A group of senior officials working on the 2007 Cricket World Cup (CWC) will start a four-day trip of India, with the aim of encouraging more Indians to come to the Caribbean for the tournament.Barbados’ delegation will be headed by Chris deCaires, the chairman of the local organising committee. He will be accompanied by Joe Benfield, the chief financial officer, and Petra Roach, who is head of the Barbados Tourism Authority’s European office. Also making the trip to New Delhi will be Ken Gordon, chairman of the CWC board of directors, Chris Dehring, the chief executive officer and managing director of the CWC’s head office, and Marvia Roach, communications manager of the tournament.deCaires said that India was a crucial market for the World Cup and beyond. He said that they were looking at cricketing, tourism and economic ties.”India is a very special market, especially with the World Cup in mind and the exposure we will get in India, while the tournament is being played,” he said. “It will be the greatest opportunity we will ever have and as a result, there have been a number of initiatives put in place to bridge some economic and business relationships with India. We will hope to develop some linkages so that we can really get going, because it is a very big market.”With most of the major sponsors of the tournament based in India, and Roach said this was part of the reason for making the trip as well. “We wanted to do an event where we could showcase our sponsors to one of the game’s largest markets. As you know, we can’t do without our sponsor and we are doing the event for them as well.”We have a media following of over 120 already signed on and we are hoping to make the most of it. We were last in India in December and this is another opportunity to push the highlights of the region as we look forward to the showpiece event.”

Tatenda Taibu, the former Zimbabwe captain who walked away from the international game after he and his family were threatened by people with links to Zimbabwe cricket, has said that he will try to qualify for South Africa.Taibu had played in Bangladesh and England since he quit last November, and, as reported by Cricinfo last week, he is now heading to South Africa where he is expected to sign for the Cape Cobras or the Warriors.”I will never return to the Zimbabwe side and I want to play Test cricket. South Africa is the best option,” he told The Times. It would take Taibu four years to qualify, but he is only 23 and so time is on his side, and when he walked away from Zimbabwe he was considered to be their one international-standard player.

Wasim Jaffer will lead the Rest of India team in the Zal Irani Trophy match against Uttar Pradesh, who won the Ranji Trophy last year, from October 9-13. Y Venugopala Rao, who led India Red in the Challenger Series, will be the vice-captain. Sourav Ganguly, who only managed 24 and 3 in his comeback bid, does not find a place in the team.Of those who starred in the Challenger Series Gautam Gambhir, Rohit Sharma and S Badrinath make it to the squad, while there’s no place for Parthiv Patel, whose batting has been a revelation. Patel batted energetically and sensibly, scoring in both the opportunities he got, but has been eclipsed by Dinesh Karthik, who has also impressed, both behind and in front of the stumps.An interesting selection is that of the 20-year-old chinaman bowler from Hyderabad, Pragyan Ojha. He has taken 33 wickets from 7 Ranji Trophy matches at an average of 26, and if the pitch at Nagpur takes turn Ojha may well find himself partnering Murali Kartik, who is another cricketer who performed well in the Challenger Series, bowling with control and accuracy.Another cricketer whose name has been doing the rounds, and who gets a look in, is Vijaykumar Yomahesh, the young mediumpacer from Tamil Nadu. Yomahesh has picked up wickets in various age-group tournaments, and people in the know suggest that he could well be destined for bigger things.VRV Singh, who bowled with good pace and rhythm in the Challenger Series, will lead the Rest of India pace attack. It came as no surprise that neither Ashish Nehra nor Lakshmipathy Balaji, who both blew more cold than hot in comeback attempts, found a place in the side.Rest of India Wasim Jaffer (capt), Y Venugopala Rao (vice-capt), Robin Uthappa, S Badrinath, Gautam Gambhir, Dinesh Karthik (wk), VRV Singh, Sreesanth, Zaheer Khan, Murali Kartik, Pragyan Ojha, Rohit Sharma, Sourashish Lahiri, V Yomahesh.

Marcus Trescothick’s enforced departure from the Ashes tour of Australia is a bitter-sweet outcome for Paul Collingwood who is expected to play in next week’s Brisbane Test with Alastair Cook likely to be promoted to open the innings with Andrew Strauss, leaving Ian Bell at No.3 and Collingwood at No.5.Cook, Bell and Collingwood arrived in Australia vying for two batting spots, but Trescothick’s health problems have contrived to open the door for Bell and Collingwood.Collingwood said the tourists were devastated for Trescothick, and admitted this was not the way he wanted to book himself a start. But after scoring 732 runs at almost 49 and two centuries this year, Collingwood would consider himself unlucky to have missed out.”It gives you a taste of the challenges, the mental side of the game, everything you do – it’s the biggest challenge in your life,” Collingwood said ahead of Friday’s three-day practice match against South Australia. “That game against Australia last year [at The Oval] with the pressures and the atmosphere, you want to have more, which is why it’s been a big kind of drive to get into this side all year.”Hopefully, I’ve come on as a player since then, playing 12 months of Test cricket and improving, so you’re a bit more confident about your game.”England’s remaining selection dilemma will be deciding between left-arm spinners Ashley Giles and Monty Panesar.

