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Surrey have awarded Ian Salisbury a benefit for 2007 to mark 10 years with the club. He arrived at Surrey from Sussex in 1997 and was awarded his cap the following year.Salisbury, Surrey’s leading wicket taker so far this season, has taken 833 wickets at an average of 32.44 in first-class cricket and has also scored 6401 runs at 20.64. He played 15 Tests and four one-day internationals for England between 1992 and 2000 and was part of team that won in Pakistan for the first time in 39 years.Paul Sheldon, Surrey’s chief executive, said: “Ian has been a huge asset to Surrey both on and off the field. He played a vital role in the success of the three-time Championship winning side and continues to perform for the club at the highest level. We all wish him the very best for a successful benefit year.”Salisbury added: “It’s a huge honour to be awarded with a benefit in my tenth year with the club. Since I joined in 1997, I have been lucky to play with some extremely talented cricketers, so receiving this honour makes me feel very privileged. I am fortunate to have some great memories since I joined the club and hope that there will be many more to come.”

The ICC has confirmed that they received a request from the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to hold an inquiry into the conduct of umpire Darrell Hair, the umpire at the centre of the ball-tampering row at The Oval.Inzamam-ul-Haq, the Pakistan captain, was charged with ball-tampering and bringing the game into disrepute, and his disciplinary hearing has been delayed till the end of September. However, Shaharyar Khan, the PCB chairman, had requested the ICC to throughly investigate Hair first before any charges against Inzamam are imposed.”We are not pressing any charges”, Shaharyar told AFP. “We are simply requesting that Mr Hair should be investigated.”Shaharyar was hopeful that Inzamam will be cleared before Pakistan select their squad for the Champions Trophy in India in October. If found guilty of both charges, Inzamam could be banned for upto eight one-day internationals or four Tests.”We are very hopeful that the charges against Inzamam would be dropped so to say that we are thinking about whether to select him for the Champions Trophy is not current”, Shaharyar told , a Pakistan-based daily. “It is too early for that. Inzamam has a strong case and he remains our captain for the Champions Trophy.””This is a very pertinent issue for us,” Saleem Altaf, director of cricket operations, added. “Our selectors want to know if they are allowed to replace him if he is banned after being named in the squad. Don’t forget besides being captain he also a key player for us. He rates high in the planning for the tournament.”The ICC’s deadline for all participating teams to confirm their squads for the tournament is September 7.

Herschelle Gibbs will meet with Indian police to be questioned over his involvement in the Hansie Cronje match-fixing scandal when he arrives ahead of the Champions Trophy.It will be Gibbs’s first tour of India since the 2000 trip which led to match-fixing hitting the headlines a few weeks later. The rest of the South African squad left Johanneburg on Wednesday, but Gibbs is not flying until October 10. He will then have a brief meeting with Indian police when he arrives in Delhi.”Herschelle will fly on the night of October 10 straight to Delhi and will be accompanied by his lawyer,” said Mickey Arthur, South Africa’s coach. “He has an appointment with KK Paul [the Indian policeman leading the match-fixing investigation], which we are led to believe will take an hour-and-a-half.”He will then join the rest of the team in Mumbai ahead of the practice game on the 13th. His legal team has it all under control, Herschelle just has to get through it all, but I fully expect him to be fine. He’s really determined to have a big season.”Following the meeting Gibbs will join up with his team-mates and prepare for South Africa’s opening match of the tournament, against New Zealand, on October 16.The police prosecution department in Delhi also confirmed that the case remains on file against Gibbs. “We will re-open the case and if some kind of interrogation is required then it will be done,” Y.S. Yadav, Director of Prosecution, told AFP.

Essex have announced that Grant Flower, the Zimbabwean allrounder, has signed a new two-year contract with the club that lasts end of the 2008 season.Flower, 35, whose brother Andy also plays for the club, scored 307 runs at 34.11 and took seven wickets at 23.71 in six Championship matches last season, and was a key member of their one-day team.”I see myself more now in the one-day set-up, but if there are any injuries or loss of form then hopefully I can be ready to take my chances in the Championship side as well,” Flower told the club’s website. “It’s not about the individual – and if the team’s doing well and I’ve got some sort of role with Essex then I’ll be pretty happy”.Flower played 67 Tests for Zimbabwe before retiring from international cricket in 2004, and joins Alex Tudor and Ryan Ten Doeschate who also signed new deals with the club in recent weeks.

