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Pat Cummins rises to the occasion to seal two-wicket Edgbaston epic

Published

3 years ago

2023/06/21

Priyan

Pat Cummins and James Anderson have a lighthearted post-match word

Australia won an epic first Test by two wickets, to take a 1-0 lead over England at Edgbaston, an hour and six minutes after they seemed to have lost it.

Pat Cummins their captain, back-cut Ollie Robinson’s short ball down towards the boundary directly in front of the travelling Australian supporters in their canary caps in Block 31 of Edgbaston’s South Stand. Harry Brook sprawled to his right in a bid to cut it off at deep third, but the ball squirmed out of his grasp and into the boundary to clinch a two-wicket victory.

When Joe Root held an outrageous caught-and-bowled off Alex Carey, Australia still needed 54 more runs to win with Nathan Lyon described by Robinson as the first of their “three No. 11s” – walking out to join Cummins. England were two wickets away from victory, and had a second new ball available.

But 12 overs later, Cummins and Lyon were still there. Cummins flogged Root for two sixes in the first over of the final hour to make a dent in the target and after surviving a spectacular effort by Ben Stokes at square leg when miscuing a hook, Lyon chipped Stuart Broad over mid-on to take the target down to single figures.

The Eric Hollies Stand roared England’s depleted attack on. Cummins dug out a yorker from Robinson and both batters wore short balls on the body. With three to win and 28 balls left, Cummins guided Robinson away to the rope, tossed his bat and helmet away, punched the air and lifted Lyon off his feet. It had echoes of the 2005 Test here – but this time, it was Australia who won by two.

In the dressing room, Usman Khawaja was “absolutely s***ing myself for the last five minutes” – and Australia’s win would not have been possible without his contribution. He faced 518 balls in the match and batted on each of the five days, top-scoring in both innings with 141 and then 65.

After rain wiped out the first session, he batted through an afternoon in which Australia added 76 runs for the loss of only two wickets – one of them nightwatcher Scott Boland, who edged Broad through to Jonny Bairstow. Travis Head poked Moeen Ali to slip as England kept a lid on the scoring rate, but with 98 to win after tea, Australia were clear favourites.

Khawaja added 49 with Cameron Green in a sixth-wicket stand that spanned the interval, but when Green inside-edged Robinson’s in-ducker on to his stumps, Stokes sensed an opportunity.

He brought himself on for his only spell of the second innings, battling his chronic left-knee injury, and smiled wryly when Khawaja chopped his short, slow legcutter on to off stump. The Edgbaston crowd paused for a moment, deceived by Stokes’ non-celebration, before erupting into life. England had the most important wicket, and needed only three more.

Root, bowling an extended spell from the Birmingham End with Moeen’s blistered spinning finger rendering him unable to grip the ball, dropped two difficult half-chances off his own bowling, giving Carey and Cummins a life each. Stokes opted not to take the new ball when it became available; three deliveries later, Root held a stunning reaction catch.

With Carey gone, Cummins became the protagonist. He has been criticised throughout these five days for a perceived negativity in his tactics, but took control of the game in its decisive passage. Root went full, so he cleared his front leg and swung him down the ground for six – then repeated the trick two balls later.

Broad returned, still with the old ball, and Lyon hooked the second ball of his spell out to Stokes at square leg, 25 yards in from the boundary. He flung himself back, sticking his right hand over his shoulder; the ball looped towards him but escaped his grasp, then squirmed away from his desperate second attempt.

When Cummins slapped a cut for four two balls later, the target was down to 30. Stokes opted to take the new ball, but it offered little for Broad and Robinson. They charged in with spread fields but had almost nothing left in the tank; as if to mark the changing of a guard, James Anderson ambled stiffly around the outfield.

Despite the jibes, Lyon batted more like a No. 3, lacing an off drive for four down the ground to the rope – and beating Robinson at mid-off to his right. After Cummins’ off-side slap snuck under Crawley at the cover boundary, Lyon flogged Broad over the top towards the Australian supporters.

