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Jimmy Adams, the former West Indies captain, has been named as the new manager of West Indies Under-19s ahead of the World Cup in Sri Lanka. Adams replaces Roger Harper who left the position to take up the coaching role with Kenya.Zorol Bathley, the cricket operations manager of the WICB, told the : “We have appointed Jimmy because of his leadership skills and knowledge of the game and what goes on within the game.”Adams added that he was pleased to have a part to play with the future generation: “I’m excited about the role and I’m happy to serve West Indies cricket again. I’m excited to work with the boys and help to guide the next generation of West Indies cricketers.”His first role will be to co-ordinate the five-day training camp being held at the cricket development centre in Trinidad. The squad then leaves to play five matches against Pakistan Under-19s before the World Cup starts on February 5. West Indies’ first match is against the USA a day later.Adams played 54 Tests and 127 one-day internationals for West Indies in a nine year career.

Professional cricketers in England will have to wear mandatory helmets next season while batting or fielding close to the wicket.The ECB Board endorsed changes, first reported on ESPNcricinfo, on Wednesday to regulations governing the use of helmets across the professional game, bringing to a formal end the fast-disappearing era of the cap and floppy hat and the cry from the likes of Brian Close, fielding at short leg, to catch the rebounds.Any player who does not wear what the ECB calls “compliant protective headgear” will not be permitted to play.The insistence upon helmets follows several deeply troubling, high-profile incidents that have brought home the danger of the sport, including the tragic death of Australia’s Phillip Hughes after he was struck in a match in his own country and Australia and the blow suffered by Craig Kieswetter, the former England wicketkeeper, which ended his career.The ECB’s chief medical officer Dr Nick Peirce also sought to put things in perspective, however, saying: “We can see from our injury surveillance that cricket is not a dangerous sport in comparison to many other leisure activities.”The key changes in the professional game in England and Wales will apply to batsmen facing all types of bowling, wicketkeepers standing up to the wicket and fielders standing closer than eight yards from the batsman’s middle stump – except behind the wicket on the off side.The ECB is also recommending that all recreational cricketers wear helmets which meet the latest British safety standard from next season, although it has retreated from trying to make this compulsory.Instead, as the outgoing chief executive of the PCA Angus Porter said, the hope is that professional cricketers will lead by example. The use of protective headgear, however, is already mandatory for all Under-18s within the recreational game. The growing cost of recreational cricket, however, is bound to lead to some resistance.The changes – new regulations will be confirmed in the New Year – follow a joint review of existing safety guidance by the ECB and the Professional Cricketers’ Association and are designed to reduce the risk of head and facial injuries within the game. Key measures which ECB has recently taken in this area include:

• Forming an ECB Cricket Safety Working Group which reviews risks to safety and the well-being of players and spectators.
• Re-defining the role of the ECB Chief Medical Officer to enable greater emphasis to be placed on injury surveillance and research into the safety of the game.
• Setting up an Emergency Care Working Group to improve training and provision of emergency care standards at first-class, 2nd XI and training venues.
• Introducing new concussion guidelines via the ECB’s Sports Science and Medicine department. The department is also working with Birmingham University to conduct further research into concussion in cricket.
• Collaborating with the Loughborough Institute of Sport Technology, through sponsorship of a PHD researching helmet design, head injuries and safety in relation to cricket.

Peirce’s comments that cricket was not a high-risk sport were tempered by the reality, as the ECB and PCA see it, that action needed to be taken.”We can see from our injury surveillance that cricket is not a dangerous sport in comparison to many other leisure activities. However, as we have seen in recent times, the cricket ball can cause significant injury and it is extremely important that players take the appropriate precautions when batting, keeping wicket or fielding close to the stumps.”The latest cricket helmets have made significant strides in providing protection against potentially catastrophic injury and we would strongly advise all players to make sure their helmet conforms to the latest British Safety Standard.Today’s decision is a major step forward and will help make first-class cricket safer as well as sending a strong message to the recreational game about the importance of helmet safety.”Porter said: “We welcome today’s decision on helmet use. It provides an excellent opportunity for professional cricketers to lead by example and drive greater awareness of the importance of player safety across the whole game.”The rule covers matches for all England teams and programmes, county first, second and academy XIs and Women’s Super League and all matches played by the first-class counties. It has yet to be confirmed whether it will extend to the Minor Counties.Helmet regulations for England’s disability cricketers will be reviewed shortly.Under current rules for Under-18s, batsmen and wicket-keepers standing up to the stumps must wear a head protector. This rule will continue to apply, but it is now strongly recommended that all Under-18s who are in the ECB’s county age-group programmes and above should follow the new regulations. Again, for reasons that remain unclear, this has not been made mandatory.As of November 2015, there are more than 20 helmets from seven different manufacturers that meet the new standard. The full list of helmets meeting this standard is available here

