The Pathan brothers, Ravi Shastri and Sachin Tendulkar were among the many cricketers to tweet their tributes to Salim Durani on his passing

ESPNcricinfo staff02-Apr-2023.

Saddened by the passing of the Great Salim Durrani. His skill, swag and his stories are folklore. Always had a kind word about every cricketer. Will cherish our interactions.

— Anil Kumble (@anilkumble1074) April 2, 2023

Players and coaches talk about how increasing numbers of female batters are learning to confidently clear the ropes

Firdose Moonda22-Mar-2023In their opening game of the 2020 T20 World Cup, South Africa restricted England, a team they had beaten only twice in their last 18 T20Is, to a modest 123 for 8, and were well set on 90 in the 16th over. But when they lost two batters in five deliveries without scoring, the required run rate climbed and at the start of the final over, they needed nine to win. Two singles later, Mignon du Preez met a length delivery from Katherine Sciver-Brunt with the full force of her bat and sent it over backward square for six. South Africa won with two balls to spare and went on to top their group.”If you would have asked anybody who would have been the person to hit Katherine Sciver-Brunt for a six that day, I can promise you 99% of people would not have said it would be me,” du Preez says. “To be that person, at the back end and to be able to say, ‘Listen, I have worked on this part of my game and I have added power to my game,’ that was a highlight.”That was du Preez’s 41st T20 six, and came two years before the end of her decade-and-a-half long international career. In 115 matches before that day, du Preez had struck sixes at an average of one every three matches. Since that match, she has hit 31 sixes in 73 matches, around one every two games.She says that clearing the boundary became a focus later in her career, thanks in part to a conversation she had with Trent Woodhill, then the Melbourne Stars coach at the WBBL. “He used to say: power over placement. That doesn’t mean being reckless, but it helped me take indecision away. For someone like me, who is not a big hitter, it gave me a way to clear the boundary and the confidence to go for it.”Between 2004 and 2014, in 160 T20Is played by England, Australia, South Africa, West Indies, New Zealand and India, the average strike rate of women batters was 94.61 and they hit a total of 291 sixes – almost two per match. Since 2015, the collective strike rate for those teams has improved to 107.55, and in 195 T20Is there have been 626 sixes or more than a three a match.Related