They had been barracked relentlessly by the neighbouring Hollies Stand over the course of the Test match but jumped to their feet to celebrate an imminent Australian victory. Three overs later, they did so once more to mark the clinching moment of an enthralling run chase.

England were “devastated”, in Stokes’ words, but without their enterprising tactics this game would have been written off as a rain-ruined draw. Instead, it bubbled up to a conclusion that had Australians gripped to their television screens until well past 4am – with the promise of four more Tests to come.

Brief scores:

Australia 386 (Khawaja 141, Carey 66, Head 50) and 282 for 8 (Khawaja 65) beat England 393 for 8 declared (Root 118, Bairstow 78, Crawley 61, Lyon 4-149) and 273 (Cummins 4-63, Lyon 4-80) by two wickets

(Cricinfo)

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Heavy showers about (100-150) mm are likely at some places in the Central, Sabaragamuwa, Uva and Southern provinces

Published

1 hour ago

2026/10/12

Priyan

WEATHER FORECAST FOR 13 October 2026
Issued at 2.00 p.m. on 12 October 2026 by the Department of Meteorology

A low-pressure area may form over the southeastern Bay of Bengal by 13 October.

Under the influence of this system, an increase in rainfall is expected over the island and the deep and shallow sea areas around the island during the next few days from tomorrow (13).

The general public, as well as the naval and fishing communities, are requested to be attentive to the future forecasts and bulletins issued by the Department of Meteorology in this regard.

Heavy showers about (100-150) mm are likely at some places in the Central, Sabaragamuwa, Uva and Southern provinces.
Fairly heavy showers above 75 mm are likely at some places in the other areas of the island. Showers or thundershowers will occur in most parts of the island.

The general public is kindly requested to take adequate precautions to minimize damage caused by temporary localized strong winds and lightning during thundershowers.

Misty conditions can be expected at some places in the Sabaragamuwa, Central and Uva provinces during the early hours of the morning.

Latest News

Farhan and Sadaqat help Pakistan seal series in style

Published

15 hours ago

2026/10/12

Priyan

Maaz Sadaqat clobbered 96 off just 51 balls [Cricinfo]

Maaz Sadaqat crashed 96 off 51,Sahibzada Farhan clobbered 73 off 44, and Pakistan scorched their way through the last 12 overs of their innings to mount a fearsome total of 215 for 3. Pakistan reaped 156 runs just in the last 12 overs of their innings, as a 73-run stand between Sadaqat and Farhan was followed by a manic 72-run partnership between Sadaqat and Hasan Nawaz.

Sri Lanka’s batting was woeful in response. They slumped to 64 for 5 by the 11th over, with none of their top seven managing to get to 30. They limped to 133 for 7, having had their hopes of leveling the series wrecked by quicks Mohammad Imran and Salman Mirza, who took five wickets between them.

Sadaqat propels Pakistan into the stratosphere

The openers had laid a decent platform with Pakistan having got to 55 for 1 by the end of the seventh over. But it was Sadaqat who injected the energy that truly set Pakistan on course to their mammoth total. Having gone at less than a run a ball in his first eight balls, Sadaqat unleashed a spectacular lofted square drive off Eshan Malinga to collect his first six, before pumping the same bowler down the ground later in the 10th over.

Sadaqat would go on to clobber six further sixes and five further fours. The big hits tended to come down the ground, while his fours were more square of the wicket. Of the 125 runs Pakistan plundered in the second half of their innings, 79 off 40 came from Sadaqat, who pummeled both pace and spin with equal relish. Off the sixteenth over, bowled by Maheesh Theekshana, Sadaqat thumped three sixes in the arc between long on and midwicket.

Sadaqat, whose previous top score in three T20Is had been 50, could have gone to triple figures off the last ball of the innings, but holed out to deep cover instead, unable to quite find the power to lift a Malinga slower ball over the ropes. He had utterly dominated the middle and late overs, however.

