South African spinner Paul Harris took a career-best 5-73 against Pakistan as the visitors extended their lead on the third day of the first Test in Karachi on Wednesday. The 28-year-old left-armer took full advantage of a spin-friendly pitch to help dismiss the home team for 291.
Pakistan will have to fight hard to save the first Test against South Africa after a masterly knock of 155 by Jacques Kallis put the tourists in command at the National Stadium in Karachi on Tuesday. At the close on the second day, Pakistan were 127-5 in reply to South Africa’s first innings total of 450, still needing a further 124 to avoid the follow-on.
Jacques Kallis scored his 25th Test century to guide South Africa to a commanding 294-3 after the opening day of the first Test against Pakistan at the National Stadium in Karachi on Monday. Kallis (118 not out) and Hashim Amla (71) put on 170 for the third wicket to justify captain Graeme Smith’s decision to bat first on a slow pitch.
South Africa got off to a solid start on the opening day of the first Test against Pakistan at the National stadium on Monday, going in to lunch at 96-1. On a perfect pitch for spinners, skipper Graeme Smith was the only casualty of the opening session when he was trapped leg before by part timer off-spinner Mohammad Hafeez.
South African captain Graeme Smith won the toss and elected to bat in the first Test against Pakistan on Monday after Pakistan batsman Mohammad Yousuf pulled out at the last minute. The 33-year-old Yousuf last week cancelled his contract with a rebel Indian league and made himself available for Pakistan.
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/ 30 September 2007
South African skipper Graeme Smith believes putting runs on the board early will be key for his side in a test series against Pakistan starting from Monday. Smith and Herschelle Gibbs are set to resume their opening partnership in the first test at the National stadium.
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/ 28 September 2007
South African all-rounder Shaun Pollock has been dropped for the first time in his career and will not play in the first Test against Pakistan which begins on Monday. ”I am surprised and disappointed at not being considered for the first Test,” Pollock told a news conference on Friday.
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/ 26 September 2007
Pakistan deployed dozens of police officers including elite commandos as the South African cricket team arrived in Karachi on Wednesday for a month-long tour of the country. South Africa are due to play two Tests and five one-day internationals in the violence-hit Islamic republic.
Pakistan on Wednesday changed venues for two of its one-day international cricket matches against South Africa ahead of a tour next month, officials said. The Pakistan Cricket Board cited a lack of cricket facilities in Peshawar and Rawalpindi as reasons for the change, but sources inside the governing body said the fragile security situation in both cities was the main reason.
Pakistan cricket officials said on Thursday they might move two matches against South Africa from Peshawar and Rawalpindi, but denied any action would be linked to security concerns. ”There may be changes in two venues of one-day internationals in the home series against South Africa,” Pakistan Cricket Board director of operations Zakir Khan said.
Sitting cross-legged on a carpet in Karachi’s largest Islamic school, cleric Mufti Muhammad Naeem voiced fears of civil war if President Pervez Musharraf escalates his fight against militancy in Pakistan’s north-west. ”Musharraf has chosen a dangerous path,” said Naeem.
The Pakistan Cricket Board confirmed former Australian fast bowler Geoff Lawson as their new cricket coach on Monday. Board chairperson Nasim Ashraf told a news conference that Lawson had been preferred over two other short-listed candidates, Dav Whatmore and Richard Done.
A cyclone hit the coast of Pakistan on Tuesday, dumping torrential rain over a thinly populated region days after about 230 people were killed when a storm lashed the country’s biggest city, Karachi. Authorities in Pakistan and neighbouring India have evacuated thousands of people from low-lying areas after weekend storms and flooding killed nearly 400 people.
Storms and torrential rain have killed more than 200 people in Pakistan’s biggest city, Karachi, a provincial minister said on Sunday, and left angry residents without power. More bad weather is forecast for Pakistan and neighbouring India, where dozens have died after prolonged downpours across the country in the last few days.
More than 200 people were killed as torrential rain and thunderstorms lashed the Pakistani port city of Karachi on Sunday, destroying hundreds of homes and causing widespread power outages. Gale-force winds uprooted trees and power pylons and blew down roofs and walls, crushing and electrocuting scores of victims.
Pakistan’s cricket chief said on Wednesday it was time for the national team to move on after Jamaican police revealed that coach Bob Woolmer was not murdered after all, and died of natural causes. Nasim Ashraf, chairperson of the Pakistan Cricket Board, said he was glad to see the end of a ”traumatic” three months.