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The confidence to clear the ropes is one aspect of power-hitting but there are other ingredients that make a big hitter, like anatomy and positioning.”A few years ago we got a lot of our players marked up and told them they had to hit the ball as far as they can, against seam and spin from a bowling machine,” says Lisa Keightley, the former England women’s coach, who spoke to this writer during her time as tactical performance coach with Paarl Royals in the men’s SA20. “We didn’t tell them what to do. We just said, ‘Hit it as far as you can.'”One of the things that came out was how players hit sixes in different ways. Nat Sciver-Brunt does it with strength. Heather Knight generates momentum when she gets into the ball, so she will take a couple of steps to go big. Sophia Dunkley is hand speed and bat speed. Tammy Beaumont really whips her bat to get bat speed.”But the general thing is the launch angle. If you want to hit a six, the launch angle of your bat helps you get it over the rope. If you have a good launch angle, you’ve got a really good chance of hitting it over the rope.”Launch angle refers to the angle of the bat face relative to the ground when it makes contact with the ball. It determines how much power a batter can get into their stroke. The optimal launch angle is dependent on the positioning of the batter’s whole body.”Boundary-hitting is all about an open blade, getting the bat flow going to the optimal height at the right time and then hitting with your back hip,” says Neil McKenzie, the South Africa men’s batting coach. “You see it in golfers and tennis players – when that back hip comes through, that’s power-hitting.ESPNcricinfo Ltd”It’s all about loading that back hip up. You’ve got players that drag the front leg back to the back leg and guys that get the back leg to the front leg and then keep that position. The key in power-hitting is an open bat face, which keeps the blade going through the ball for longer, and it’s about hitting with your whole body.”If you get too wide, you only hit with your arms. In the past, a lot of players used a closed bat face, which limits the swing. At the point of contact, the back hip and the blade come through the ball and that’s called keeping your shape.”Working on power-hitting has been a part of men’s cricket for some time now. In 2021, West Indies allrounder Fabian Allen talked about learning to “keep my shape and keep my base” as part of his training routine, but it was not a part of the conversation in women’s cricket when Keightley was playing for Australia between 1995 and 2005. Cricket back then was not set up to accommodate a female power game.”We definitely had longer boundaries,” Keightley says. “The ICC have [now] made the boundaries certain sizes. You’ve got a minimum of 55 metres and a maximum of 65, so boundary sizes are fairly standard across the board and that’s made a big impact. The other thing is international venues where the outfields are quick and you have pitches where the ball is coming on pretty well. And then the bats – the distance they can hit has really evolved over time.”Female athletes are now getting to be full-time professionals, so they can get stronger. I wouldn’t say fitter – the Australia team I played on were pretty fit – but I think the strength factor has increased significantly in the top teams. And there is also the explosion of the T20 format. In T20 if you’ve got some power-hitters, they can really change the game. Most females can generally hit fours, but in T20s it’s about players that can clear the rope.”Mignon du Preez was not a natural six-hitter but built the ability into her game after a conversation with batting coach Trent Woodhill that helped her “take indecision away”•Getty ImagesKeightley played only one T20I – the last international of her career – in September 2005. There was only one six in that match. That number has increased steadily over time. Forty-three sixes were hit in the 2016 women’s T20 World Cup in India, and 75 in the next edition, in the Caribbean. In between, a record was set for the most sixes hit in a single women’s T20 – 19, in a WBBL game in Sydney in December 2017.Increasingly there is an understanding that a team that hits more sixes has an obvious advantage. “If someone can come in and hit three or four sixes in their innings, they are changing the game,” England allrounder Nat Sciver-Brunt says. “I’ve typically tried to be someone to play through the innings and not really think too big too soon, but if I can change the game in my first ten balls or my first 20 balls or whatever it is, then that will almost put the team in a better position. In the best T20 innings, people are facing 40, 50 balls and scoring a hundred.”To date, there have been 40 centuries scored in women’s T20Is, all of them after 2010, and 37 after 2017. The turning point was, as Keightley suggested, the result of professionalisation.In 2013 the Australia women’s team, who had part-time deals since 1997, were given a major raise, and tour payments and marketing bonuses were included in their packages. In 2014, England, New Zealand and South Africa announced their first women’s contracts. It’s no surprise that the increased focus on power-hitting has come from these countries, followed closely by India (who have quickly kept pace) and West Indies.

That's one way to open your account!#AUSvPAK pic.twitter.com/Io7ED4fkNv

— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) January 24, 2023

While Jason Holder’s inclusion could add balance, their Indian fast-bowling stocks have been depleted by Prasidh Krishna’s injury