Medium-pacer Sony Cheruvathur, the 29-year-old with just eight first-class matches under his belt, has been appointed as Kerala’s captain for the forthcoming season.The team doesn’t boast any heavyweights but the new coach Vedam Hariharan felt it was an opportunity for the youngsters to stand up to the challenge. “True, the last five to six years we had to depend heavily on imports for our batting,” Hariharan was quoted as saying in the . “This year, we don’t have men with heavy records. Players should now stand up to be counted.” Hariharan, who has coached sides in Australia, Scotland and Ireland was roped in earlier this month.Sadagoppan Ramesh and S Suresh, experienced hands from Tamil Nadu, were Kerala’s outstation professional players last year but the Kerala Cricket Association (KCA) decided not to draft anyone in this time. Kerala begin their campaign with an away match against Vidarbha in Nagpur, between November 3 and 6, and host Services in Palakkad from November 15 to 18.The side is also set to play a friendly against Karnataka in Bangalore from October 29 to 31. Kerala plays four of its five matches away from home but Cheruvathur, making his captaincy debut, wasn’t deterred. “We do very well in away matches for we get tracks where we can use our fast bowlers,” he said. Former Indian fast bowler Tinu Yohanan will be leading the pace attack along with the accurate Prasanth Chandran.Squad for the first two Ranji Trophy games: Sony Cheruvathur (capt), VA Jagadeesh (vice-capt), Prasanth Parameshwaran, Sebastian Antony, Sambasiva Sarma, Rohan Prem, Robert Fernandes, Sreekumar Nair, Raiphy Vincent Gomez, Vinan G. Nair (wk), Tinu Yohanan, Prasanth Chandran, S Aneesh, P Prasanth, KJ Rakesh. Coach: Vedam Hariharan.

The profits from the World Cup may entirely clear the debts of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB). Board president Ken Gordon told the Express last week: “I’m optimistic enough to hope that it might wipe it all out.”The beleaguered board are carrying a debt of US$15m. And it was the pre-tournament hope of Gordon that the six-week tournament, which will end on Saturday in Barbados, would go some way to relieving that burden.Asked last week if the WICB would in fact reap the expected financial bounty, the president said, “I expect that if we don’t reap the full benefits, we will get pretty close. There may be a shortfall but I don’t think it will be of any significance. I think we will come close to the targets we set. And I think overall, we will look back on this as a tremendous event.”Elaborating on what the World Cup profits could mean for the board, Gordon continued: “West Indies cricket expects to get a fair investment on it and out of that it intends to put in place plans for the developing of cricket. That’s what we want to do. We’ve been carrying a deficit of US$15m. If we can find a way to clear that, it eases our overall structure. It gives us the ability to have bank-borrowing, to do things which we can’t do now. Now we can hopefully work our way out of that.”The Caribbean’s first-ever hosting of cricket’s biggest event, however, has been marred by the death of Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer, complaints about the numbers of spectators at some venues and the restrictions on them.”Many things have gone wrong,” Gordon admitted. “But,” he asked, “who could have expected Bob Woolmer, right at the beginning of the series, to go like that? Who would have expected India and Pakistan to be withdrawn and so many thousands of people who were planning to come canceling? Who could have expected these things? Some countries have paid the price for it.”In spite of the difficulties, though, Gordon insisted that the World Cup was more success than failure. “This is the third largest event in the world. And we have done it when people didn’t think we could. And I think at the end of the day, we should all take some little pride in achieving it.”Gordon said he was impressed with the manner in which the local organisers have responded to the various problems. “We have dealt with enormous problems and our people have grown every time they have addressed them. And I think even though there were all these setbacks which I referred to, we moved into a second gear. And other things were done to put in place.”Grenada was happy, Guyana was happy. From what I see here, Barbados looks happy. We’ve had some empty stands, but you always have empty stands when you have weak games. The challenge is how you handle that in a way that would minimise the damage to the visible, while at the same time, not affecting the sales you’re trying to build, and I think we’ve done a pretty good job at this.”And Gordon noted further that he was especially pleased with “the tremendous personal growth I’ve seen amongst the people who have been managing this. The volunteers have been one of the great successes of this thing … because they have been absolutely superb. I’ve heard so many tourists talk about that. You can’t quantify the benefit of the warmth that has been generated at that level when those people leave here We must understand that this is not a project that you can expect your investment to be returned in a year or two, it’s a long-term investment.”Gordon, who has tendered his resignation as WICB boss but who has been asked to re-consider, is expected to give the board his final decision on Sunday at a special meeting.The WICB have been busy this week with planning meetings on the way forward for the cricket following the West Indies’ disappointing World Cup performance. Gordon said last week a change of culture was needed, “by laying down rules on which you are first of all absolutely serious about implementing. Those who don’t conform to those rules will know it’s their option to conform or otherwise…the new people you bring in, people who are committed to those standards, will ensure that they are maintained.”Asked why such change was taking so long, Gordon said: “I can only speak for the last 18 months and I will tell you that we have attempted to do so. But when you are dealing with a culture that has been inculcated over a very long time, you don’t do that and press your fingers and it disappears.”Gordon said he felt Brian Lara’s appointment as captain for a third time, last year, and his re-commitment to really do everything that he could to put cricket on a new footing, was the start of “an important beginning.”But the president conceded last week that West Indies cricket must now go back to the drawing board again. “We were found sadly wanting. We tried but it wasn’t good enough because we were not trying the right way, because we are not prepared properly enough to do it. And that’s what we’ve got to correct.”

