Ahmedabad (Gujarat) [India], March 17 (ANI): While many praised Jos Buttler’s ferocious knock as England beat India in the third T20I on Tuesday, former India batsman VVS Laxman believes the bowling of Jofra Archer and Mark Wood in the powerplay deserves credit.
Buttler played a sensational knock of 83 from 52 balls to chase down the target of 157 quite comfortably. But before Buttler, it was Archer and Wood’s show which ensured India didn’t get to a good start in the third game.
Laxman feels the English duo’s aggressive bowling didn’t allow the hosts’ batsmen to settle down.
“While Butler played an outstanding knock, I feel the way Archer and Wood bowled in the powerplay was the reason why England won this game comfortably. Both of them bowled aggressively and didn’t give anything easy to the batsmen,” Laxman tweeted.
Except for skipper Virat Kohli, no India batsmen got going. Kohli led from the front in all-rounder Hardik Pandya’s company as the duo added 69 runs from 30 balls to take the hosts to a fighting 156/6.
For England, Buttler and Jonny Bairstow starred with the bat scoring 83* and 40* respectively to see visitors home. The wicket-keeper batsman after the win said his preference remains opening the batting but he has kept his options open as certain teams might ask him to bat anywhere else in T20 cricket.

“Yes, opening the batting is my preference in T20s. I think for most people it is the best place to bat. But I am always open-minded, certain teams may ask me to bat somewhere else,” said Buttler in the virtual press conference.
With the win in the third T20I, England has gained a 2-1 lead in the five-match series. Both teams will now meet in the fourth T20I on Thursday which will be played at the same venue. (ANI)

Madrid [Spain], March 17 (ANI): Real Madrid manager Zinedine Zidane praised Luka Modric saying that the player is 35-years-old but “you wouldn’t know it out on the pitch”.
Zidane’s comments came after Real Madrid advanced to the Champions League quarter-finals with a 3-1 win over Atalanta in the second-leg match here on Wednesday. In the first-leg match, Real Madrid had secured a 1-0 win against Atalanta.
In Wednesday’s match, Modric provided a key assist for Karim Benzema’s opener. Zidane is also impressed with Modric’s understanding of the game and said he won’t have any problem becoming a coach.
“He’s so intelligent, that’s clear. He’s 35 years old but you wouldn’t know it out on the pitch. If Luka wants to become a coach, he’s got that in him. He understands football, if he wants to be a coach he won’t have any problem. I love the kind of guy he is,” the club’s official website quoted Zidane as saying.
Zidane is also pleased with the team’s victory and said it was a “strong all-round performance from start to finish.”
“We put in a great display. It was a strong all-round performance from start to finish. When you feel as if you put in a great performance, it makes you happy to have got through. We’re into the quarter-finals and things will get increasingly more difficult,” the manager said.
“We now have to rest up well because we’ve now got Saturday’s game and that’s just the way it goes. We controlled the game defensively and in attack we had the chances to score the goals. I’m delighted for the players and for the performance they put in,” he added.
Real Madrid will next play against Celta Vigo in LaLiga on Saturday. (ANI)