Ekanth26-Mar-2023Where Rajasthan Royals finished last seasonRajasthan Royals were runners-up in IPL 2022, finishing second in the league stage and losing the final to Gujarat Titans.Rajasthan Royals squad for IPL 2023Jos Buttler (wk), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Devdutt Padikkal, Sanju Samson (capt, wk), Shimron Hetmyer, Riyan Parag, Joe Root, Dhruv Jurel (wk), Donovan Ferreira, Kunal Singh Rathore, Jason Holder, Akash Vasisht, Abdul Basith, Yuzvendra Chahal, R Ashwin, Adam Zampa, KC Cariappa, M Ashwin, Trent Boult, Navdeep Saini, Obed McCoy, Kuldeep Sen, Kuldip Yadav, KM Asif, Sandeep Sharma.Player availability – Prasidh Krishna outPrasidh Krishna was ruled out of the season with a stress fracture of the back, which requires surgery. Sandeep Sharma, who went unsold at the player auction, has been named as his replacement.Obed McCoy is recovering from a knee injury and might sit out the early stages of the tournament.England will start their summer with a Test against Ireland on June 1, which is four days after the IPL final. While Chennai Super Kings’ Ben Stokes has said he will leave early to prepare, Joe Root’s availability for Royals for the closing stages of the IPL is unknown. England have eased up their approach with regards to allowing players complete their franchise-league commitments, as was seen during their limited-overs tour to Bangladesh.What’s new with Rajasthan Royals this yearJason Holder could be the solution to Royals’ problem of a long tail. In IPL 2022, 99.47% of Royals’ 2807 total runs came from the top seven.They could also start with Root instead of Shimron Hetmyer if they think they have enough firepower at the top and are instead looking for someone to bring stability in a crisis.There’s also the option of Root in place of Holder to further bolster the batting, and, in such a case, choose either Devdutt Padikkal or a bowler like KM Asif or Kuldeep Sen in the XI based on the toss result and use the Impact Player rule to substitute them later.They sent R Ashwin up the order as a pinch-hitter last season, which they could do once again if conditions suit the move. This year they can make the move with the comfort of knowing they have extra batting cushion if it does not come off.The good – Strong core for Sanju Samson’s boysRoyals have an experienced set of core players who are likely to feature in all of their games. Jos Buttler and Sanju Samson are gamechangers at the top; in Trent Boult, Yuzvendra Chahal and Ashwin they have wicket-taking as well as run-controlling options; Holder glues both disciplines together.Kumar Sangakkara and Lasith Malinga continue as head coach and director of cricket, and fast bowling coach respectively.The not-so-good – Inexperience in local pace ranksThey have Navdeep Saini and now Sharma, but in Prasidh’s absence, the inexperience of back-up bowlers Kuldip Yadav and Kuldeep Sen could show.They also lack like-for-like cover for Holder.Schedule insightsRoyals’ first two home games will be in Guwahati in Assam and not in Jaipur in Rajasthan, meaning a lack of familiarity to start off. And they don’t play in Jaipur until April 19th, their sixth game of the season.They largely have gaps of 2-3 days between their games (just twice, once at the end of April and then before their last league game of the season, do they have a four-day gap) so fatigue could be a factor.The big question

Ravindra’s knowledge of the conditions makes him as local as anyone can be, while Williamson, who’s working towards his comeback, is no stranger to these shores either

Shashank Kishore08-Oct-2023YH Chandrasekhar, the curator at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium, has one final look at the square at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium, seemingly happy with the work behind the scenes to get ready for the New Zealand vs Netherlands match on Monday. He suddenly gazes left, where Rachin Ravindra is training. He signals to him, but Ravindra is focused on the ball. The curator walks towards the centre nonetheless to exchange pleasantries. It dawns then that there’s a sense of familiarity between the two.In July, Ravindra was part of the Hutt Hawks, the Wellington-based club that his father runs, on an exchange programme to Hyderabad where they trained and played a series of 50-overs matches against the academy team run by MSK Prasad, the former India wicketkeeper and chief selector. Four of those matches were in Uppal, where Ravindra batted on three different centre strips, “training like mad” – according to Prasad – to fine-tune his game against pace and spin.He’d have a bowling session in the early morning, followed by breakfast. And then a 50-overs game until 4.30pm, followed by an hour’s rest and another indoor net session with the ball before calling it a day. It’s a routine he followed for the entire duration of his stay in Hyderabad, before he travelled to Anantapur, adjoining the Karnataka border, for more game time before returning home to Wellington.Related