Scorecard

Victoria will host Queensland in the Ford Ranger Cup final after a David Hussey century set up a crushing 143-run win for the Bushrangers over Tasmania. Hussey made 116 as the Bushrangers gave the Tigers a challenging target of 284 but the home side’s finals hopes evaporated and they crashed to 140.The demoralising loss was worsened for Tasmania when their captain Dan Marsh retired hurt with a potentially season-ending calf tear. The timing of Marsh’s injury would be a major worry for the Tigers, who are still in real contention for the Pura Cup final with two matches remaining.Hussey’s 103-ball innings was punctuated by six fours and five sixes and no bowler was safe as he and Rob Quiney built an important 98-run partnership for the third wicket. Quiney continued on from his impressive Pura Cup debut during the week and finished with 50, including two sixes beautifully clipped off his pads over square leg and midwicket.A quick 31 late in the innings from Adam Crosthwaite pushed Victoria to 6 for 283 and only Xavier Doherty (2 for 43) escaped with acceptable figures. Early wickets to Mick Lewis and Shane Harwood started the downward spiral for Tasmania, who virtually lost any chance when Marsh went to hospital with his leg problem.George Bailey top-scored with 35 but two wickets each to Harwood, Darren Pattinson, Andrew McDonald and Grant Lindsay sealed the win. Victoria’s home final will give them a chance to add to the Twenty20 title they earned last month.

Victoria have axed their wicketkeeper Adam Crosthwaite for their first Pura Cup match of the season. The Bushrangers instead chose Matthew Wade, who they recruited from Tasmania during the off-season, for the game against South Australia beginning on Sunday at Adelaide Oval.Wade, who turns 20 later this month, played one FR Cup game for Tasmania last season and believed his chances of a first-class debut would improve with a move to Melbourne. That opportunity has immediately come at the expense of Crosthwaite, who has spent two summers as Victoria’s first-choice gloveman but has managed only one Pura Cup half-century.A former captain of the Tasmania Under-19 side and a member of Australia’s Under-19 World Cup squad in 2005-06, Wade impressed Victoria during his junior career with his ability to regularly build big scores. He was also productive in his first game in Melbourne’s club cricket on the weekend, when he made 76 for Camberwell Magpies.”I’m thrilled to get an opportunity to play for the Bushrangers at first-class level,” Wade said. “Hopefully I can grab it with both hands and help get some points on the board for Victoria. We’ve had some solid hit-outs leading into the season so the whole squad’s really excited and can’t wait to get stuck into it.”Aiden Blizzard is also a chance to make his first-class debut if Victoria can find room in their middle order. Blizzard made a powerful statement in his first Twenty20 game last season when he blasted 89 from 38 balls at Adelaide Oval.The Bushrangers named a 13-man squad for this weekend’s match with Andrew McDonald’s inclusion dependent on the results of a scan on his right shoulder. McDonald had surgery during the winter and pulled up sore from a recent bowling spell.Shane Harwood is still recovering from a shoulder injury, leaving Victoria with a slightly inexperienced bowling line-up. Gerard Denton will lead the attack, while Allan Wise could play his first state match since 2005-06 after missing most of last season with stress fractures in his back.Squad Nick Jewell, Michael Klinger, David Hussey, Robert Quiney, Aiden Blizzard, Cameron White (capt), Andrew McDonald, Matthew Wade (wk), Gerard Denton, Bryce McGain, Peter Siddle, Allan Wise, Dirk Nannes.

