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Lancashire have turned to one of their own to try and bring success to the county with the announcement of Glen Chapple as head coach

Andrew McGlashan17-Jan-2017Lancashire have turned to one of their own to try and bring success to the county. Glen Chapple, who has been involved with the club for more than 25 years, has been named as head coach to replace Ashley Giles.Chapple, who worked as a first-team coach under Giles, will be assisted by Mark Chilton, the former Lancashire opening batsman who had a 14-year career, after he was promoted to assistant head coach having worked with the second team over the previous three seasons.Both were named in an interim capacity in December when Giles returned to take the director of sport role at Edgbaston and it came as little surprise that they were confirmed in the positions.There are few who have worn the Red Rose with such distinction as Chapple – who took 985 first-class wickets and 320 in the one-day game during a career that began in 1992 – and though that does not automatically mean a successful coaching career is assured, Lancashire have appointed someone with a intimate knowledge of the club and the demands it brings.”I would have been ready to take this job whenever,” Chapple said. “I’m still reasonably young in coaching terms but I have I feel I have a lot of experience.”Between the pair of us we’ve worked with a lot of international coaches and also have a lot of experience of this club and how it operates, the members and supporters and what they want us to achieve. We are aware of all that.”Chapple called the current Lancashire squad “exciting” but acknowledged that top of his to-do list over the next few weeks, as well as preparing the players for the pre-season tour of Dubai, is recruiting some experience to help competitiveness in all formats. In 2016 they narrowly avoided relegation in the County Championship and failed to get out of the group stages in the T20 Blast and Royal London Cup.In recent times the runs from Ashwell Prince and Alviro Petersen have been lost, while the club are unlikely to see much of Jos Buttler in the first half of the season due to IPL and England commitments. Haseeb Hameed will be available while England are in white-ball mode, but from July will likely be away with the Test side.News of a signing is expected in the coming weeks and that could indicate heading down the Kolpak route, although both Chapple and Chilton stressed the importance of continuing to nurture local talent.”We do need to make additions to the squad, we need to make sure we can compete in all forms,” Chapple said. “This particular squad at the moment is exciting, it has a lot of young players. Some who were blooded last year and took their opportunity well. So it’s certainly exciting times. But we are a young squad and we have to understand that it will develop.”We want to build a team who are aggressive, ambitious – I think the squad needs some experience to go with it, we’ve lost a lot of players in recent years through retirement, injury and players not coming back. We have some areas we need to develop, but to work with the young players we have here is exciting.”Over the coming months we’ll be looking to balance the squad. When you get into the season there are challenges that come, but we want to go into the season with a chance in all three competitions. You are looking to help a team develop, but it’s results driven as well. To say you can win three is a bold statement, but we aren’t focusing on one over the other.”Chapple said he will draw on his experiences with Giles and Peter Moores – he made specific reference to his time as captain under Moores, during which Lancashire won their first County Championship title in 77 years – but said it was important the new coaching structure went about things their own way.”I had a particularly good time with Peter Moores because I was captain and it was six years long. But at the same time you go into a job and do it your way, we’ve been around the game for 25 years now so aren’t just looking at other coaches. We’ll work on things that we think are important, you have to do things your way otherwise it won’t look right.”As a final piece of housekeeping, it was worth noting that Chapple has never officially announced his retirement as a player. He last appeared in 2015 but remained registered. Is that, now, officially it? “Let’s just let that slip into the background and not mention it, possibly,” he said.

There were a few names among the overseas players picked on day one of the Pakistan Super League draft that might have had you asking, “Who?” Here are brief answers to that question

