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Haywire scheduling, key retirements and a stubbornly stiff right hamstring. Even before the vagaries of the subcontinent could be considered, Michael Clarke departed for India with the palpable sense that he is embarking upon the most difficult task of his captaincy so far.Clarke was at pains to keep his selection options as open as possible before setting off to join the squad assembling in Chennai. The loss of Michael Hussey so soon after Ricky Ponting and the redefinition of Shane Watson have left the batting in particular with a whiff of the uncertain.Add to this Clarke’s hamstring trouble, which may yet rule him out of the full squad’s only warm-up match, and there was every reason to believe the captain’s pronouncement that he has not stared down a greater challenge than those to come over the four Tests.For a reminder of the difficulty, Clarke needed only to look back at the 2010 visit, a tour hurriedly upgraded from ODIs to Tests by the BCCI and finishing in a 2-0 defeat for the team then captained by Ponting. Clarke cobbled 35 runs in four innings, his torpor summed up by a Bangalore stumping in which he did not realise his foot had dragged beyond the crease line.”Touring India is as tough a challenge as I’ve had in my career,” Clarke said in Sydney. “Every time I’ve been there on a Test tour it’s been extremely difficult, hence the Australian team hasn’t won that much over there. So it’s a huge challenge, the players know that.”That’s partly why we’re trying to prepare as well as we can by sending players early to get them used to conditions, to give ourselves the best chance. We know it’s going to be tough, we know how good India is, but we look forward to it.”The Australian team’s calendar for 2013 is so congested that this tour is the first to start before the home international program had finished. While Clarke is somewhere in the air between Sydney and Chennai, 11 members of his squad will be commencing a two-day warm-up match.After Clarke has arrived, the coach Mickey Arthur will still be minding a severely weakened Twenty20 team in a match against the West Indies in Brisbane. Given the jarring adjustment from Australian climes and surfaces to those that may be found in India, it is hardly the ideal way to prepare. And preparation has always been one of Clarke’s favourite buzzwords.”What I’ve learned in the past is how important preparation is for my personal performance,” Clarke said when asked about his dire 2010 tour. “I need to make sure I’ve done all my training to give myself the best chance of scoring runs.”That’s what I’m looking forward to over the next few days. Getting into the Indian conditions, batting on those wickets, facing a lot of reverse swing, a lot of spin bowling, and making sure when that first ball’s bowled in that first Test that I’ll be as well prepared as I was for this summer.”I’d really like to play that three-dayer. I’ll be advised by Alex [Kountouris] the physio once I land in India but at this stage my plan is to play that three-dayer. There is so much time I don’t think there is any doubt I’ll be fit for the first Test.”In my mind cricket-wise I feel like I need that game to spend some time in the middle in Indian conditions both batting and bowling, but also with my captaincy as well because India is such a different place to Australia. But I’ll listen to the expert and see what he has to say.”Among the players who have a headstart on Clarke by way of acclimatisation time are the allrounders Glenn Maxwell and Moises Henriques, plus the young batsman and sometime legspinner Steve Smith. One of the trio is likely to be chosen in the Tests as No. 6 or 7 batsman and fifth bowling option, now Watson can no longer provide it.”It’s very open, hence we’ve sent 17 players in three different stages to get over there as soon as possible to prepare and get used to conditions,” Clarke said. “Runs and wickets will certainly play a big part in these practice games leading up to the first Test but for a lot of guys it’s more about preparation and seeing conditions.”Those conditions will vary, as will the range of questions posed by an Indian side stung by recent defeats and intent on demonstrating, in the words of Harbhajan Singh, “how we play cricket here”. Clarke’s leadership, as both batsman and captain, is about to face its sternest examination yet.