Division One

4th dayNo surprises at Edgbaston where Hampshire consigned Warwickshire to an expected defeat. Warwickshire started the day at 69 for 2 needing a further 338 for an unlikely victory. Instead, their batting collapsed and they lost by 193 runs. While most batsmen managed to get a start, none could hold it together and Nick Knight ended up the topscorer, with just 34. Wickets were shared, with Chris Tremlett (3 for 50) the most successful, and the job was wrapped up inside 100 overs.3rd dayA brisk hundred from Justin Kemp powered Kent to a 151-runlead on the third day against Yorkshire at Canterbury.Resuming on 196 for 3, Martin van Jaarsveld (82) and Matthew Walker(60) put on an excellent fourth-wicket stand of 118. And thoughRichard Dawson removed both batsmen in quick succession, Kemp stoodtall, smashed five sixes and nine fours. He received good support fromNeil Dexter (39) who, though only 21-years-old and playing in hissixth first-class game, already has two fifties to his name. Together,the pair put on a vital 81-run partnership to hand Kent a very usefullead of 151 going into the final day.A good day for Middlesex restored some balance to their game against Durham at the Riverside but it is still unlikely to be enough to save them. Although Durham are still firmly in control of proceedings, helped by a fourth-wicket stand of 86 between Jon Lewis and Dale Benkenstein, Middlesex chipped out the last seven wickets for 91 runs. Chris Silverwood did the damage with 5 for 47, well supported by Alan Richardson who took 4 for 50. Middlesex were left chasing an unlikely 386, and by the close they 87 for 4.

Division Two

4th day Daniel Cherry and David Hemp put on a second-wicket stand of 172 as Glamorgan made sure of the draw against Leicestershire. After following on, Glamorgan had started the day at 37 for 1 but Leicestershire failed to make significant inroads into their batting, thanks to the efforts of Cherry and Hemp, who each made fifties. Hemp was eventually out nine short of what would have been a well-deserved hundred, while Cherry made 86. Mark Cosgrove made certain the points were shared with an unbeaten fifty.3rd dayAt the County Ground, Gloucestershire completed their second win of the season, beating Northamptonshire and leapfrogging them in the process, just to rub it in. Gloucestershire started the day at 8 for 1, needing a just 94 more runs for victory which they knocked off quite comfortably to win by six wickets. Their captain Jon Lewis was understandably delighted with the win, completed inside three days, and he told reporters: “Northamptonshire are a decent side and to beat them so convincingly is great for us.” But they weren’t so delighted with being docked one point for a slow over-rate. A sporting declaration from Essex has increased the chances ofa result against Somerset, after Ronnie Irani and Andy Flowerboth continued where they left off last night to add a further 118runs on the third day at Taunton. The home side’s batsmen lost bothopeners cheaply, but Cameron White and James Hildreth both hitattractive fifties before Keith Parsons (59*) and Will Durston (69*)carried Somerset to a commanding 346-run lead.Ray Price and Nadeem Malik’s plucky tenth-wicket stand of 60 nearlypulled off a stunning victory for Worcestershire, before IanHunter took the final wicket to hand Derbyshire a tense35-run victory on the third day at Worcester. Earlier in the day,Kabir Ali gave Worcestershire the upper hand with a brilliant burst of7 for 43 as Derbyshire collapsed to just 149 inside 41 overs. But, inchasing 210 for victory, Worcestershire’s batsmen stumbled to 114 for9 thanks to some penetrative bowling from Steffan Jones (4 for 62) andGraeme Welch (4 for 33). Though Price (56) and Malik took their sideclose, it was too little, too late.