Mohit Shah21-Dec-2015Jim Allenby
Australia-born Jim Allenby played one first-class match for Western Australia towards the end of the 2006 season but has earned his name in county cricket, chiefly for Glamorgan. The 33-year-old, a medium-pace bowling allrounder who can strike the ball powerfully, was a potent force in the Glamorgan side that reached the final of the Yorkshire Bank 40 in 2013. He shifted to Somerset at the beginning of the 2015 season to get a taste of First Division cricket.Cameron Delport
The 26-year-old South African is a big-hitting left-hand batsman who is also capable of bowling solid medium pace. He has played in the Big Bash League (Sydney Thunder) and the Caribbean Premier League (Trinidad & Tobago Red Steel), and slammed 34 off 9 for Dolphins to briefly threaten Chennai Super Kings during a massive chase in the 2014 Champions League T20 – he finished that tournament with a strike rate of 280.Kevon Cooper
Another pace-bowling allrounder, Kevon Cooper is a T20 specialist who plays around the globe – he has already plied his trade in the IPL, the Bangladesh Premier League and the CPL. The 26-year-old Trinidadian has played 122 T20 games and only two first-class games. He was recently a part of the Barisal Bulls squad that finished runners-up in the BPL, and was the highest wicket-taker in the tournament with 22 wickets at an average of 9.31 and an economy rate under six. Cooper can also whack a few big sixes down the order.James Vince
Hampshire captain James Vince is a stylish, classy batsman who recently made his T20I debut for England against Pakistan, a few months after debuting in ODI cricket. He showed flair and considerable nous in making scores of 41, 38 and 46 in the three-match T20 series and finished as the highest scorer from either side. Former England coach Duncan Fletcher once compared Vince’s batsmanship to that of former England captain, Michael Vaughan.

Virat Kohli, in his second match as captain, smacked an 83-ball 102 to power India to a tall score against West Indies, but he said more than his innings, India earning a bonus point was more satisfying

ESPNcricinfo staff06-Jul-2013Virat Kohli, in his second match as captain, smacked an 83-ball 102 to power India to a tall score against West Indies, but he said that earning a bonus point was more satisfying than his innings.India were in a difficult position in the tri-series before the start of the match because they had lost their first two games – the second against Sri Lanka being one of their heaviest defeats – and needed to win this match to keep their chances afloat. India’s much-vaunted batting line-up had struggled for fluency at Sabina Park, but at Queen’s Park Oval the openers responded with a 123-run opening stand to set an ideal platform. Kohli, despite limited support from other middle-order batsmen, ensured it wasn’t wasted.”We got a good start. It’s a bit of a tricky situation if you go in after a good start,” Kohli said. “You don’t know whether to play yourself in or go after the bowlers. To get a hundred in my second game as captain, I am pretty happy. I was getting good starts, but hitting that one shot straight to the fielder, so I was waiting for this big innings. But more than the hundred, I am happy we won with a bonus point.”Darren Sammy credited Kohli for lifting India’s score beyond 300, but said that West Indies’ bowlers could have bowled better. The fast bowlers were expensive and even Sunil Narine wasn’t able to control the flow of runs, giving away 35 in his five overs.”We have to give credit to Kohli and the Indians for the way they played. We did not bowl as well as we know we can,” Sammy said. “That is one area where we went wrong today. India played really well. They knew they had to come hard at us, to get a win and stay in the tournament, and they did just that.”Chasing 312, West Indies lost Chris Gayle early to Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who struck again in his next over to dismiss Darren Bravo. A rain disruption added to West Indies’ woes as the target was readjusted to 274 off 39 overs, but none of the West Indian batsmen stayed long enough to put up a challenge.”The way Kohli played just goes to show what can happen when a set batsman stays in to the end of the innings,” Sammy said. “We had two very good innings in Jamaica when Chris [Gayle] got a hundred against Sri Lanka and [Johnson] Charles got 90 against India to win those two matches for us, but we did not get any real big partnerships going today.”West Indies are still placed at the top of the table with nine points and need to win their next match against Sri Lanka to confirm their entry into the final.”We are still very much in the tournament. Today we lost but there is need to panic,” Sammy said. “We are still at the top of the points table and we have all to play for when we face Sri Lanka on Sunday. We still believe we can win this tournament. We will regroup and look to bounce back when we meet Sri Lanka on Sunday and look to move into the final.”

Hampshire’s Australian batsman Glenn Maxwell produced another explosive innings to carry Hampshire to victory in the Twenty20 South group clash against Essex at Chelmsford.

