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ScorecardGraham Napier made a half-century from just 29 balls but Essex’s 244 for 7 was nowhere near enough•Getty Images

A magnificent century from James Vince carried Hampshire to a crushing nine wicket victory over Essex in the opening Yorkshire Bank 40 match of the new season at Chelmsford.Vince smashed an unbeaten 129 from 93 deliveries and shared in an opening partnership of 156 in only 17 overs with Michael Carberry as the visitors surpassed the target with 10.2 overs to spare.Their blitz on the Essex bowlers saw them raise the 100 in a mere 9.2 overs with Reece Topley and Sajid Mahmood suffering most. Mahmood, making his first appearance for the county following his move from Lancashire, conceded 34 runs in his first two overs while Topley went for 26.Vince needed just 27 deliveries to record his half-century and a further 44 to move into three figures with the help of 15 fours and a six. By then, he had lost Carberry for 65 made off 51 balls and containing eight fours and a six. He departed when giving a return catch to Graham Napier but that proved Essex’s solitary success as Jimmy Adams, with an unbeaten 29, helped Vince to see them home. In all, Vince hit 17 fours and a six and was just two runs short of equaling his competition best.Hampshire’s triumph came after a late surge from Napier and Greg Smith had led Essex to what appeared a challenging total. They added 93 in 51 deliveries for the sixth wicket after coming together in the 31st over with the total on 143.Napier, fresh from his heroics in the Championship victory two days earlier when he scored an unbeaten 78, made 50 from 29 balls before he was caught on the boundary from the last ball of the innings. Napier’s effort contained two sixes and five fours while Smith made 43, which included a six and six fours from 33 deliveries until he was bowled by Chris Wood..Earlier Australian left-hander Bobby Quiney struck a fluent 71 from 87 balls with the help of six fours and a six. His effort ended when he was bowled by Hamza Riazuddin after sharing in half-century stands with fellow opener Tom Westley (34) and Mark Pettini.But there was no joy for Ravi Bopara who had hoped to celebrate his inclusion in England’s Champions Trophy squad. He was bowled attempting to attack left-arm spinner Danny Briggs, a dismissal that completed a miserable week for him with the bat. In the Championship match against Hampshire, he failed to reach double figures in either innings and in eight trips to the middle this season, he has only once topped fifty.

ScorecardGujarat beat Punjab by six wickets in the final in Indore to win the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. Punjab elected to bat, but were in all sorts of trouble as they were reduced to 20 for 4, through the bowling of Mehul Patel, Jasprit Bumrah and Rohit Dahiya. Chandan Madan and Amitoze Singh put up a 44-run partnership for the fifth wicket to help steady the innings.Once Madan was dismissed, Gurinder Singh and Amitoze put up a further 49 runs, to leave Punjab at 113 for 6. Amitoze top-scored with 49, as Punjab stuttered to 122 for 8. Bumrah was the pick of the bowlers with 3 for 14, and was ably supported by Mehul’s 2 for 26.Gujarat started badly, as they lost their wicketkeeper captain Parthiv Patel with the score on 2. Asad Pathan and Niraj Patel put up a 50-run partnership, before they were both dismissed with the score on 52. Manprit Juneja and Abdulahad Malik put up a further 64 runs, as Gujarat kept abreast with the required run-rate. Ultimately Malik and Akshar Patel sealed the victory in the 18th over, and with six wickets in hand.

Ralph Waters has been named new chairman of the local organising committee for the 2015 World Cup hosted by Australia and New Zealand. Waters was previously the deputy chairman of the committee and succeeds James Strong, the previous chairman, who died in Sydney last week.Waters, a prominent businessman from New Zealand, said he would work closely with the home boards organising the World Cup and carry out a successful tournament.”Like myself, James [Strong] had lived and worked in Australia and New Zealand and was determined to put on a truly world class tournament in 2015,” Waters said. “I share his vision and will work closely with the ICC, Cricket Australia and New Zealand Cricket to deliver a successful tournament for cricket fans around the world.”Alan Isaac, ICC president, said Strong would be missed, but a successful World Cup would be delivered nevertheless. “James’ passion and expertise will be missed by all of us,” Isaac said. “I know Ralph shares the same love for the game and together we will deliver a great tournament.”

