced a major setback. It is learnt that the batter failed to clear all three strength tests at the BCCI’s Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Bengaluru on Tuesday. Shreyas, India’s designated ODI vice-captain, has been doing rehab at the CoE. Although he did okay in the batting and running drills, he failed the strength tests, each by two marks. Unless there’s a drastic improvement over the next two-three days, Shreyas is all but ruled out of the ODI series against the Kiwis…

India’s final T20I in the home series against New Zealand is on January 31. Their opening game at the 2026 T20 World Cup is on February 7. The turnaround time is less than a week and as India approach their final home series of the season, against the Kiwis, the biggest issue would be the fitness and workload management of the players. The World Cup squad has been picked and in a country that revels in the embarrassment of cricketing riches, there are adequate replacements for almost every position if by chance someone picks up an injury. Just two players…

Only three days ago, Angkrish Raghuvanshi was lying flat on the field while attempting a catch during Mumbai’s Vijay Hazare Trophy (VHT) game against Uttarakhand. He suffered a concussion, was taken to the hospital for medical tests and was kept under observation even after returning to the team hotel. It was heartening to see the young Mumbai opener taking the field on Monday and scoring an unbeaten half-century in his team’s nine-wicket win over Chhattisgarh. Mumbai won the toss at Jaipuria Vidyalaya Ground in Jaipur and sent the opposition in. Shardul Thakur ripped through Chhattisgarh’s top order, claiming four…

The MCG pitch for the Boxing Day Test between Australia and England has received an “unsatisfactory” (below average) rating from the ICC match referee Jeff Crowe, Cricket Australia has confirmed. It means that the game’s second-most hallowed venue, after Lord’s, would be handed one demerit point. Six demerit points in a rolling five-year period earn a centre a 12-month ban from hosting international cricket. “The ICC Match Referee has rated the pitch for the fourth NRMA Insurance Ashes Test at the MCG as ‘unsatisfactory’,” CA said in a press release. It added: “Under the ICC’s four tier pitch rating system, “unsatisfactory” is the third ranking and characterises a…

Rishabh Pant appears to be on the ODI slippery slope, as a 15-member squad for the three-match series against New Zealand is likely to be announced on January 3 and 4. On December 25, RevSportz reported that Ishan Kishan has started knocking on the ODI door on the heels of his return to the T20I set-up. And yet, on the face of it, a decision to drop Pant would be without rhyme or reason. A story is doing the rounds that there have been issues between the wicketkeeper-batsman and head coach Gautam Gambhir. A source in the know rubbished the…

Ben Stokes has launched a scathing attack on the MCG pitch after the Boxing Day Ashes Test ended inside two days. A total of 36 wickets fell in less than six sessions, as England eventually secured a tense four-wicket win to reduce the margin to 3-1 in the five-Test series. Stokes, the England captain, was brutally honest despite his team’s victory and said that a pitch like the MCG would raise “hell” if it was produced in another part of the world. “If that was another condition somewhere else and that happened, you probably would get a pasting. I’m pretty…