Ronnie Chisholm, one of Scotland’s finest batsmen, has died aged 79. After making his debut in 1948, Chisholm played a record 80 times for his country, scoring 3175 runs including 17 fifties.”Ronnie was one of the best-loved and most successful cricketers of his generation,” Neil Leitch, a historian specialising in Scottish cricket, told . “He was a solid accumulator of runs and a useful leg-spin bowler.”His most notable innings came in 1953 against the touring Australians, in which he struck an unbeaten 55 opening the innings. In addition to appearing for Scotland, he was prolific at club level too – for Aberdeenshire and Stewart’s Melville College – amassing over 16,000 runs.”Ronnie left international cricket on a high with a 50 for Scotland,” Hamish More, his former opening partner, said, “in one of the best innings I ever saw him play.”

Although still recovering from his recent heart bypass surgery, Reginald Pearman, the Bermuda president, has expressed his disappointment over his country’s three successive defeats to Kenya in the recent one-dayers.”Well as you can imagine I haven’t been much in touch with what went on in Kenya other than getting the news that we lost all three matches,” he told , “and of course that was news that was rather disappointing.”I feel that what the players have to realise is that they have to work harder to acclimatise themselves as quickly as possible when they go to play in other countries. They have to realise that they are on the big stage now and must be prepared for whatever hurdles are placed in front of them.”

El James, the former board president, echoed Pearman’s comments while adding that a level of understanding was needed by the public and media.”The local cricket fraternity has to remember that we are going through something we have never experienced before, the players are going to strange countries far from home, leaving their friends, families and loved ones and eating new foods, adjusting to new surroundings and playing on wickets that are different,” James said, responding to comments made last week by Martin Williamson, Cricinfo’s Managing Editor.”It’s a huge adjustment to their whole lives and it takes a while for them to settle down and deal with these changes – so to be honest it’s unfortunate when a harsh judgement is made,” he said. “We actually need to turn our game around, especially when the thinking of some in the world is that we are going in the opposite direction after qualifying for the World Cup.”We need match-winners – look at Kenya’s Steve Tikolo – he was always playing a spear-header’s role and in return who did we have – nobody really.”We lack a match-winner in bowling and batting, nobody is a threat in these respective departments and this is not good. If we had one or two individuals who can come up with a century and a few fifties and a couple of bowlers who can capture several scalps in a game on a consistent basis then we could look forward to a few successful results. But without any semblance of consistency it’s only going to get harder.”Meanwhile the assistant coach, Herbie Bascome, insists the players desperately need to toughen their resolve mentally if they are to find success.”I definitely feel this team has much more to offer than we’re offering now,” he said. “But what’s happened may have a lot to do with coming to Africa, a different environment, a different culture, because we’re getting more experiences than just cricket,” he said. “The cricket is at the highest level but when you come to Africa you’re coming to a place where you’ve always wanted to visit because you’ve read so much about it. You know, maybe the players weren’t in the right frame of mind to play cricket.”Mentally, if we decide we’re going to play this game we have to get tuned in. The most important thing is being able to think your way out of situations. When we realise the importance of the mental part of the game, then we’ll get better.”

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has decided to challenge the Pakistan board’s decision to overturn the bans imposed on Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif for testing positive for nandrolone, a banned substance.WADA will approach the Court of Arbitration in Lausanne, Switzerland, and contest the decision on the ground that Pakistan is a full member of the ICC which in turn is a signatory to the anti-doping code laid down by the WADA.Dick Pound, the WADA chairman, said that since both Shoaib and Asif did not ask for their B samples to be tested it meant that they had accepted the result of the initial test. “The Pakistan Cricket Board [PCB] simply did not apply the code,” Pound told BBC Sport.Shoaib and Asif tested positive after an internal dope test was carried out by the Pakistan board just before the Champions Trophy in October. A three-man tribunal banned Shoaib for two years and Asif for one year in November but by December the appeal committee overturned the ban on the ground that neither player had been warned or cautioned against taking supplements.Nasim Ashraf, the PCB chairman, refused to respond saying, “No comment. As far as we are concerned, the matter is now closed.” Pound, responding to a similar comment by Ashraf earlier, said that it was the WADA’s job to monitor compliance with the anti-doping code. “In cases of that nature, there are sanctions that are meant to be applied and in our view they have been improperly applied.”You cannot have in an anti-doping system an individual national federation purporting to act without regard to the rules of the international federation which has adopted the code.”He said that the agency would appeal to the CAS to deal with the case expeditiously but was fairly certain that the two players would get to play in the World Cup in March as such cases took months rather than weeks to be sorted.Pound criticised the ICC for being indecisive about the matter adding that if the WADA managed to contest the ban successfully then it would be considerable embarrassment to the ICC for not acting promptly. “The ICC doesn’t seem to be entirely clear which way it wants to go, so rather than wait and possibly have the thing fall between stools, we’re going to exercise our responsibility under the code – we do not think the proper result has been achieved to date.”

