Three shirts, eight sweat bands, and 4000 Twitter followers

Settling in with Chennai's Super Kings

Australia news

The debate over discipline versus winning at all costs

In The Hindu, Greg Chappell states that the recent events within the Australian team reflect a bold attitude and the decision may have helped stem a decline in team attitudes.

One can argue that things should have been done differently, in days gone by it would have been handled man to man over a beer, but the world has changed so one has to assume that previous warnings or exhortations went unheeded. In that case the only recourse was to use selection as the blunt instrument to get the message across.

Thirty-two years ago, an Australian captain asked his brother to bowl an underam delivery to stop New Zealand from scoring a six off the last ball. In Mid Day, Clayton Murzello recollects the win-at-all-costs attitude of previous Australian teams and says the current side places more emphasis on discipline.

The discipline aspect is vital too, but Australia have not given themselves the best chance to win. Michael Clarke ought to realise that the last time Australia won a Test in India was when his career was just three Test matches old. He will play his 92nd today in Mohali.

England news

Shut out the Ashes talk

In the Guardian, Mike Selvey analyses England's problems at the start of an overseas series and suggests they filter out any Ashes-related talk ahead of the second Test against New Zealand.

One also senses that the tour is still widely seen only as an hors d'oeuvre for the main Ashes course to come.
Away from the team the talk surrounding it is incessant, be it ticket sales or what Australia's performance in India means for those series, or who has the greater depth of pace bowling, and much of it must filter down to all involved with the England team. It is unavoidable and they would not be human if they did not cast an eye to the excitement ahead. But to succeed as a player you have to live in the moment.

Reluctant but brave

Australian cricket

Bradman on film, in Canada

Every so often we get a glimpse of how Don Bradman batted and now the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia has released previously unseen footage of "The Don" playing on a privately organised tour of Canada in 1932.

The film, which you can watch a segment of courtesy of the Daily Telegraph, shows Bradman in action against an All-Toronto side. During the match in question, he made 52 (after Toronto had been dismissed for 80) but a title card informs the viewer that he went on to break the Canadian record by scoring 260 against Western Ontario. The footage is thought to be the only in existence showing Bradman in action outside Australia or the United Kingdom, the two countries where he made all of his 52 Test appearances.

The Toronto leg was part of the 51-match "Goodwill Tour" of north America, which also served in part as the recently married Bradman's honeymoon. However, while Bradman would lead his "Invicibles" around England 16 years later, on this trip the Australians were beaten - Vancouver the team to blemish their record.

England begin on amateurish note

The South Africa night parade

No second teams anymore

The biggest cricket fan in India

Bullseye

What's in a Suriname? George Bailey's visa

No cricketer can have gone to more extraordinary lengths to secure an India visa for the IPL than Chennai's George Bailey. Following the end of Australia's Twenty20 series against the West Indies, Bailey flew all the way from Barbados to the South American nation of Suriname in search of his travel documents - having been given some odd advice that it could not be obtained in the nearby Caribbean island of Trinidad as expected.

Having picked up his visa in the capital, Paramaribo, Bailey and his driver set off for the airport to fly back to Barbados. It soon became clear they were no chance of making the flight time, at which point Bailey's driver announced that he knew the pilot and would call him. Asked to delay the flight until the car arrived, the pilot happily obliged, but when Bailey reached the plane, some time after it was due to depart, the pilot insisted on having his photo taken with Bailey before departing. Bailey then turned up on day two of Australia's tour match against the WICB President's XI at the Three Ws Oval to relay his traveller's tale.

An inviting university town

Here lie Trumper and Fingleton

Tales of the Don

The cricketers' chef

The perils of being an England fan

Matty or Trotty?

Abu Dhabi: plenty to do