Ashton Agar’s stay in India has been extended to take in Australia’s major warm-up for the Test series as the possibility grows that he may be in line for an extraordinary international debut in Chennai.Previously scheduled to depart for India once the full touring squad had assembled, Agar will now be playing the three-day match against India A beginning on Saturday, and may yet have his time on the subcontinent expanded to include the Tests.Agar is one of three spinners Australia will field in the practice game, Xavier Doherty and Nathan Lyon being the other two. Michael Clarke and David Warner will miss the match, following their recovery from injuries, to be ready for the first Test on February 22.Only 19 years old and having played just a pair of Sheffield Shield matches for Western Australia following the shoulder injury to Michael Beer that ruled him out of this tour, Agar’s left-arm spin has stuck in the memory of all who have witnessed his bowling in recent weeks.His mature approach and skill in the field and with the bat has notably impressed the national selector John Inverarity, who is en route to India to discuss the composition of the team ahead of the first Test with the captain Michael Clarke and the coach Mickey Arthur.”The plan at the moment is that he returns in time to play for Western Australia but there is a possibility that he could stay a bit longer,” Inverarity told . “We needed someone to make up the XI and it was a very good opportunity to invest an opportunity in a promising young player.”Inverarity’s panel named numerous spin bowling options for the tour behind the incumbent Test tweaker Nathan Lyon, including the Tasmanian Xavier Doherty and the allrounders Glenn Maxwell and Steve Smith. Agar lost little by comparison to his more experienced slow bowlers when he delivered eight overs during a two-day practice match earlier this week, and now has a further opportunity to usurp his seniors.”Ash bowled really well in the two-day game,” Clarke told . “Everyone knows he’s very talented. He’s had success for Western Australia [eight wickets at 30.12 in two matches].”I spent some time with him yesterday in the nets and tried to get him to watch some of the Indian spinners in the nets and see what he was learning from what they were doing. He’s going to be a very good bowler. He wants to learn – he wants to get better.”You never know what could happen. He’s very lucky now. He’s been given the opportunity to play in this three-dayer. We have Xavier Doherty, we have Nathan Lyon, we have Glenn Maxwell and we have Ashton Agar who all bowl spin. We want to make sure we’re doing everything in our power to make the right decision for the first Test.”In this there are parallels with Lyon, who was chosen for Australia’s Test side in Sri Lanka in 2011 after only a handful of Sheffield Shield appearances for South Australia, and to date has played more than half his 35 first-class matches at Test level. In the absence of outstanding spin bowling talent bolstered by experience, the selectors have been inclined to flights of fancy, of which Agar would be another.His spells for the Warriors against New South Wales on his Shield debut at Blacktown Oval were noteworthy against batsmen well versed in tackling spin, the wickets of Scott Henry and Peter Nevill gained through genuine turn and changes of pace.Agar’s Shield batting has also been useful, reaping one half-century and one other handy score in four innings so far. He went to India on the cricket equivalent of an internship, but is now a chance of making a most rapid graduation to full duties.’I wasn’t expecting too much at the start of the summer but it has all happened very quickly and it has turned into a bit of a dream,” Agar said. ”Michael Beer was bowling really well but he got injured. That gave me an opportunity to play for Western Australia, now to tour India for a week. It has been great.”

ScorecardLuke Pomersbach’s brutal assault at the top of the order fired Brisbane Heat to the semi-final of the BBL as they dished out an eight-wicket mauling to Hobart Hurricanes at the Bellerive Oval. Pomersbach smashed 82 off just 42 balls as Heat overhauled the 151-run target in the 15th over to get the much-needed win which put them on equal points with Hurricanes and Adelaide strikers, but their superior run rate helped them set up a semi-final clash with Melbourne Renegades.Pomersbach set about the chase at a frenetic pace on a sticky Hobart pitch and was particularly severe on Doug Bollinger and Jason Krejza. While Bollinger was taken for 27 off his first two overs, Krejza leaked 31 from his two.Pomersbach brought up his half-century off 24 balls, the fastest fifty of this year’s competition, and hit 13 fours and two sixes. Bollinger removed the other opener, Peter Forrest, early, but a 107-run stand in less than 10 overs between Pomerbach and Joe Burns ended Hurricanes’ tournament.”We’re the underdogs now,” Pomersbach said on the team’s entry to the knockouts. “We’re going in there, we’re going to give it everything and I’ve got a really good feeling about it.””We probably misjudged the wicket a little bit although I think it probably suited their bowlers, that sort of slow medium pace,” Hurricanes captain Tim Paine said.Hurricanes chose to bat first and made a steady start with a 47-run opening partnership, but the scoring rate stayed below seven for almost three-quarters of the innings. Only some late aggression by Jonathan Wells – 40 off 24- and Owais Shah, 32 off 28, helped the team to get to 150. James Hopes was miserly in his bowling, giving away 18 off four overs, while Dan Christian picked up two wickets.

