Author: Mishaal Mubarak

Ever since they lifted the T20 World Cup in Barbados, India have not held back from playing the shortest format. For them, this will be one of their usual T20 series in preparation for the World Cup in 2026. For South Africa, the encounter brings along some bitter memories from a few months ago, when India thrashed them out of their first-ever World Cup final at the last moment. The game has the potential to be named a revenge match, but vengeance is not quite as sweet when the stakes involved have fallen dramatically. Yes, for the sake of publicity…

Australia are headed toward a busy summer, which has started with a white-ball series against Pakistan. Following the three ODIs and as many T20I matches, Australia will host India for the five-match Border-Gavaskar Trophy which will start on November 22 at Optus Stadium, Perth, four days after the last T20I game against Pakistan. As a result, many key players were left out of the T20I squad to buy them time for extra training before the Test tour. It was also decided earlier that a new captain would be named for the T20Is since all of Australia’s usual captains, vice captains,…

West Indies and England take the decider to Barbados after a series of flexing batting muscles After a pedestrian display of batting in the first ODI, the English captain knew he had to take charge if he desired to take the series decision to the 3rd ODI. The task looked easier when the rookie pacer, John Turner, was able to dispatch the openers back to the pavilion under four overs. However, the problems came face to face with the visitors in the form of Windies skipper Shai Hope, who batted for almost 43 overs as if this was the last…

Bangladesh need to desert their Test horrors to fare against the unforgiving Afghanistan at the latter’s makeshift home It’s quite normal for a body to crash after an adrenaline rush, in order to bring things back to normal. Bangladesh have been going through the same transition lately. The adrenaline that pumped them to win the Test series 2-0 against Pakistan, wore off as soon as the winning jubilations started. Since then, a weakened Bangladesh have lost seven games, regardless of the format or opposition. But they could not afford to stay in bed, ‘recovering’ from their highs or lows as…

1574 players, out of which 1165 are Indian while the rest are foreign, have registered themselves for the mega-auction this year including some big names who were not retained earlier. This long list will be cut short before the auction on November 24 and November 25 in Jeddah. This year’s list includes players from all full-member nations, barring Pakistan, as well as Italy, Canada, Netherlands, Scotland, USA and UAE. Since it’s a mega-auction this year, all ten franchises are allowed to build a squad of a maximum of 25 players for the next three years. Having retained 46 players altogether…

International Cricket Council (ICC) has announced the full Women’s Future Tour Programme for the cycle 2025 to 2029. This five-year period will see the Women’s teams participate in the ICC Women’s ODI Championship, trilateral series, LA Olympics and as many as five ICC mega-events. The global governing body announced Zimbabwe as the latest addition to the ODI Championship, which means that now all full-member nations, barring Afghanistan, who do not have a women’s team, will be a part of the Championship. The Chevrons will join the Championship from its fourth edition which will begin in 2025. Each team will play…

The last time Pakistan played a 50-over game, Babar Azam was still Pakistan’s all-format captain, India’s fortress in a home Test series had never been breached with a whitewash, Bazball was all raging, and Australia had only four ODI World Cups in their trove (pathetic). They spent a year cleaning up the mess their shambolic ODI World Cup campaign caused and in the process, cycled through more premiers, captains, and coaches than many organizations do in their entire lifespans. But all these off-field changes are no alternatives for testing how these strategies have panned out in real-time. And for that…

Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) confirmed through their social media that the Islanders will host Australia for two Test matches in Galle followed by an ODI match. The newly added Test matches will be part of the ongoing World Test Championship (WTC) and are likely to act decisive as to which team proceeds to the WTC final. Both Test matches will be played at the Galle International Stadium, with the first match beginning on January 29, while the second on February 6. The one-off ODI game, set to be played six days before the tournament opener, will be a build-up to…

With a mega-event just around the corner, the last thing a team would like is to struggle against a side that is not even a part of the said event. But England had to endure this in Antigua as West Indies raced one-sidedly over the line. The first match of the three-match ODI series saw a huge involvement of rain, even threatening to turn the game into a washout at one point, much to the hosts’ chagrin. However, the Windies neutralized the looming threat of rain with their explosive batting to wrap up the game in a ball less than…

The Border-Gavaskar Trophy has increased significantly in importance for India ever since their series defeat against New Zealand. The men in blue need to be at the top of their game and win at least three out of the five Test matches due to be played during the tour. Although Rohit Sharma’s men are on a three-year winning streak in Australia, the stakes are higher than ever with India’s World Test Championship (WTC) final chances hinging on how they perform down under.  For warming up before the big series, India had earlier opted to play a three-day intra-squad game against…