Dubai [UAE], March 17 (ANI): India skipper Virat Kohli has moved back into the top five while England star batsman Jos Buttler has re-entered the top 20 in the latest ICC men’s T20I rankings after blistering performances in their ongoing five-match series in Ahmedabad.
Kohli, a formerly top-ranked batsman in the format and currently number one in ODIs, has gained one slot and a massive 47 rating points after unbeaten knocks of 73 and 77 in the second and third T20I. The India skipper is at the fifth spot and that has made him the only batsman to be placed in the top-5 across all three formats.
Buttler’s match-winning 83 not out in the third match has helped him advance five places to the 19th position, just two shy of his career-best 17th position attained in October 2018.
Shreyas Iyer (up 32 places to 31st) and Rishabh Pant (up 30 places to 80th) have gained among batsmen while all-rounder Washington Sundar (up two places to 11th) and seam bowlers Shardul Thakur (up 14 places to 27th) and Bhuvneshwar Kumar (up seven places to 45th) have moved up the list for bowlers.
For England, Jonny Bairstow, who chipped in with 40 runs and was associated in an unbroken 77-run stand with Buttler in the eight-wicket win on Tuesday, has moved up two slots to 14th position in the list led by his compatriot Dawid Malan. Jason Roy has advanced four slots to 24th with scores of 49 and 46 in the first two matches.
Fast bowlers Jofra Archer (up 43 places to 34th) and Mark Wood (up 59 places to 39th), as well as left-arm seam bowler Sam Curran (up 41 places to 74th) have gained in the weekly update for men, carried out on Wednesdays.
In the men’s ODI rankings, wicketkeeper-batsman Shai Hope’s Player of the Series effort against Sri Lanka, in which he had scores of 110, 84 and 64, has helped him gain five slots and reach joint-seventh position, three off his career-best fourth position attained in May 2019.
Nicholas Pooran (up one place to 32nd), Evin Lewis (up 10 places to 44th) and Darren Bravo (up eight places to 99th) are the other West Indies players to move up in the batting list after their team won the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup Super League series 3-0. Fast bowler Alzarri Joseph’s four wickets see him advance seven places to a career-best 27th position.
For Sri Lanka, Danushka Gunathilaka has gained 20 slots to reach 51st position after scoring 187 runs in the series while PWH de Silva (up from 94th to 66th) and Lakshan Sandakan (up from 124th to 99th) are among those to move up the bowlers’ list.
In the men’s Test Rankings, Hashmatullah Shahidi has entered the top 100 after notching up Afghanistan’s first Test double century, which helped his team beat Zimbabwe by six wickets to level the two-match series 1-1. He has rocketed 47 places to 90th position.
Captain Asghar Afghan, who scored 164 and shared a fourth-wicket partnership of 307 with Hashmatullah, has moved up to a career-best 65th place while leg-spinner Rashid Khan’s toil of bowling nearly 100 overs not only earned him returns of four for 138 and seven for 137 but also a reward of nine places to reach 32nd position in the rankings.
Zimbabwe captain Sean Williams is up to a career-best 24th place after scoring 151 while following-on, his tally of 621 rating points the highest for his country since Brendan Taylor in 2014. Donald Tiripano’s knock of 95 in the second innings has helped him progress 22 places to 123rd in the charts. (ANI)

Raipur (Chhattisgarh) [India], March 17 (ANI): Legends Sachin Tendulkar and Brian Lara are all set to take on each other once again on the cricket pitch as India Legends face off against West Indies Legends in the semi-final of the Road Safety World Series T20 at the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Cricket Stadium on Wednesday.
Two of the greatest and stylish batsmen in the history of cricket are thick friends, but when it comes to the field, they are fiercest rivals who are keen to outdo each other. This contest was the most awaited one of the tournament even though the two had locked horns last year in the opening match of the series.
The Indians had easily outplayed them by seven wickets at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai before the tournament shifted to Raipur due to the coronavirus pandemic. This time Lara, however, will be more charged up and keen to get the better of Tendulkar, especially after Windies’ win over England in the last league game of the series on Tuesday.
The team from Caribbean Island will be high on confidence post their last encounter where they easily chased down a challenging target of 187, set by Kevin Pietersen’s side. The Indians, however, will have the upper hand over their rivals. They are the league leaders and the most successful side of the tournament along with Sri Lanka Legends.
Under Tendulkar, the Indians have won five games and lost just one from six matches and lead the points table with 20 points. The Windies however have had an inconsistent tournament where they lost three and won three.
The Indians will take confidence from the last game where they scored 200-plus runs against South Africa in 20 overs, the first team to do so in the tournament. Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Yuvraj Singh and Yusuf Pathan’s form will be the key to India’s fortunes in taking them through to the finals.
India Legends: Sachin Tendulkar (C), Virender Sehwag, Mohammed Kaif, S Badrinath, Yuvraj Singh Yusuf Pathan, Irfan Pathan Munaf Patel, Manpreet Singh Gony, Pragyan Ojha, R Vinay Kumar, Noel David, Naman Ojha
West Indies Legends: Brian Lara (C), Narsingh Deonarine, Adam Sanford, Dinanath Ramnarine, Pedro Collins, Ryan Austin, Suleiman Benn, Tino Best, Carl Hooper, Dwayne Smith, Mahendra Nagamootoo, Ridley Jacobs, William Perkings. (ANI)