Rory Hamilton-Brown has been reinstated as England Under-19 captain after the ECB was forced to make an about-turn, less than a week after it had stripped him of the captaincy and banned him from the first of two Tests against Pakistan.On Monday, it was reported that Hamilton-Brown had been punished for drinking on the eve of the first Test. He was named in the squad for the second match at Derby, which starts today, but only as a player with Ben Wright continuing as captain.But this morning the ECB issued a statement which said: “Following an investigation, Rory Hamilton-Brown has been reinstated as captain. Following the original decision taken by the England Under-19 team management there were suggestions that Hamilton-Brown had been involved in purchasing and consuming alcohol. Those suggestions have now proven to be unfounded.”The ECB has launched a full inquiry into the circumstances which led to the initial suspension which was imposed by the team management of John Abrahams and Andy Pick on the morning of the first Test.Whatever the outcome, board officials are likely to face some embarrassing questions as to how he was so swiftly banned on what now appears to be unsupportable evidence.

Zimbabwe’s one-day series defeat to Bangladesh is set to open another can of worms with the board and local cricket followers infuriated by the team’s poor performance. Zimbabwe went down to their third straight defeat at Bogra, on Tuesday, handing the series over with two matches left.Pressure on the coach Kevin Curran has quickly resurfaced and the board, which previously backed him when he came under siege from former board member Crispen Tsvarayi and the former head of selectors Bruce Makovah, has also become edgy. The humiliating loss to Bangladesh could be the final straw.Curran is not alone, though. Calls to axe under-performing players – a riot act was reportedly read by selectors before the tour – have grown by the day since Zimbabwe lost the first ODI by nine wickets.Sources have told Cricinfo the board wanted Curran to stay on until the World Cup, but there are now whispers in the corridors of Zimbabwe Cricket power that he is a contributing factor to the team’s slide.The defeats are dreadfully timed. The board is making frantic efforts to be seen to nurture a team that will be competitive when it finally returns to Test cricket at the end of next year.Many blame the board for the team’s continuing plunge, and it is feared that more players may quit the team to run away from taking stick on their own while the Peter Chingoka regime exonerates itself. Vusi Sibanda, the opening batsman, has already missed two tours with Zimbabwe after deciding to play league cricket in Australia where he is reportedly performing well.

Australia’s answer to an allrounder of Andrew Flintoff’s calibre may not lie in the national or domestic sides, according to Alan Davidson, Australia’s last great allrounder. Davidson, the first Test player to take 10 wickets and make 100 runs in a match in the famous tied Test against the West Indies in 1960-61, has encouraged the national selectors to look further than the current crop.”I think the selectors are on the right track but should also be looking at people in the Australian Under-19s. In the meantime we just need to be patient,” Davidson, 76, told the . “People like Andrew Flintoff take years to develop. He’s done a lot of hard work and had a lot of expert coaching. That’s the difference between the superstars and the others.”In Andrew Symonds and Shane Watson, Australia currently have two potential greats in the making, but the players now find themselves thrust into the role of allrounder in the longer format of the game. “That’s a very difficult thing to achieve,” said Davidson, a former national selector. “There are prospects, but nobody who shows enormous potential. I think Watson’s a very fine young batsman but he’s got an awful lot to learn about bowling.”Both men have been given limited opportunities to prove themselves in Tests and Davidson said there was little gain in contriving an allrounder if there was not one commanding national selection.Davidson, who aggregated 1328 runs and took 186 wickets in 44 Tests, added that a true allrounder should be able to take five wickets in an innings and hit 70 or 80 when the situation demanded it. “In my view our last real allrounder was Gary Gilmour, but he had specialists like Dennis Lillee and Greg Chappell around him who were great, and there wasn’t so much need for an allrounder.” Watson batted at No.7 behind Adam Gilchrist and bowled two overs in the first Test against the West Indies at Brisbane before breaking down with a shoulder injury, while Symonds’s first Test innings in almost two years was foiled by a running mix-up with Brad Hodge in Hobart. Neither Symonds nor Watson have contributed much with the ball, despite bowling first change, and Davidson is of the view that they should play as batsmen.