30-Jun-2012
ScorecardGlenn Maxwell produced another explosive innings to carry Hampshire to victory in the Twenty20 South group clash against Essex at Chelmsford. The 23-year-old Australian smashed an unbeaten 60 from only 24 balls as the visitors overhauled their opponents’ total of 176 for 4 with six wickets and 12 balls to spare.Thirty of those came in one over against left-arm spinner Tim Phillips, the 17th of the innings. Maxwell smashed him for three sixes, all of which went out of the ground, and he was to win the match with his fourth, a mighty blow over mid-wicket against Graham Napier.Keeping him company during the blitz which also included six fours, was Simon Katich. He stroked the ball around in a more orthodox manner while scoring 42 from 38 balls and taking part in an unbroken stand of 83 in six overs.Maxwell’s explosion of shots came a few days after he struck a match-winning 66 from 32 balls in the victory over Kent and leaves Hampshire well on course for a place in the quarter-finals.Essex had looked set for a much bigger total as openers James Franklin and Mark Pettini scored at around 10 an over during an opening stand of 83, brought to an end when slow left-armer Liam Dawson had Pettini caught in the deep for 38.Pettini’s effort off 26 balls contained three sixes but it was Franklin who went on to play the starring role with an innings full of quality. His 78 from a 49 deliveries included five sixes and he was looking set for a century when he drove Sean Ervine into the hands of James Vince at long-on.James Foster predictably added momentum late on with a quickfire unbeaten 30 from only 14 balls, striking two sixes in the final over of the innings sent down by Maxwell. But Maxwell was to have the final word.

Hampshire Royals made it five wins from five in the Friends Life t20 with a nine-run victory over winless Gloucestershire Gladiators at Archdeacon Meadow

10-Jun-2011
Scorecard
Hampshire Royals made it five wins from five in the Friends Life t20 with a nine-run victory over winless Gloucestershire Gladiators at Archdeacon Meadow.Neil McKenzie led the Royals to 165 for 4 with an unbeaten 89 from 53 balls, while left-arm spinner Ed Young took 2 for 14 in his four overs.Home captain Alex Gidman top scored with 43 not out in the Gladiators’ reply of 156 for 6, and there were useful contributions from Hamish Marshall (33) and Kane Williamson (28), but they still fell short of their target.After being put into bat, the Royals lost the wickets of Michael Lumb, run out by Marshall’s direct hit, and James Vince, bowled by Muttiah Muralitharan, in struggling to 10 for 2 in the third over.
James Adams and McKenzie revived the innings with a partnership of 51 in six overs, which ended when the former, on 22, reverse-swept Young to Ian Saxelby at short third man.Sean Ervine struck Williamson for six over midwicket during a stand of 56 in eight overs with McKenzie. But the Zimbabwean all-rounder departed for 21 in the 17th over when he holed out to Ian Cockbain at long-on to give Young his second wicket.McKenzie’s 33-ball half-century contained seven fours and the South African struck a further four fours and two sixes, both over midwicket, in his impressive innings. Dimitri Mascarenhas weighed in with an unbeaten 17 off 12 deliveries, but Hampshire’s total was no better than average on the small King’s School ground.Ireland World Cup star Kevin O’Brien got the Gladiators’ innings off to a rapid start with 22 from 12 balls before he swung across the line and was bowled by Chris Wood. Marshall cracked 33 from 26 deliveries, including two sixes, but then fell leg before to Royals skipper Dominic Cork in the 10th over with the total on 78.The game started to swing Hampshire’s way in the next five overs as the scoring rate slowed and left-arm spinner Danny Briggs accounted for Cockbain, lbw, and Williamson, who hit a full toss to Vince on the midwicket boundary.Alex Gidman put the outcome back in the balance by striking three fours and a six in the next two overs, which realised 30 runs. His brother, Will, fell lbw to Cork and Young was caught at long-on off Wood in the 19th over. That left the Gladiators needing 17 to win off the last over, but Cork bowled it superbly to concede only seven runs to Gidman and Jon Lewis.