A week into his retirement, Ricky Ponting is already developing a taste for life after cricket.Ponting admitted he quite enjoyed getting to a Test match right on the appointed 10.30am start time rather than two hours before, and that he was not exactly sorry to be missing training for the Hobart Hurricanes in Melbourne. This was in order to be conveyed around Bellerive Oval in the back of a ute as a way of saying thankyou to the Tasmanian cricket faithful, who numbered 6,221 on the first day of the first Test against Sri Lanka.The question of Ponting’s life after Test matches has been pondered by many in the wake of his emotional exit at the conclusion of the South Africa series, and the man himself is wondering aloud at how the pull of participating in the game will be diminished by the lack of Australian duty to sustain him.”I’ll see how I feel about cricket at the end of this season,” Ponting told Channel Nine. “It might be a little harder for me I reckon, playing those last few games out, knowing there’s not the bigger picture in mind as there’s always been for me when I’ve played state cricket, which is to play for Australia.”While Cricket Australia and the national captain Michael Clarke are equally keen to have Ponting still involved with the team in a coaching or mentoring capacity, the attraction of a lucrative and far less stressful role as a television commentator has its appeal.”I’d like to work in the media at some stage, at some time, in some way, shape or form,” Ponting said. “Just being around cricket for as long as I have and being part of successful teams, I think I’ve got a pretty good knowledge of the game and I’m pretty insightful on the game I think. So we’ll wait and see what happens.”Ponting was memorably granted a guard of honour by South Africa’s captain Graeme Smith at the WACA ground as he commenced his final innings, and in Hobart he and his family were flanked by the ranks of cricketers from his home club of Mowbray in Launceston before starting on his valedictory lap of the oval.”As we all know things came to an end for me last week, so to be here in a different capacity today is good fun,” Ponting said. “I’m excited about this next little phase of my life, all my family here and a lot of my club-mates have even made it down for the game – they probably bought all their tickets weeks ago thinking I was going to be playing, but unfortunately I’m here as a spectator with them today.”I generally get a little bit embarrassed when people start talking about me, and even having a whole lunch break in a Test match dedicated to me today is a little bit more than what I would have expected as well. But the reason it’s here is for me to come and say goodbye to the Hobart fans and people of Tasmania who have looked after me so well over a long period of time.”As for those final moments in Perth, particularly his opponents’ spontaneous gestures of thanks for a career spanning 17 years and innumerable achievements, Ponting said they would not soon be forgotten. “That is something I’ll never, ever forget,” he said. “When I pulled Graeme Smith out of the line and shook his hand I said ‘I really appreciate this’ and he said ‘no, you deserve it, but just make sure you don’t get too many against us today’.”I thought all the running around that was happening after I got out was just them celebrating the wicket, but they were actually running over to try to shake my hand and say congratulations on my career. Robin Peterson got me out and actually apologised, he said ‘I’m sorry about that’.”So there were a couple of things that took me by surprise, the guard of honour and then all of them running to me on the way off. I got 10 metres from the gate and realised I hadn’t said goodbye to the crowd either, so I had to take my helmet off, and do all that stuff, and make sure that I acknowledged my family, and everyone there as well. A lot of those are memories I’ll never forget.”Before Ponting thinks about whether he might play another season, he has the BBL to negotiate, flying to join the Hurricanes ahead of their date with Shane Warne’s Melbourne Stars on Saturday. But the enthusiasm that has always been there for any game of cricket is quickly being tested by the more leisurely life. “I’m actually missing a training session so it’s not that bad,” Ponting said. “The boys are over in Melbourne training at the moment, so I’d rather be here I think.”