In a curious incident of the missing match-referee, the Delhi v Uttar Pradesh match at the Feroz Shah Kotla was abandoned on the final day. The match referee and one of the umpires were missing from the ground for close to 90 minutes even as the players waited for them to start play.The two umpires – I Shivaram of Hyderabad and Sameer Bandekar of Mumbai – decided at 9:15 am that the light was not good for play to begin. The light improved around 11 am and the players prepared to take the field but there was no sign of the match referee, Sambran Banerjee, and umpire Bandekar.The two coaches – Chetan Chauhan of Delhi and Rajinder Singh Hans of Uttar Pradesh – were stumped at the turn of events: “We are ready to play, but we have no idea why they (officials) are not starting,” he was quoted in . Delhi & District Cricket Association (DDCA) general secretary Sneh Bansal agreed that the conditions were perfect for cricket, and was left wondering why play did not start.The two officials reappeared at 11.45am and Bannerjee hid behind the excuse of being in the toilet. Yet, that was no way of excusing a delay of 90 minutes. The same newspaper also reported that Bandekar and Banerjee had gone to St. Stephens ground to watch a Bengal-Punjab Under-22 match. The match was then called off just after lunch, when light was not indeed good for play. “They decided to call it off at lunch,” said one of the players involved, “and didn’t wait a little longer to see if the light improves.”The DDCA Sports Secretary Sunil Dev was furious. “The irresponsible conduct of the two officials has denied Delhi batting practice and also robbed Aakash Chopra of the chance to complete his second century of the match,” he said. “I will request the DDCA to file a complaint with the BCCI.”

If it is not bad enough for England that they are staring at an Ashes whitewash, they have now suffered the ridicule of being asked to bring their best game to Sydney by Australia’s coach. As Australia named an unchanged 12 for the fifth Test starting on Tuesday, John Buchanan said he wanted the visitors to give his side a proper contest instead of competing for only short periods.England have become used to being patronised by their own supporters over the past month, but the plea from an opposition coach might be enough to stir them into action. “I’m hoping they really enjoy the New Year and come back with a new resolve and are really ready to take us head-on in Sydney,” Buchanan said. “There is nothing to lose for them and I’m sure they don’t want to go down 5-0 and I’m sure we want to go up 5-0. It’s a real challenge ahead for England.”The tourists have had chances in each game but the momentum has been stolen from them and Australia marched to a 4-0 advantage with the three-day win at Melbourne on Thursday. Buchanan said players and teams should be measured on how they operate during the tough moments and England have faltered. “We’ve been tested at certain periods of time,” he said, “but they haven’t been able to sustain their skills through five days.”Buchanan recognised the problems as the same ones Australia suffered on the 2005 Ashes tour, but he did not feel any sympathy for England’s plight. Australia are on an 11-match winning streak heading into the SCG and Buchanan is pleased they have achieved their pre-series aims of regaining the urn in convincing fashion.”We wanted to re-establish the gap between us and what is supposedly the second best team in the world,” he said. “Part of that is the way we play and part of it the way they play. We’ve won ten from ten for the year and it’s up to the other teams to come chasing us. We want to kick off 2007 the right way.”The way England have abandoned the attacking approach of 2005 has surprised Buchanan and Australia recognised the change in attitude during both batting innings at Adelaide. “It didn’t suggest the team was going to play with aggression, belief in themselves, challenge the opposition, take risks or back themselves in any situation,” he said. “In looking at those plans they were not necessarily the side we faced in 2005. There was definitely something missing.”Australia’s unchanged squad means there is no place for Stuart MacGill on his home ground. MacGill has not been included in any of the Test plans this summer and with Shane Warne retiring at Sydney the selectors may already be looking at the next generation. Andrew Symonds will be expected to use his offspin and it is unlikely Australia will make any alterations to the line-up, with Mitchell Johnson spending his fifth match in a row as 12th man.Australia squad Matthew Hayden, Justin Langer, Ricky Ponting, Michael Hussey, Michael Clarke, Andrew Symonds, Adam Gilchrist, Shane Warne, Brett Lee, Stuart Clark, Glenn McGrath, Mitchell Johnson.