Farhan sets the tone

On another flat Rawalpindi deck, Farhan made the first big charge, although he waited until spin came on to really get into high gear. Theekshana was one of his main victims as well. Farhan’s first six came from a slog sweep off Theekshana in the seventh over, before he launched the same bowler over wide long on and cow corner off successive balls in the ninth over. Getting to his 12th T20I fifty off the 31st ball he faced, Farhan began to aim big blows off the seamers as well. He was caught at deep third off the bowling of Dasun Shanaka, in the 15th over.

Sri Lanka stumble in the powerplay

An excellent Salman Mirza bouncer took the glove of Lahiru Udara in the first over, ending the innings of one of Sri Lanka’s few form batters for a mere five runs. And although Sineth Jayawardena – playing his first international in a full-strength Sri Lanka side – hit three consecutive boundaries in the third over, Sri Lanka were unable to build up any momentum in the powerplay. By the end of the sixth over, they had laboured to 35 for 2.

Imran’s spell lights up the middle overs

A full house in Rawalpindi was treated to some excellent fast bowling by Imran, who finished with the game’s best figures of 3 for 11 from his four overs. Having got Jayawardena to top-edge a desperate pull shot at the end of his second over, Imran had Kusal Mendis caught behind off a slower delivery, before two balls later (a wide in between), he took Sahan Arachchige’s edge with a quick delivery angled across the left-hander. Wicketkeeper Khawaja Nafay made two diving grabs to convert these chances in the eighth over.

All through his unbroken spell, Sri Lanka’s batter struggled to so much as hit Imran off the square, despite the good batting conditions on offer. Imran mixed up his pace, frequently going to slower balls, but his line and length control were also excellent through the spell. When he finished his unbroken spell at the end of the 10th over, Sri Lanka’s required rate had climbed past 15.

Chamindu Wickramasinghe and Theekshana struck some late boundaries, but by the time they came to the crease, Sri Lanka did not have a realistic shot at levelling this series. They lost by 82 runs in the end.

Scores:
Pakistan 215 for 3 in 20 overs (Sahibzada Farhan 73, Fakhar Zaman 22, Maaz Sadaqat 96, Hasan Nawaz 19*; Maheesh Theekshana 1-55, Eshan Malinga 1-41,Dasun Shanaka 1-30) beat Sri Lanka 133 for 7 (Sineth Jayawardena 22, Kamnbdu Mendis 23, Chamindu Wickremasinghe 29, Maheesh Theekshana 32*; Salman Mirza 2=28, Mohammad Imran 3-11, Saim Ayub 1-19, Shadab Khan 1-19) by 82 runs

[Cricinfo]

Foreign News

At least 139 dead, 84 missing as migrant boat capsizes off Djibouti

Published

16 hours ago

2026/10/12

Priyan

A member of the International Organization for Migration inspects the abandoned wreckage of a boat that capsized off the coast of Djibouti on April 12, 2026 [Aljazeera]

At least 139 people, including 15 children, have died and 84 are missing after a boat capsized off the coast of Djibouti, according to the United Nations migration agency.

In a statement on Sunday, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) quoted survivors as saying that the incident happened near Guhere off Djibouti’s eastern coast in the Gulf of Aden near the Bab al-Mandeb strait from Thursday night to before dawn on Friday.

The boat was heading from Djibouti to Yemen with more than 300 people on board. More than 80 people – all Ethiopians – survived the shipwreck while Djiboutian search and rescue operations continued.

“Our teams are on the ground alongside local authorities to provide emergency assistance,” IOM Chief of Mission in Djibouti Alexandre Coissac said, lamenting the “devastating loss of life”.

That number only includes those buried by authorities in Djibouti. Others have been buried by the migrants themselves but they won’t be added to the official count until authorities can verify the bodies, Alexandre Coissac, IOM Chief of Mission in Djibouti, told the Associated Press.

“This tragedy is a stark reminder of the dangers faced by migrants along this migration corridor as they seek economic opportunities,” Coissac added.

[Aljazeera]