West Indies batsman Ramnaresh Sarwan has resigned from the board of the West Indies Players’ Association (WIPA). Dave Kissoon, the attorney who had presided over the recent court cases concerning player contracts and a disputed memorandum of understanding involving WIPA and the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB), also resigned as director.The reported, quoting sources, that Sarwan may have resigned as WIPA executive to patch up with the WICB and ultimately make his way back into the national team.”Both Ramnaresh and Dave have in their own ways contributed to WIPA’s progress. We certainly wish Ramnaresh all the very best in his future cricket career as we are certain that he still has a great deal to contribute to West Indies cricket,” WIPA stated in a release.Sarwan, who last played for West Indies in June 2011, had last month won his case against the WICB over comments made about his fitness and was awarded $161,000 in damages. Sarwan had lodged the appeal, in conjunction with WIPA, in March 2011 for unfairly questioning in public his fitness and attitude. This, he said, effectively cost him not only a central contract for the 2010-11 season but also damaged his “reputation as a professional cricketer” and “sullied his career as an international cricketer.”Earlier this summer Sarwan, who had a successful county season with Leicestershire even as West Indies were being beaten on their England tour, had said how he had been “mentally broken down by certain individuals”, while blaming the coaching set-up for his non-selection.

Australia bowled New Zealand out for 83 to win their first World Twenty20 warm-up in Colombo by 56 runs. New Zealand’s chase was constantly punctured by wickets and only three batsmen managed to score in double figures. The rot started at the beginning of the innings, when three wickets had fallen for eight runs by the third over. The only resistance came during a 31-run stand for the fourth wicket between captain Ross Taylor and Kane Williamson. At 59 for 7, when the last specialist batsman Williamson was dismissed by Brad Hogg, the contest was over. Hogg took the wickets of Williamson, Taylor and James Franklin, and Shane Watson also bowled economically, taking 2 for 7 in three overs.Unlike the bowlers, Australia’s batsman had not put in a convincing performance. Their openers, David Warner and Shane Watson were dismissed in the 20s and the middle order slumped, leaving Australia on 71 for 5. Glenn Maxwell, who had performed well against Pakistan in the UAE, added 46 runs with wicketkeeper Matthew Wade to lead the recovery. Wade and Daniel Christian scored 21 off the last nine deliveries of the innings to set New Zealand 139, which proved far too many.Bangladesh registered a comfortable five-wicket victory against Zimbabwe, achieving the target of 135 with ten balls to spare. Led by opener Mohammad Ashraful’s 38, the chase was structured around two big partnerships of 52 and 50. There was a hiccup when Bangladesh lost three wickets for five runs to slip to 85 for 5, but Mahmudullah and Ziaur Rahman saw them through. Three Zimbabwe bowlers – seamer Brian Vitori, offspinner Prosper Utseya and left-arm spinner Ray Price – proved expensive, going for 10, 13.50 and 9.25 runs per over.Zimbabwe were slow after they got sent in. Vusi Sibanda was their top scorer, with 40 off 47 balls, and they didn’t lose too many wickets in a heap due to steady partnerships for the first four wickets. However, their innings lacked acceleration until at the death, when they were struggling at 106 for 5 with less than two overs to go. Elton Chigumbura and Craig Ervine scored 27 runs in nine deliveries before Ervine was dismissed off the penultimate delivery. Their 134 proved to be too little.A solid batting performance by Afghanistan helped them defeat Sri Lanka A by 51 runs in Colombo. Their innings was built around a 109-run partnership off 58 balls between opener Mohammad Shahzad and Asghar Stanikzai, which nullified the advantage Sri Lanka A had gained by taking two wickets in the first over without a run on the board. Both Shahzad and Stanikzai, however, were dismissed in the 11th over for 48 and 50 respectively. Mohammad Nabi then scored 51 off 24 balls with five sixes, as he had stands of 30 and 56 with Shafiqullah and Gulbodin Naib to help his team cross the 200-run mark.Seamer Nuwan Pradeep, who gave Sri Lanka A a positive start with two wickets in the first over, proved expensive, going for 10.75 runs per over. Their best bowler was legspinner Kaushal Lokuarachchi, who took 3 for 16 in his four overs.Sri Lanka A began the chase of 209 well, their openers put on 30 off 22 balls before Shehan Jayasuriya fell to Mohammad Nabi. From 50 for 1, they lost three wickets for seven runs, which included two batsmen stumped off legspinner Samiullah Shenwari. Sri Lanka A lost wickets regularly thereafter and only Kosala Kulasekara stuck around to give them some hope, scored 63 off 38 balls. Kulasekara’s wicket in the 17th over signaled the end of the contest. Daulat Zadran took 3 for 22 while all four other bowlers also took wickets.For a report of India’s 26-run victory against Sri Lanka, click here.