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India rounded off a sensational year with an unsurprisingly one-sided victory over Sri Lanka to take their second Asia Cup title in 12 months. They stormed through the tournament with win after win and eventually rolled Sri Lanka over to win by eight wickets.Sri Lanka, who were beaten finalists earlier this year, were never in the hunt. After choosing to bat they lost their first wicket with 4 on the board and didn’t recover, making just 93. The pace bowler Jhulan Goswami was unusually expensive, with an economy rate of 5.75, but she made a vital incision, trapping the opener Dedunu Silva for 2 to puncture Sri Lanka. They quickly deflated.Sunetra Paranjpe saw India home with an unbeaten 35, to finish with a tournament average of 62, and Mithali Raj joined her, with 17 not out. Sri Lanka badly needed early wickets and, although India lost their two openers along the way, there was no real contest.India’s win caps a year of prosperity on and off the pitch. They beat England in a Test for the first time, and on English soil, too, to take the series 1-0, although they lost the one-day series. They have also benefited from their board’s merger with the richest cricket board, the BCCI, which has provided them with better fees, facilities and transport.No team can touch them in the Asia Cup – they have lifted the title three times out of three – but already they will be working towards their next big target: to lift the World Cup. They became the first team in the subcontinent to reach the final last year, but fell away drastically to Australia. They will now be aiming to go one better, in Australia in 2009.

Shaun Pollock, Ashwell Prince and Andre Nel have all received a mid-season bonus from Cricket South Africa (CSA) because of their outstanding performances during 2006-07. Each man has received an upgrade to their current contracts.The decision was announced on Wednesday by Gerald Majola, the chief executive of CSA, two days before the second Test against Pakistan at Port Elizabeth.”Shaun, Ashwell and Andre have played pivotal roles in the success of the Proteas this season,” said Majola. “CSA has consequently decided to upgrade their contracts mid-season as a reward for their hard work, commitment to the team effort and outstanding performances on the field”.Pollock, who was Man of the Series in both the Tests and one-dayers against India, moves from “A” to “A+”. He took 13 wickets at 16 and scored 187 runs at 31.16 in the 2-1 Test win, and also picked up 10 wickets at 8.30 in the one-dayers.Prince and Nel, meanwhile, go from “C” to “B” contracts. Prince captained South Africa in two Tests against Sri Lanka, before scoring 121 against India at Durban and 138 against Pakistan at Centurion last week. He is his country’s leading run-scorer in Test cricket this season with 905 runs at 47.63, including 306 runs at 61.20 against India.Nel was one of the star bowlers against India in 4-0 one-day series victory, where he picked up the remarkable figures of 8-2-13-4 at Durban.

Ryan ten Doeschate has set his sights on achieving success with the Netherlands in the World Cricket League.ten Doeschate has been one of the leading batsmen outside Test cricket in the last year, averaging over fifty in Netherlands’ six ODIs in 2006 and scoring 686 runs at 228.66 in the Intercontinental Cup. His continuing good form will be crucial if his side is to reach the final and so qualify for the inaugural Twenty20 World Championships in South Africa in September.”We have been working very hard to get the formula right,” he explained. “We were on a recent tour to Pretoria and we devised a formula for one-day cricket that we think is going to work for us.”I think we learned a lot from the ICC Trophy. Ireland and Scotland had obviously moved ahead and we had started to stagnate a little bit. Now I think we are back on track and we have been putting in some strong performances.”We certainly want to get to the final – that may sound optimistic because the favourites will probably be Kenya, Scotland and Ireland for the two final spots, but we think we have what it takes to get there.”

India and Pakistan have been drawn together in the group stage of the inaugural Twenty20 World Championship while England and Australia will also face each other in South Africa during September.Cricket South Africa have confirmed the four groups, although the fixtures still have to be ratified by ICC and the final list is not expected until the end of the month. The groups have South Africa, West Indies and Bangladesh in Group A, England, Zimbabwe and Australia in Group B, New Zealand, Sri Lanka and Kenya in Group C and Pakistan, India and Scotland in Group D.The tournament is due to run from September 11 to 24, although there seems to be confusion over the dates. Roweda Kandan, who is overseeing the preparations for CSA, confirmed the schedule while an ICC spokesman told Cricinfo said they had still to be finalised.Warm-up matches are slated for September 8 and 9, yet England and India don’t complete their one-day series until September 8 at Lord’s. “England and India will arrive late and might just have one warm-up game,” Kandan told Cricinfo.