Lachlan Stevens has beaten a strong field to become Mickey Arthur’s new assistant coach at Western Australia

Cricinfo staff27-May-2010Lachlan Stevens has beaten a strong field to become Mickey Arthur’s new assistant coach at Western Australia. Stevens, who spent several years as a fringe batsman with South Australia and Queensland, was favoured over big names believed to include Jason Gillespie, Allan Donald and Carl Hooper.Despite his relative youth at 31, Stevens has plenty of coaching experience, having taken on the role of high performance coordinator at the Centre of Excellence in 2004. For the past two seasons, he has been assistant to the Queensland coach Trevor Barsby, and his past roles also included a stint as career and education manager with Queensland Rugby Union.”I am excited by the challenge to work with the players of the Retravision Warriors and look forward to helping them to fulfil their potential in the coming seasons,” Stevens said. “I also saw this as a fantastic opportunity to work with Mickey Arthur and learn from one of the leading coaches in world cricket.”Western Australia identified Stevens as a “hands-on” coach who would complement Arthur as he tries to lift the Warriors, who haven’t won any silverware since the 2003-04 one-day trophy. Arthur was confident Stevens would be a good fit with Western Australia.”Lachlan is a very hard worker,” Arthur said. “When you are preparing players to be the very best they can be, it is vital that the coaches set the standard in terms of the level of application required to succeed at interstate level.”

Meanwhile, England head coach urges Diamonds to hand Bess Heath the keeping gloves

Valkerie Baynes03-May-2024Somerset have played a blinder in appointing England captain Heather Knight to a board advisory role as it builds a team to compete in the top flight of the new domestic women’s competition next year.That is the stance of England Women’s head coach Jon Lewis, who said he had briefly discussed the post with Knight before Somerset announced this week that she would join their board to advise on cricketing matters.Somerset, Durham and Essex will join Surrey, Hampshire, Lancashire, Nottinghamshire and Warwickshire in Tier 1 of the new women’s domestic competition in England and Wales from next season after making successful bids to the ECB. A further two teams – Yorkshire and Glamorgan – will join them by 2027.”Somerset have made a really smart decision in getting someone involved in their board who’s got a real intrinsic knowledge of women’s cricket,” Lewis said on Friday, with Knight once again set to lead England’s squads for the T20I and ODI series against Pakistan from May 11. “[She] will really help them set up a new team, which I think will be a challenge for Somerset – a really, really big challenge for Somerset, Essex, and Durham, the teams that have got new teams.”I think that would be a really tricky thing for them to do over the next four or five months, and to have someone who has this experience around will be great. I don’t think it’s going to affect her involvement or her responsibilities as England captain. Heather’s very, very adept at managing her time and she’s an incredibly smart woman and she’ll be able to manage that, I think, without any problem whatsoever. But I think Somerset have made a really good signing.”Related

• Durham, Essex big winners as top-flight women's teams are named

• Richard Gould: Yorkshire Tier 1 omission is 'not punishment for past sins'

• Knight challenges England players and hopefuls to 'dominate' regional games

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• England Women turn to AI to aid borderline team selections

Somerset’s outgoing CEO Gordon Hollins has said that while Knight’s role would not be limited to women’s cricket, the timing of her appointment was critical as the club prepared to enter a team at the top level of the new competition.Currently Somerset, Glamorgan and Gloucestershire act as feeder clubs for Western Storm in the regional 50-over Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy and 20-over Charlotte Edwards Cup.With the regional set-up due to be disbanded after this summer, many players face moving to different cities to play at the highest level, or playing in the lower tiers of the new competition.Knight was acutely aware of the challenges facing those players when the successful Tier 1 bids were announced, saying that the prospect of having to relocate from Leeds to Durham, for example, had caused “quite an unsettling time” for some of the Yorkshire-based players at Northern Diamonds. “It’s important that the girls are looked after and helped to transition into the new structure,” she said.Meanwhile, Bess Heath may find herself taking the wicketkeeping gloves more for Northern Diamonds after being ear-marked as Amy Jones’ understudy in the England set-up.Lewis said he was concerned that former England batter Lauren Winfield-Hill had been preferred behind the stumps for the opening four games of this year’s RHFT with Heath playing as a specialist batter in the three matches for which she was available, and that Heath had discussed the matter with Diamonds head coach Dani Hazell.”It does really concern me that one of the best young wicketkeepers in the country isn’t keeping wicket,” Lewis said. “She’s a really dynamic batter and we hope that she’s able to keep wicket for the Diamonds. I haven’t personally spoken to Dani Hazell, but I know that Bess has spoken to Dani Hazell and they’ll be talking about that moving forward from this point.”Bess Heath takes part in a wicketkeeping drill•PA Photos/Getty Images