ScorecardEoin Morgan made 50 in his first match as Lions captain•Getty Images

Eoin Morgan made 50 batting at No. 3 for England Lions before three wickets in the evening session brought Australia A back into the match on a damp opening day of the first unofficial Test.With a slow, turning pitch expected at Old Trafford – 34 wickets fell to spinners in Lancashire’s Championship match against Worcestershire last month – the Lions included Samit Patel, James Tredwell and the local boy Simon Kerrigan, for his first Lions appearance, while Australia A picked only two quicks in their four-man attack.Ravi Bopara, who missed England’s second Test against South Africa for personal reasons, was not included for the Lions after deciding he was not ready for a return to cricket.Morgan, captaining the side, elected to bat despite rainfall during the morning that delayed the start until 2.30pm. In testing conditions, the Lions openers, Joe Root and Nick Compton, scored seven runs from the first seven overs, before Mitchell Johnson had the former caught behind off the glove.That brought in Morgan and he and Compton buckled down for a 79-run partnership. Nathan Lyon removed the Somerset batsman after a typically obdurate innings, his 46 coming off 137 balls, and it was Lyon’s offspin that also accounted for Jonny Bairstow after another painstaking stay at the crease.Morgan had already reached his fifty but Johnson struck in the next over, having the England batsman caught at mid-on, to leave the Lions 114 for 4. However, Patel was joined by Craig Kieswetter to shore up the innings and remain unbeaten the close.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
Misbah-ul-Haq declared after making a quick half-century and taking Pakistan past 550•AFP

Afternoon showers on day three put an outright result in serious doubt as only one session could be played out. In that session, Pakistan added 63 to their overnight 488 before declaring. In the next 70 minutes, Sri Lanka were put through a sterner test than the Pakistan openers, but they lost just one wicket.Pakistan’s quicks generated more response from the pitch than their Sri Lankan counterparts, but that didn’t translate into too much success as Tillakaratne Dilshan rode his luck. An overnight declaration on 488 was a consideration because of the weather: 45 overs had already been lost on day two, and forecast for the rest of the Test wasn’t the brightest either. However, Pakistan went for the scoreboard pressure, and declared only after they reached 550.Pakistan didn’t meander aimlessly, though: Misbah-ul-Haq went at a strike-rate of 82.50, much higher than his ODI career statistic, and Abdur Rehman hit two straight sixes in his 18 off 13. It took Pakistan little under an hour, and 12.4 overs, to score the 63 runs that took them past 550. In the process Misbah reached his 17th half-century, scoring 37 off 40 balls on the third morning. The fields were spread far out so he had to rely more on well-placed ones and twos as opposed to boundaries. Asad Shafiq and Adnan Akmal perished for the cause, but Rehman provided the required thrust with sixes off both spinners. Rangana Herath bowled one over fewer than a whole ODI innings.Ten minutes later, with runs on board already, Pakistan made a spirited start with the ball. Aizaz Cheema and Junaid Khan bowled faster and hit the seam more often than the Sri Lankan bowlers. As a result, they bowled more threatening deliveries in one spell than Sri Lanka did in the whole innings. Cheema began with a short-of-a-length delivery that reared towards Tharanga Paranavitana’s chest. Paranavitana never settled in, and was caught bat-pad to a Junaid delivery that seamed in. This was Paranavitana’s seventh duck in his 28th Test, a high rate for a Test opener.Tillakaratne Dilshan, at the other end, tried every trick in the book to get out, but the pitch and luck smiled on him benevolently. The seam movement in Junaid’s first over seemed to have rattled him, and he hoicked at the last ball of that over; the leading edge fell straight of mid-on. Until lunch, Dilshan kept slashing and flashing, twice edging short of the cordon, once bisecting keeper and first slip. In Saeed Ajmal’s first over, minutes before lunch, he survived a desperately close lbw shout when he was hit just above the knee roll bang in front and inside the crease. However, nothing stopped the aggressive Dilshan: he followed that lbw shout with two lofted fours, a response not too different to the rest of his innings. By lunch he had raced along to 46 off 54.Kumar Sangakkara was much more reassuring for Sri Lanka, clipping the first ball he faced for four, and continuing to do so. The only moment of concern at Sangakkara’s end arrived when he got a thick inside edge onto his pad, but it was too meaty for Azhar Ali at short leg to react in time.No play was possible after lunch.