A report in the Zimbabwe Independent claims that Zimbabwe Cricket is making a desperate attempt to lure back Tatenda Taibu before the February 11 deadline when squads for the World Cup have to be named.Taibu retired from international cricket more than a year ago after his family was threatened by people with links to both the government and cricket. Since then he has played in Bangladesh, England and at the moment is turning out for Namibia in South African domestic competition.Zimbabwe’s cricket, meanwhile, has continued to lurch from crisis to crisis, and following a 5-0 one-day whitewash in Bangladesh at the end of last year, there are real fears that the side could face humiliation in the World Cup.While Taibu was deeply unhappy with Peter Chingoka, ZC’s chairman, it is understood that the real obstacle to his return is the US$38,000 he is owed by the board for outstanding match fees. Two other players who have also quit international cricket – Andy Blignaut and Heath Streak – are also believed to be owed more than $100,000 between them. Despite senior officials insisting the board is not strapped for cash, cheques have bounced recently and sources privately admit that ZC does not have enough to meet such debts at the moment.”We hope we can talk and agree with Taibu to come back, but maybe he’ll demand the money he says Zimbabwe Cricket owes him,” a board member told The Independent. “Other players are being talked to as well. There’s Tinashe Panyangara also who we hear might be in Australia or England.”Chingoka recently said that a committee had been formed to try to lure back former players, but critics have pointed out that it is likely to be a short-term solution to try to save face in the Caribbean. One player briefly mentioned as someone who might return was Ray Price, but a friend of his said that as nothing had changed since he quit, that is not an option.Many of those who walked away were dismayed at the way Chingoka and those close to him have run the game in recent years, and it will take more than some sweet talk and more promises to lure them back for anything longer-term than the World Cup.

Stuart Clark, the most high profile omission from Australia’s World Cup squad, could return to county cricket during the off season if a deal with Hampshire can be arranged. It would mean an enticing partnership with Shane Warne, who he shared 49 wickets with during the Ashes series.Discussions about a move to the Rose Bowl began during the Ashes series, but it had been widely expected that Clark would line-up for the World Cup and be part of Australia’s long-term one-day plans. Now, though, he is eager to play more cricket in an aim to show confirm his standing among Australia’s best all-round pacemen”The chance to play with Warney again would be fantastic,” Clark told the . “I have really enjoyed the few opportunities I have had to bowl with him in the past, and to get the chance to do that again would be great.”My immediate focus is on this Pura Cup season with NSW, but beyond that, there are certainly a few opportunities out there. I have played for Middlesex quite recently, and there was talk earlier this season about an opportunity at Hampshire. We might look to reopen those talks. It’s in my manager’s hands.”Clark’s stint with Middlesex came in 2004 and 2005. During his time at Lord’s be bagged 25 wickets at 25 apiece and was called up to Australia’s Ashes squad in 2005 as cover for Glenn McGrath and Brett Lee, but didn’t make his debut until the tour of South Africa in March 2006.

Luke Pomersbach has been ruled out of Western Australia’s Pura Cup match against Victoria after being involved in a car accident on Sunday. Pomersbach is not in hospital but has been rested as a precaution as Western Australia’s medical staff wait for the results of scans to determine the extent of any injuries.The Warriors recalled Clint Heron to replace Pomersbach for the match starting on Thursday at Melbourne. However, Pomersbach could yet be deemed fit to play in next week’s Pura Cup game against South Australia. Western Australia also called on Danny McLauchlan, the uncapped left-arm fast bowler, to boost their attack at the MCG as Brett Dorey continues to recover from a toe injury.McLauchlan, 29, moved to Perth from Sydney at the start of the season in an effort to increase his chances of playing first-class cricket. His nine-wicket match for the Western Australia Second XI last week – including 6 for 111 in the second innings – came on the back of a solid season for his club Scarborough, where he has 42 wickets at 19.70.The Warriors also returned Shaun Marsh to their 12-man squad. The game is a vital one for both teams, with Victoria third and Western Australia fourth on the Pura Cup table and only one match remaining for each side after the MCG clash.Victoria have not yet named their line-up but they will be without Jon Moss, who suffered a thigh strain at training on Thursday and is unable to bowl for two weeks. Moss batted in the FR Cup final on Sunday but Greg Shipperd, the Victoria coach, said he would not be risked this week. “He’s an important part of our team so we can’t take any chances with him,” Shipperd said on the Bushrangers’ website.Western Australia squad Justin Langer (capt), Chris Rogers, David Bandy, Shaun Marsh, Marcus North, Adam Voges, Clint Heron, Luke Ronchi (wk), Aaron Heal, Steve Magoffin, Ben Edmondson, Danny McLauchlan.