New Delhi [India], March 17 (ANI): The Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise Rajasthan Royals have deepened their association with the energy drink giant Red Bull in India and plans to continue scouting talent from the annual international T20 tournament for college cricket teams — Red Bull Campus Cricket.
The tenth year anniversary of the global cricket tournament for university students, Red Bull Campus Cricket (RBCC) has been underway in India across 32 cities with city qualifiers from February 17 to discover and nurture budding cricketers from college campuses.
Last year, the RBCC national finals were held at the Ekana Stadium in Lucknow with COVID-19 protocols undertaken. Eight of the best cricket universities in the country faced off to be crowned the Red Bull Campus Cricket National Finals winner.
An exciting final game between DAV College Jalandhar and Subodh College Jaipur, saw DAV College Jalandhar emerge victorious and were crowned the Red Bull Campus Cricket national finals winners.
A recent success story from Red Bull Campus Cricket is Tamil Nadu batsman Shahrukh Khan who was picked up by Punjab Kings for a whopping Rs 5.25 crore at the recently concluded IPL auction.
Shahrukh Khan was the RBCC national final man of the tournament as he guided Hindustan College from Chennai to the finals of the 2019 edition of Red Bull Campus Cricket.
He also got selected for RBCC player tryouts with Rajasthan Royals at Institute of Sports, Talegaon, Nagpur in the first week of December, 2019. He also became a part of the IPL 2020 auction but was unsold but got noticed because of his name.
“I personally wanted to win the tournament for my team but we, unfortunately, lost it. How I saw it was this would be a chance for me, if I did well there, I would have a chance to get picked. Rajasthan Royals had called me for a trial after watching me play at Red Bull Campus Cricket. It was a very good experience for me,” said Shahrukh in a statement.
Red Bull Campus Cricket 2021 city qualifiers took place from February 17 to March 15 across various cities. The winning college from each city will then proceed to the zonal/regional finals in April. The top two teams from each zone in RBCC will then compete in the National finals in June first week, where the teams will play in the knockout rounds of quarterfinals, semifinals and finals respectively.
The National winner will then represent India in the RBCC 2021 World Finals. Past winners from India that have gone on to represent the country at the World Championships are Rizvi College, Mumbai; DAV College, Chandigarh; Swami Shraddhanand College, Delhi; MMC College, Pune.
KL Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Aiden Markram, Lungi Ngidi, Niroshan Dickwella, and Chirag Suri are six players who went on to make their names in international cricket for their respective countries by using the Red Bull Campus Cricket platform.
Red Bull athlete KL Rahul was the top scorer in the 2013 edition of the competition and credits RBCC for his success at the domestic and international level. Cricketers like Manan Vohra, Shardul Thakur, Karun Nair, Shashank Singh, Siddhesh Lad, Himanshu Rana, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Anukul Roy, Ruturaj Gaikwad, and Ricky Bhui have also reaped the benefits of Red Bull Campus Cricket.
The women’s competition will be held in four zones — north, south, east and west — with the winners of the zonal editions going on to play in the national finals. The winner of the national final will be declared the best women’s college cricket team in India. A few players participating in the women’s championship will also get an opportunity to interact with Smriti Mandhana. (ANI)

Ahmedabad (Gujarat) [India], March 17 (ANI): Former India opener Gautam Gambhir has questioned the decision to leave out batsman Suryakumar Yadav from the playing XI in the third T20I against England on Tuesday.
Suryakumar made way for opener Rohit Sharma, who was rested for the first two games, and the omission of the youngster irked Gambhir who wants the team management to give the Mumbai batsman a consistent run.
“It amazes me, seven months before the World Cup he starts preparing for World Cup, and probably after the World Cup he will start preparing for the next World Cup. It really doesn’t matter, the kind of form you are in matters,” ESPNcricinfo quoted Gambhir was as saying.
“Imagine if there is an injury issue, what have you seen of Suryakumar Yadav, what have you seen of Suryakumar Yadav in international cricket. I hope nobody gets injured but if there is an injury case and somebody needs to bat at number 4 and number 5,” he further said.
“For example, there has to be a replacement for Shreyas Iyer, who are you gonna go for. So at least look at someone whom you have got into the setup. Probably give him that opportunity in three or four games and see where he stands,” Gambhir added.
The former India opener opined that if Suryakumar had delivered for the hosts in the ongoing series, he could be looked at as a backup option at the number four batting position.
Gambhir said that too much rest and rotation of players has created an unwanted problem and cited England’s approach of fielding the same XI in the T20I series.
“We create a problem for our own self because we juggle a lot. In every game, there is some change or the other. Look at what England has done in this third T20I, they have not changed their batting order. So if you create problems for yourself, you would keep talking about problems of plenty,” said Gambhir.
“India will never be short of talent, there will always be players coming through because we have got such a great structure, we have got such a great franchise cricket a tournament like IPL. But when you keep juggling players, keep dropping players you will create problems for yourself,” he added.
India skipper Virat Kohli played an unbeaten knock of 77 to guide India to 156/6, but the total did not prove to be enough as Jos Buttler and Jonny Bairstow made light work of the chase to hand England an eight-wicket win. Buttler and Bairstow remained unbeaten on 83 and 40 respectively.
With the win in the third T20I, England has now gained a 2-1 lead in the five-match series. Both teams will meet in the fourth T20I on Thursday which will be played at the same venue. (ANI)