Heath’s importance as a back-up keeper for England was emphasised after Tammy Beaumont, who could conceivably step in during an emergency, was overlooked for the T20I squad to face Pakistan, starting in Birmingham in a week’s time.The 22-year-old Heath made her international debut in the third ODI against Sri Lanka at Grace Road last September and went on to play one T20I in India in December and three T20Is on England’s recent tour of New Zealand.”What I don’t want to do is stop Bess’s development by being a squad player for England and just moving around the world, carrying the drinks and just training,” Lewis said. “We need to balance her development with as equal a dose of playing as we can, whilst also having cover for Amy Jones because we would look a little bit silly if Amy injured a finger during a game or during warm-ups and we didn’t have a keeper around.”I’m really excited about Beth. She’s a really cool person, she’s a great person to have around. She’s a really enthusiastic young cricketer and she’s got a lot to learn and a lot to develop. Hopefully we can do that in and around her England involvement.”

India captain backs Ashwin’s suggestion to reduce the impact of dew on day-night ODIs

Deivarayan Muthu17-Jan-20230:46

‘I like the idea’ – Rohit on early starts in ODIs in India

Rohit Sharma is in favour of early starts at the ODI World Cup in India to reduce the impact of the dew factor and promote more even contests.Day-night ODIs in India start at 1.30pm and finish around 9pm, which is prime time on television, leading to greater viewership numbers for the BCCI and the broadcasters. Rohit, however, said that this gave the chasing team a significant advantage if there’s dew, because they get to bowl in dry conditions in the afternoon and bat when the dew gets the ball wet in the evening, making it easier to score.”I mean, it [having an early start] is a good idea because it’s a World Cup, right?,” Rohit said on the eve of the ODI series opener against New Zealand in Hyderabad. “You don’t want to compromise too much on the toss factor and you want to take that [advantage] completely away. I like that idea of an early start, but I don’t know if it’s possible.Related

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• Kohli, Rohit, Gill and India's dew diligence against Sri Lanka

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• Can New Zealand challenge India's strong home record?

“The broadcasters will decide what time the game should start [laughs]. But ideally you don’t want that sort of advantage in the game. You want to see good cricket being played without one side having the advantage of batting under lights with the dew. But those are the things that are not in your control. But I like the idea of an early start.”During the first ODI against Sri Lanka in Guwahati, India were wary of the dew factor and showed greater intent while batting first to rack up a potentially dew-proof total of 373.After that game, India offspinner R Ashwin had suggested an earlier start time, arguing that a 11.30am start to World Cup matches wouldn’t necessarily hurt viewership figures because of what’s at stake.

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“The quality difference between the teams isn’t coming through,” Ashwin said. “Dew is narrowing that gap if you happen to lose the toss. My suggestion – or rather my opinion – for the World Cup is to look at what venues we are playing in, and at what times. Why shouldn’t we start matches at 11.30am during the World Cup? Won’t all cricket fans prioritise the World Cup and watch matches at 11.30?”The Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad is known to favour teams that chase because of both dew and a fast outfield. There wasn’t much dew on Tuesday evening, though, as India’s players went through their drills on the main ground and had a net session at an adjacent facility around 6pm. Still, the dew remained a talking point, even among the visitors with New Zealand captain Tom Latham saying that it was a problem not just in India but all over the world.”I haven’t given a huge amount of thought to the change of match timings, but I think you see around the world at night time in different conditions where the ball does dew up or the ground does dew up,” Latham said. “And sometimes it can get hard to hold onto the ball and it does get a little bit slippery, but that’s something we’re presented with in international cricket where you’ve got to be able to be flexible to bowl with the wet ball or field in those conditions. You got to ride with whatever conditions you’re faced with and that’s adapting to the conditions as best as possible.”