Pakistani cricket chiefs said they hoped an expected announcement on Tuesday by Jamaican police on the death of Bob Woolmer would show that their former coach was not murdered. Jamaica’s police commissioner Lucius Thomas is expected to announce that Woolmer died of natural causes.
The India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh cricket boards will discuss the possibility of reducing the duration of the 2011 Cricket World Cup. Officials from the four South Asian Test-playing nations, who will co-host the next World Cup, will meet in Pakistan on June 18, a senior Pakistan Cricket Board official said.
A robber who tried to hold up a bank using a baby doll and a blood pressure pump was in custody on Wednesday after his heist failed, a Pakistani newspaper reported. The 25-year-old burst into the bank in Karachi on Monday brandishing the doll, which he claimed was a bomb, and the pump, which he said was a hand grenade.
Former Pakistan captain Inzamam-ul-Haq on Friday hit back at an official report that described him as a ”dictator” and blamed him for the team’s disastrous World Cup showing. The Pakistan Cricket Board inquiry concluded that Inzamam’s attitude was ”haughty and that of a dictator” and said he should have been removed as captain before the World Cup.
Pakistan’s biggest city was tense but quiet on Sunday a day after at least 34 people were killed when pro-government and opposition activists clashed as the country’s suspended top judge tried to meet supporters. A judicial crisis over government attempts to remove Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry has escalated into the worst political street violence Pakistan has seen since the 1980s.
Eighteen people were killed in Karachi on Saturday in clashes between pro-government and opposition activists over the arrival of the country’s suspended top judge to rally support for his cause. Opposition leaders said Karachi was under siege by supporters of the pro-government Muttahida Qaumi Movement.
Twenty-seven people were killed and 100 wounded in Karachi on Saturday in clashes between pro-government and opposition activists as Pakistan’s suspended top judge tried to hold a rally with his supporters. Heavy gunfire erupted in several parts of Karachi as gunmen battled and smoke billowed from more than 100 burning vehicles.
A Pakistani investigator on Tuesday said that a probe into the cause of death of national cricket coach Bob Woolmer was still inconclusive. Woolmer (58) was found dead in his Jamaican hotel room on March 18, the day after Pakistan crashed out of the World Cup by losing to minnows Ireland.
The Pakistan Cricket Board has named all-rounder Shoaib Malik as captain of the national team following the resignation of Inzamam-ul-Haq in the wake of the side’s early World Cup exit. The 25-year-old, who has played in 18 Tests and 137 one-day internationals, was handed the role until the end of the year for the Test and one-day squads.
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Pakistan’s Inzamam-ul-Haq has said the World Cup would have been halted anywhere else in the world other than the Caribbean after the suspected murder there of coach Bob Woolmer. Inzamam also suggested the death of Pakistan coach Woolmer was due to a security lapse.
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Pakistan cricket board officials suspect that the death of coach Bob Woolmer was due to natural causes and that the Jamaican police acted hastily by declaring it a murder. A senior official of the board said they had received information that there could have been mistakes in the first autopsy on Woolmer’s body.
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Angry fans told Pakistani cricketers to ”go to hell” as they returned home on Wednesday, still reeling from the murder of coach Bob Woolmer and their humiliating World Cup exit. ”Why have you come back?” one fan shouted as the players were protected by dozens of uniformed police.
Pakistan pace bowlers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif have been ruled out of the World Cup due to injury, a senior cricket board official said on Thursday. The double withdrawal comes just five months after the pair tested positive for the anabolic steroid nandrolone and were banned by their national board before an appeal panel cleared them to play again.
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/ 26 February 2007
Australian umpire Darrell Hair has withdrawn his racial discrimination case against Pakistan, the country’s cricket board said on Monday. ”We have been informed that Hair has withdrawn his case of racial discrimination against us and it doesn’t surprises us because he couldn’t sue us for what happened to him,” Pakistan Cricket Board director of operations Salim Altaf said.
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/ 20 February 2007
Fitness and fielding hold the key if Pakistan want to turn their huge potential into success in the World Cup in the Caribbean. Pakistan have had a dismal build-up to their Cup campaign as question marks hang over the fitness of key bowlers Shoaib Akhtar, Mohammad Asif and Umar Gul, with fears that none could feature.
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/ 8 February 2007
Pakistani all-rounder Shahid Afridi has been charged by the International Cricket Council (ICC) for conduct unbecoming after an incident during the first one-day international against South Africa. The ICC said on its website on Thursday that the charge was brought by chief executive Malcolm Speed for conduct that could bring players and officials or the game of cricket into disrepute.