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All this cricket was packed into a two-week calendar that was originally meant for him to be off to rest and recuperate ahead of the long season. While New Zealand’s squad hadn’t entirely been firmed up yet, Ravindra had been sounded out to be ready as he was among the probables picked for the high-performance camp.It’s this sense of familiarity that Ravindra will bank on as he returns to Hyderabad to play Netherlands in their second World Cup fixture. He may not be a local, but his knowledge of conditions and pitches makes him as local as anyone can be. His return to the venue couldn’t have been more grand, given he’s coming off a memorable World Cup hundred on debut against England in a sensational takedown with his good mate Devon Conway.A little over a week ago in Hyderabad, Ravindra batted with composure and poise to make 97 against a high-quality Pakistan attack in a warm-up game. Yet, he may have not played the World Cup opener had Kane Williamson been fit and available. But with Williamson still recuperating from an ACL injury, Ravindra had his chance and he’s made the most of it, giving Williamson and the team management healthy selection headaches.Rachin Ravindra hit a fine century on World Cup debut•Associated PressWilliamson himself is no stranger to these shores, having played eight IPL seasons for Sunrisers Hyderabad. He’s Kane to the local staff and fans. , a salutation in the local language Telugu, is reserved for someone much admired as Williamson is. But merely playing for the local franchise doesn’t guarantee cult status. With David Warner and Williamson, to a lesser extent, the popularity stems from their embracing the local culture, making them as much a fan favourite as a Virat Kohli or Rohit Sharma.If Warner did an imitation of the dance to send the small crowd into a tizzy during the warm-up game last week, Williamson has given them moments to cheer with his imitation of a dance gig from , an Oscar-winning chartbuster, during an ICC promotion. Beyond the familiarity and colour, the real reel fans, especially those back home, are interested in is from the nets, where they want to see if Williamson has managed to get back the whole range of his movements, if Tim Southee is bowling full tilt and if Lockie Ferguson brings his bristling energy to training.Williamson surveyed the ground, and pointed to the bright orange seating that hits your eye as the peak afternoon sun glows bright. It’s a humid day, he’s already guzzled quite a few bottles of water already, and is out to train. Williamson has been confirmed to sit out, but he’s the central focus of the team’s physio and trainers.He goes through a series of carefully orchestrated movements to test his full range of mobility. Like doing forward stretches to defend, playing the sweep to test his hamstring, rising onto his toes to tuck the ball, sprinting between the wickets, the trigger movement when he turns at full stretch – they were all carefully monitored and ticked off. The hope is he’ll be fit in time to play Bangladesh on Friday. And for him to get there, Williamson seems to have done most things in his capacity.Southee too bowled a fair bit, even if not full tilt, feeling his way back into full rhythm in an afternoon session where temperatures hovered over the mid-30s. Southee was carefully monitored by Trent Boult, whose late swing back in was quite a sight. Every now and then, there was laughter, banter and wholesome encouragement for each other as they pushed hard on match eve. Daryll Mitchell batted and batted, as did Will Young and Ravindra before they retired to the dressing room. Or so you thought as they all began to walk off.Williamson then nudged assistant coach Luke Ronchi as they walked right back into the nets again. Williamson wasn’t satisfied with the full range of his straight hitting. So, he tried to perfect hitting on length deliveries, asking Ronchi to chuck him balls in an area he circled out, focusing on holding his shape and then carefully feeling his side. Then to top off the session, Ronchi fed him full tosses which Williamson kept pulling until it got to a point where he couldn’t stay out any longer, with the sun going down.Watching Williamson train was watching a perfectionist practice his craft, oblivious to the world around him. The police sirens that marked the arrival of Netherlands, the chaos of the shutterbugs that followed to snap the team getting off the bus, the sound of the generator that was running full throttle behind him and smoke from the fumigation around the nets area – none of this seemed to cross his mind. He was simply, to quote the old cliche, seeing ball, hitting ball until the last lux of light allowed him to.

While other American players have struggled to get into the MLC’s starting XIs, this left-arm quick has made a stunning impact

Peter Della Penna23-Jul-2023When the team sheets were submitted on Saturday night at Church Street Park in Morrisville, North Carolina, there was only one player out of the 22 who had actually played for USA. In a first-year T20 franchise league launching in the USA, American players have been noticeably absent in the playing XIs.Saurabh Netravalkar may have been the American lone ranger for Washington Freedom in the Major League Cricket (MLC), but the left-arm pacer made the league-wide USA contingent hold their heads a little bit higher after a tournament best haul of 6 for 9 in Freedom’s 30-run win over San Francisco Unicorns. Church Street Park has become a de facto USA team home base since the men’s national side’s first visit in September 2018, when Netravalkar made his captaincy debut for the team. His familiarity with the nuances of the venue contributed to his ability to step up with a performance where he rocked Unicorns with three wickets in the powerplay before coming back with three wickets in the final over to wipe out the tail.”The ground, it was a known thing for me,” Netravalkar said in the post-match press conference. “But the kind of players that are there are world class, and you need to upskill your game. I think playing over these years, the three-year ODI cycle, that really helped us. Especially the World Cup Qualifiers was a huge step up as well, to play against teams like West Indies, Sri Lanka and Ireland. We’ve been working really hard as a unit, and I was really happy that I could execute today.”Related