Jhye Richardson and Marcus Harris will remain with the Test team as concussion/Covid-19 stand-bys

ESPNcricinfo staff15-Jan-2022Perth Scorchers and Brisbane Heat have received a boost with Mitchell Marsh, Josh Inglis, Mitchell Swepson and Michael Neser released from Australia’s Test squad to play in the BBL.The quartet will take a charter flight from Hobart to Melbourne on Sunday to join their respective squads with Swepson and Neser set to be available for Heat’s clash against Melbourne Stars on Sunday night at the MCG.Jhye Richardson and Marcus Harris will remain with the Test team in Hobart until the end of the fifth Test as concussion/Covid-19 stand-bys.Swepson and Neser will provide a boost for Heat who are languishing second last on the table with three games to go. They would need to win all three with Bash Boost points in each game and have other results go their way to play finals.The Scorchers look set to lock away top spot and the return of Marsh and Inglis only makes them stronger favourites for the title. Marsh was the Player of the Match in three of five BBL matches he played before being called up to the Test squad with scores 100 not out, 86, 42 not out to go with four wickets.

White-ball captain got to interact with fringe players and was greatly impressed by them

ESPNcricinfo staff27-Aug-2020Players on the fringes of the South African men’s team were afforded an opportunity to integrate with senior stars at the recently completed culture camp. The squad of 32 included the 16 contracted members of the national side as well as the High-Performance unit and the white-ball captain Quinton de Kock highlighted exactly why it was important for them to mingle.”In this environment, even though you’re contracted, it doesn’t mean that you’re guaranteed to play,” he said in a CSA press release on Thursday. “So I think it was important that the up and coming players needed to be there with the squad. This is professional sport and we’re trying to play the best team that we can. If a younger guy is performing and he gets an opportunity, it doesn’t help that he hasn’t been here and he doesn’t know anything.”We’ve seen what they’ve done in the franchise system and we know there’s a potential future for them in the team, so it was important for them to come here. It was great to learn some views from the younger guys and help them understand the situation with the Proteas and how we want to go about things.”South African cricket has recently been waylaid by stories of racial tension. This culture camp, which took place at Kruger National Park earlier this month, was a way to address that tension and at the end of it, it was decided that the South African team should never again be a place where players experience isolation or feel unable to express their feelings, and should foster respect, belonging and empathy. In service of that, their “Protea Fire” identity has been put on hold.”I think it’s been really good,” de Kock said. “We’ve had a lot of good chats which I think the team needed. Everyone is leaving feeling a lot better about the environment and about themselves. A lot of guys got things off their back. We feel a lot more comfortable as a team going forward, which was needed… we’re excited about going into the future now.”We are human and we make mistakes,” he continued. “We’re trying to get better in what we’re doing in our professions, that’s why we got together. I can’t promise results but I can promise that we’ll get better and we are learning, which will give us the best chance of getting better results.”Players who attended the camp: Aiden Markram, Andile Phehlukwayo, Anrich Nortje, Beuran Hendricks, Bjorn Fortuin, Daryn Dupavillon, David Miller, Dean Elgar, Dwaine Pretorius, George Linde, Glenton Stuurman, Heinrich Klaasen, Janneman Malan, Jon-Jon Smuts, Junior Dala, Kagiso Rabada, Keegan Petersen, Keshav Maharaj, Kyle Verryenne, Lungi Ngidi, Lutho Sipamla, Pieter Malan, Pite Van Biljon, Quinton de Kock, Rassie van der Dussen, Reeza Hendricks, Rudi Second, Senuran Muthusamy, Sisanda Magala, Tabraiz Shamsi, Temba Bavuma, Zubayr Hamza, Theunis de Bruyn.Faf du Plessis was unable to join the team due to the birth of his second daughter, Zoey.