Pakistan has asked Australia to play three ODIs and three Twenty20s in the UAE in August and September, despite being granted ICC permission to change the series to six T20s. Cricket Australia is believed to have agreed in principle to the proposal, but is not expected to sign off on the deal until discussing it with its players, after the Australian Cricketers’ Association expressed “significant concerns” about the extreme heat in the UAE at that time of year.The PCB was open to the idea of only T20 games but ESPNcricinfo understands the broadcaster had objected for commercial reasons. The PCB’s request for the ICC to allow a six-match T20 series due to the weather conditions was approved this week, but Pakistan considered it only a backup plan in case the ODI portion of the series could not go ahead.The chairmen and chief executives of both sides met during the ICC’s annual conference in Kuala Lumpur and agreed in principle on a series of three ODIs and three T20s in the UAE. The PCB chairman, Zaka Ashraf, said the matches would start in the evening in order to avoid the worst of the heat.”We had a decision with Cricket Australia officials that we’ll play [three ODIs and three T20s] in the UAE in the evening,” Ashraf told ESPNcricinfo. “Cricket Australia is looking at the weather as well and our broadcaster objected to the omission of ODIs. However the decision will be taken this week.”The Australian Cricketers’ Association has already expressed its concerns about playing ODIs in such hot weather, whereas T20s would lessen the problem due to a later start time and shorter games. However, Pakistan insists that the conditions can be handled by starting the 50-over matches in the evening.Cricket Australia confirmed that positive discussions had taken place in Kuala Lumpur, between Cricket Australia’s chief executive James Sutherland and chairman Wally Edwards and their Pakistan counterparts. However, a spokesman said further details of the series, including the mix of matches, grounds and start times were yet to be finalised.”They [Australian officials] have agreed in principle to a proposal that the PCB has put to us, subject to us seeing the final detail,” a Cricket Australia spokesman told ESPNcricinfo. “We’re expecting the final detail within the next 24 hours. Once we sign off on the final detail we’re expecting a formal announcement from the PCB within the next two or three days.”

ScorecardKent took control against Division Two strugglers Leicestershire and trail by only 37 runs after an action-packed opening day that saw 12 wickets fall.Having dismissed the visitors for 141, Kent were then boosted unbroken third-wicket partnership between Rob Key and Brendan Nash that had added 68 by the close. Key, Kent’s captain, batted almost three hours for his unbeaten 23, while Nash posted an impish, unbeaten 50 from 74 balls.The hosts made a dreadful start when Sam Northeast, fresh from a brace of second-XI centuries and preferred for this game ahead of on-loan Scott Newman, fended Matthew Hoggard’s first-ball lifter to slip. Ben Harmison played attractively for 30 before he too fell to the former England seamer when chopping a short one on to the base of leg stump.Key and Nash dug in thereafter to boss the final session and leave Leicestershire pondering their ill-disciplined batting of earlier in the day.Though England Lions paceman Matt Coles had bagged his second five-wicket haul of the Championship campaign, to take his season’s first-class tally to 33, it was old-stager Charlie Shreck who ran through Leicestershire’s top order with a devastating spell of 3 for 1 off 11 balls.Leicestershire’s openers Will Jefferson and Greg Smith both rode their luck in posting 27 for the first wicket. Jefferson survived a huge appeal for leg before against Mark Davies, while Smith was dropped at third slip off Shreck when on 5.Neither man made the most of their good fortune, however, as Jefferson fell lbw to Shreck when half forward. Jacques du Toit then fell without scoring when a half-hearted cut brushed the edge to give wicketkeeper Geraint Jones the first of five catches behind the stumps.Smith then flailed across the line against Shreck to also go leg-before, Josh Cobb fished outside off against Coles to be caught behind, as did the leaden-footed Ramnaresh Sarwan after making 17. Preston Mommsen also appeared to have his feet set in cement when he forced off the back foot against Stevens to again gift a catch to Jones and make it 66 for 6 at lunch.After the break, Ned Eckersley and top-scorer Wayne White all but doubled the visitors’ score in adding 56 for the seventh wicket until White also nibbled to the keeper against Coles. No one made double figures thereafter as Kent, in glorious batting conditions, wrapped up the Leicestershire.