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Netravalkar was USA’s best pacer at the recent 50-over World Cup Qualifier in Zimbabwe, but a neutral observer would hardly know it just looking at the wickets column. The 31-year-old finished with six wickets in five matches, including 3 for 53 against West Indies. However, he was denied at least a few more by the fielders behind him – USA were one of the most woeful catching units in Harare.Netravalkar himself was not exactly blameless on that front. And that much showed during his performances in the first week of MLC in Texas, where he had a crucial drop down the stretch against Seattle Orcas in Freedom’s first match, spilling a chance off Shimron Hetmyer on 9 when Anrich Nortje induced a false drive, before Hetmyer cranked a six later in the over and finished with 23 in a narrow win with two balls to spare. But thankfully for Netravalkar, Glenn Phillips provided the fielding standard – which is sorely lacking in the USA lineups – with some sensational fielding.Defending a total of 133, Phillips made his mark in the third over, running from backward point for a gymnastic twisting catch off Nortje to get Finn Allen. Netravalkar was clocking between 127 and 130 kph for most of his opening spell, which is hardly the type of pace to blow away top-class batters on the franchise scene. But true to his reputation as the most cerebral of USA’s bowlers – his day job is being a senior programmer for Oracle in Silicon Valley – Netravalkar used his favored left-arm around the wicket angle to the right-handers to enhance his natural inward shape, bowling Marcus Stoinis and Shadab Khan in the space of three balls in the fourth over. This was before he came back to team up with Phillips in the sixth as another acrobatic catch was taken running from backward point to remove Matthew Wade.”I think the pitch wasn’t that easy to hit [on] if you hit the good-length areas,” Netravalkar said. “We observed that it was a little two-paced in the wicket, so we knew that if we had a good powerplay, we always had a chance. We wanted to fight till the end. That was our motto, we never give up, and we try to fight until the last ball. T20 is a funny game. One over can change the game from here to there. So, we just wanted to believe in ourselves and keep trying, and I’m glad it worked out today.”

“I’m really clear about my role. That’s my strength. I look to swing the ball up front so I back myself to do that.”Saurabh Netravalkar

Coming back in the final over, Netravalkar continued where he left off in the sixth, getting Chaitanya Bishnoi edging behind while attempting an innovative flick after a shuffle across his stumps. It was fitting though that Phillips took the catch in the deep that completed Netravalkar’s five-wicket haul one ball later off a Haris Rauf slog. Liam Plunkett then edged behind in more orthodox fashion to give Netravalkar his sixth.In a bowling unit featuring Nortje and Marco Jansen, few people would have put money on Netravalkar being Freedom’s leading wicket-taker after four matches. But Netravalkar is not only topping the bowling charts for Freedom but sits in first place in the MLC wickets column alongside legspinner Mohammad Mohsin of Texas Super Kings with eight. Netravalkar is quick to give credit, though, to the more heralded South Africans he’s been able to rub shoulders with in the dressing room, who have helped give him strategic tips to achieve the success he’s had so far in the tournament.”I’m blessed to have a team atmosphere like this,” Netravalkar said. “It’s really positive and the staff and captain, they give us so much clarity in the roles. Even the senior bowlers, we have good productive meetings where we brainstorm ideas and that’s really helping me learn a lot in bowling in different situations. I’m really clear about my role. That’s my strength. I look to swing the ball up front so I back myself to do that, and I’m glad I’m executing it.”

Both have been selected for the Afghanistan T20Is, and look set to make the World Cup squad too. But should they feature in India’s best T20 XI?

Sidharth Monga08-Jan-20246:24

Is the Rohit-Kohli T20I selection a step forward or back?

