'You've got to sex up Test cricket'
2009-07-04 04:22:31David Morgan recently said the ICC would consider the prospect of four-day Test matches, which set people talking
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Rain gave India the advantage - Kirsten
2009-07-04 04:05:50Gary Kirsten, India's coach, has credited India's innings not being affected as much as by inclement weather as crucial to taking a series lead
Agent provocateur
2009-07-04 04:00:16He was the main event both on and off the field - sledging, jesting, fighting, winning, and getting up people's noses most of all
Cricket-West Indies v India scoreboard
2009-07-04 02:23:12GROS ISLET, St.Lucia, July 3 (Reuters) - Scoreboard from the third one day international between West Indies and India at the Beausejour Stadium on Friday.
How the Ashes got their name
2009-07-04 01:52:00
Mention the word 'Ashes' to any cricket fan and they know you are talking about a Test contest between England and Australia.
North tells critics to lay off Hughes
2009-07-04 01:01:47Marcus North has urged detractors of Phillip Hughes not to make too much into the Australia opener's failures against England's back-up bowlers ahead of next week's first Ashes Test.
Dhoni leads India to victory
2009-07-04 00:28:11India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni struck an unbeaten 46 from 32 balls to lead his side to a six-wicket victory in the third ODI.
Most fans agree 2008 best year for SA cricket
2009-07-04 00:13:00
Cricket-Skipper Dhoni guides India to last over win
2009-07-04 00:06:23GROS ISLET, St. Lucia, July 3 (Reuters) - Skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni struck an unbeaten 46 off 34 balls to guide India to a six-wicket victory, under the Duckworth-Lewis method, in a rain affected third one-dayer against West Indies on Friday.
Angus Fraser on Ashes mind games
2009-07-04 00:01:58
Test matches against Australia have and always will provide cricketers with the ultimate challenge. England may have dominated early Ashes confrontations, and the West Indies did rule the cricketing world in the late Seventies, Eighties and early Nineties, but in the 133 years that Test cricket has been played, no team comes close to matching Australia's win ratio of almost 50 per cent. The quality of cricketer produced Down Under is consistently high, and that is why contests against Australia continue to provide opponents with an accurate reading of where and how good they are as individuals and a team.
Who can decide the Ashes?
2009-07-04 00:01:52
The Independent's cricket correspondent Stephen Brenkley gives his guide to the key players battling for the urn.
Angus Fraser's key steps to winning the Ashes
2009-07-04 00:01:51
Former England cricketer Angus Fraser pinpoints five key areas to target if you're to lift the famous urn.
Six rules for watching the Ashes this summer
2009-07-04 00:01:41
James Corrigan lays down a few ground rules for watching this summer's sporting spectacle.
Your complete guide to The Ashes
2009-07-04 00:01:34
The key players, the legendary series and the crucial factors for 2009, plus interviews with Alastair Cook, David Gower and Mike Hussey plus much much more in The Independent's guide to this summers Ashes.
The joy of sledging
2009-07-04 00:01:30
Douglas Jardine had appeared at the door of the Australian dressing room, objecting that he had heard himself described as a "bastard" on the field. Vic Richardson, the vice-captain, turned to his team. "All right, which one of you bastards called this bastard a bastard?"
Phil Hughes is Australia's danger man
2009-07-04 00:01:25
The fear of failure is a frailty most cricketers have to confront on a daily basis. Everyone has their own way of dealing with it, with some handling it better than others. Successful players are characterised by daring, a self belief and confidence that is almost disdainful of consequence. They cope with it better than the rest.
Mike Hussey: 'I've waited for this since I was a kid'
2009-07-04 00:01:21
They called him Mr Cricket and for a while he was a left-handed Bradman. In the first 20 matches of a Test career for which he had waited like a lovesick kid pining for a girlfriend Mike Hussey scored eight hundreds and eight other scores above fifty. His average was 84. This was consummation of a high order.
How England have regained previous Ashes
2009-07-04 00:01:20
England have regained the Ashes at home only six times. Each series was hard-fought, many were controversial, none was dull. Stephen Brenkley tells the heroes' stories.
David Gower: 'Strauss can be very good, but there are few greats in this game'
2009-07-04 00:01:10
England approach an Ashes series captained by an equable, public school-educated, left-handed batsman, whose brief includes the careful handling of a barnstorming player previously deposed as captain himself. For 2009 read 1989, for Andrew Strauss read David Gower, and for Kevin Pietersen read Ian Botham. And if you still need convincing that nothing is new under the cricketing sun, consider the abject relations between captain and coach 20 years ago. Pietersen and Peter Moores, whose mutual lack of empathy in the end did for both of them, were Darby and Joan compared with Gower and Micky Stewart.
Alastair Cook: The first among equals
2009-07-04 00:01:08
Alastair Cook is 24 and has scored 3,287 Test runs. No England batsman has amassed so many so young and when he is 34, given a fair wind, Cook may well be the heaviest scorer of the lot. Ahead of Graham Gooch, Geoff Boycott, David Gower and, who knows, Kevin Pietersen.
James Lawton: Australia are a ruthless winning machine
2009-07-04 00:01:01
One of Shane Warne's more withering lines of propaganda is that England would not have the beginnings of an Ashes challenge without their heavyweight foreign mercenary Kevin Pietersen.
Hughes falls again to fiery Harmison
2009-07-04 00:00:01
Good old Middlesex. There were those who thought the county was being disloyal by employing Phil Hughes at the start of an Ashes summer, thereby giving the young Australian a chance to sample English conditions for the first time in his life. But not a bit of it, you see.