Indian News Round-Up

Former Pakistan captain and the coordinator of the Cricketers' Benefit Fund Series (CBFS), Asif Iqbal is of the view that there are no hindrances to the future participation of India in tournaments staged in Sharjah.

Speaking to the United News of India in Sharjah about India's participation in the trination Tournament next April, Asif Iqbal said that unlike the Sahara Cup, there will be a third team participating in the tourney and added that India has a contractual obligation for playing at the venue.

Moreover, Asif Iqbal felt that cricket has gone from strength to strength with every tournament staged and found no reason why India could not participate in the tournament staged at Sharjah.

The members of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) Pitches Committee, G Kasturirangan and Dhiraj Parsana on Tuesday visited the Vidarbha Cricket Association ground in order to inspect the venue for the second Test between India and Zimbabwe, scheduled to be held in Nagpur from November 25 to 29.

Meanwhile the Vidarbha Cricket Association (VCA) named a list of 20 probables for this season's Ranji Trophy Tournament. The final 16-member team is to be named on November 2.

The probables: MS Dosi, PV Gandhe, Vivek Naidu, SA Khare, AM Piprode, AM Jichkar, UI Patil, SU Harbade, PJ Janbandhu, AS Manohar Dhiraj Sharma, AB Waghmare, Kishore Ben, Mangesh Kulkarni, BA Yadav, AS Naidu, AV Deshpande, CE Atram, Rahul Jadhav and Ali Akhbar.

All rounder KN Ananthapadmanabhan will lead Kerala in the first two matches in the South Zone Ranji Trophy league this season. Medium pacer Prashant Chandran is the only debutant in the squad.

Releasing the 14-member team list, S Haridass, secretary, Kerala Cricket Association (KCA), said the team was for the first two matches against Andhra and Hyderabad. Kerala faces Andhra at Vijayawada from November 1 to 4, while they take on Hyderabad from November 8 to 11 at Hyderabad.

After these two matches, Kerala is scheduled to play Goa from November 15 to 18, Karnataka from November 22 to 25 and Tamil Nadu from November 29 to December 2 - all at Kochi.

The following is the squad for the first two games: KN Ananthapadmanabhan, Sunil Oasis (vice captain), MP Sorab, S Shanker, NA Kudua, B Ramprakash, R Menon, M Suresh Kumar, VB Kamaruddin (wicketkeeper), CP Menon, V Girilal, S Nair, T Yohannan, P Chandran. Coach : P Balachandran. Manager: R Radhakrishnan

The Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA) has named Indian all rounder Robin Singh as the captain of the State Ranji Trophy team for the 2000-2001 season. Tamil Nadu are slated to take on Goa in their first match of the season from November 1 to 4.

Apart from the 16-member squad, the TNCA has also named C Hemanth Kumar, Vidyuth Sivaramakrishnan, TR Arasu, JR Madanagopal and Ashique Ali as the stand byes.

The team: Robin Singh (captain), S Sriram (vice captain), Hemang K Badani, S Ramesh, Aashish Kapoor, S Sharath, S Reuben Paul (wicket keeper), T Kumaran, S Mahesh, R Sathish, Rajat Bhatia, SV Saravanan, MR Shrinivas, WD Balaji Rao and S Badrinath. Coach: K Bharath Kumar; Manager: KRK Namdev.