There is every chance Rohit Sharma carries his ODI World Cup form into the T20 World Cup. He already has the intent. Who is to rule out that he unleashes the turbocharged version of the 135-plus strike rate in the powerplays in ODIs and continues going even harder after the sixth over in T20s, not putting a heavy price on his wicket because he knows of the muscle to follow?If Virat Kohli makes up his mind, can he not take on the spinners in the middle overs? He can even open the innings, thus forcing the opposition to bowl spin in the powerplay, and manages to hit them because of the field restrictions reducing the amount of spin India have to face in the middle overs.Anything can happen in T20 cricket especially with conditions being such a big unknown. Yet, on this day, the 8th of January, about five months before the T20 World Cup, it can objectively be said India are hoping to derive different results by doing the same thing over and over again.Related

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The story of the last four T20 World Cups has been the same. India’s top order has been caught batting first in a game, unenterprisingly so, which has resulted in their ouster. Unless they are hoping to win every toss and be chasing, there must be some compelling reasons to pick a similar squad for the Afghanistan T20I series, which all but guarantees Rohit and Kohli will go to the World Cup now after having not played any T20 internationals since the 2022 T20 World Cup.Rohit has not had a year in T20 cricket where he has struck at 140 or above since 2018. His IPL team has already replaced him as captain looking at a prolonged dry run as a batter.Kohli faced 124 balls of spin in the middle overs of the IPL last year for a strike-rate of just 110. He made just 32 attempts to hit a boundary. By comparison, Suryakumar Yadav tried to hit a boundary off 59 out of 148 balls of spin he faced in the middle overs. In the whole of IPL, a boundary attempt was made once every 3.43 balls of spin in the middle overs, which is better than Kohli doing it once every 3.88 balls. If he bats at No. 3, Kohli’s main role will be in these middle overs.It seems likely that both Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli will be part of India’s 2024 World Cup squad•AFP/Getty ImagesThese are the most obvious and basic things for us to point out. The selectors and the team management are equipped with more advanced metrics that will tell you an XI is too small for two such batters. Perhaps even one. The decision-makers in this case are smart former cricketers who are not being unmindful. In that case, in the absence of a press conference following the selection, we must try to look at plausible reasons.Hardik Pandya is injured. His fitness and availability are not the most reliable at the best of times. In his absence, Suryakumar captained the side for the Australia T20Is in late November last year, but he is injured too. This team for the Afghanistan series seems to be one of those rare selections where a captain has been chosen before debating the best 15. It seems they felt the team needed a leader, and they saw something promising in Rohit’s form and intent in ODIs.In all likelihood, once they brought Rohit back, leaving out Kohli, which in any case would have been an unpopular and a bold decision, it became even more so because how do you bring back one and leave out the other? We anticipated that dilemma once Rahul Dravid accepted an extension to his coaching job.A month later, despite being aware of everything, the leaders of the team have decided to bring back both Rohit and Kohli, which will likely result in there being no room for Tilak Varma, Shreyas Iyer or Rinku Singh in the playing XI. Even Shubman Gill for that matter, who had a great IPL 2023 showing both intent and the game to play the T20 format. These are players who provide a better structure to the team by being either left-hand or a spin hitter or a “finisher”. Players in whom the leadership invested between the two World Cups. Players who proved themselves.Rinku Singh has shown his love for finishing games in T20Is as well•Gallo Images/Getty ImagesIf there is a saving grace, it is that Kohli seems to have read the room. He attacked one in eight balls of spin in the middle overs in the IPL 2022 and had a strike rate of 105. That intent has definitely improved. There is also an element of asking Kohli to show an improved game in this series against Afghanistan and the IPL 2024 because he could have easily waltzed back in without any games straight into the T20 World Cup side. The same probably goes for Rohit.There is still room then to leave both or one of them out if their game doesn’t look up to the scratch for the T20 format. There is probably an element of them not coming back as a matter of right. That they actually have to earn their spots.These two are ultimate competitors and expert batters. You can’t bet against them achieving anything if they put their mind to it. Rohit has a game more naturally suited to the format so perhaps he will find it easier than Kohli, who on his part, is batting as well as he has ever batted in the other two formats. At this point, though, all that is more hope than evidence-based conviction.