The proposed professional Twenty20 league in the USA, scheduled to be held in June and July 2013, has been postponed for a year because of operational reasons. However, the promoters are looking at a “major cricket event” in the coming season.Neil Maxwell, a director of Cricket Holdings America LLC (CHA), which has been putting together the event, told ESPNcricinfo: “The league will be pushed out until 2014. There are a number of issues that have taken longer than anticipated to address. We are conscious of getting the product right, particularly in the area of venues.”We are excited about the prospect of the league and, to this end, we are looking to stage another major cricket event this season to bridge the gap.”Gladstone Dainty, the president of the USA Cricket Association, confirmed the delay. “It’s a fact that the T20 league will not get started until 2014. Instead a series of matches will played by international T20 teams later this year while we work on a quality T20 product.”But he denied suggestions the failure to stage the competition in 2013 would have serious implications for USACA’s budget, telling ESPNcricinfo: “The financial impact on USACA should not be burdensome because USACA is still entitled to fees under the current agreement.”Rumours have been circulating for some time that organisers were facing a series of problems ranging from venues to problems attracting investors but these had always been denied.However, at USACA’s AGM in December Dainty admitted there were difficulties and indicated the board’s partnership with Rajiv Podar, the primary investor supplying funding to USACA through CHA, might be coming to an end. Podar denied this, admitting to “minor delays” but insisting he did not envisage them being enough to end the league.Dainty was due to meet Podar earlier this month regarding funding issues. If Podar has withdrawn then USACA would have to return advances he made to it which would pose serious issues as the board is in debt and has no significant revenue streams.

Pakistan cricket history is as old as the country itself. The Quaid-e-Azam trophy – the country’s premier first-class competition – has been a testing ground for cricketers in the domestic circuit since 1953. This year, 14 teams including Bahawalpur will compete in a newly revamped structure and is a chance for players to impress ahead of Pakistan’s South Africa tour in January 2013.The new structure promises improved competition among evenly-matched teams. The new regional teams are allowed to recruit five players from the old department sides, of whom four can be part of the playing XI. The 14 regional teams have been divided into two groups of seven, with top four teams from each group progressing to the super-eights while the remaining six would be playing in the plate league. The league toppers will contest in their respective league finals. Either way, each team will at least play eight matches apart from the finalIn a bid to give bowlers exposure to internationally-recognised cricket balls, the board has also made the use of Kookaburra balls mandatory for the tournament.Such measures have been taken by the board to revive national interest in the first-class game. Cricket is the most popular sport in Pakistan, but that interest seldom trickles beyond international matches – a far cry from the eighties and nineties when fans used to regularly flock the venues to watch players like Imran Khan, Javed Miandad, Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, etc. practice in the nets.Team previewsKarachi Whites and Karachi BluesKarachi is Pakistan’s biggest and the most successful regional cricket association having won the trophy 19 times. The city has two teams in the competition – Whites and Blues. The Whites are led by fast bowler Mohammad Sami and boast of prolific batsmen like Fawad Alam, Asad Shafiq, Khalid Latif and Saeed Bin Nasir. The Blues, captained by former Test batsman Faisal Iqbal, have a promising fast-bowling line-up with Tanvir Ahmed, Tabish Khan and Anwar Ali.The Whites, more successful of the two teams with a hat-trick of titles between 1990 and 1992-93, won their last title in 2002 and last year, finished third in Division 2, while the Blues were led to their eighth title by Sami in 2009.BahawalpurAfter a successful debut in this season’s Faysal Bank T20 Cup, Bahawalpur are all set to make a return to first-class cricket after nearly a decade. Bahawalpur were the winners of the inaugural Quaid-e-Azam trophy in 1953 when they beat Punjab in the final. They won their second title in 1958. During the 200304 overhaul of domestic cricket, Bahawalpur were merged with the Multan region.Rehan Rafiq, an opening batsman who has played for WAPDA and Habib Bank in the absence of his native regional team, will lead the Bahawalpur side this season. The squad is relatively inexperienced and the team mainly relies on veteran allrounder Bilal Khilji, seamers Kamran Hussain and Mohamamd Talha.SialkotA renowned Twenty20 side, Sialkot won the 2005-06 Quaid-e-Azam Trophy Golden League. Though they failed to defend their title the following year, they came hard to clinch it again in 2009.The combination of 20 players is centered on left-arm batsman Haris Sohail, who made 673 runs at 134.60 with four hundreds in the President Trophy for Zarai Taraqiati Bank Limited. He was rewarded with a national call-up when the selectors chose him in the ODI squad for the India tour. Left-arm fast bowler Naved Arif, who immigrated to England last year, has returned to play for his native domestic side as an overseas player.Left-arm spinner Abdur Rehman, who has been serving a 12-week ban after testing positive for cannabis during his stint with Somerset, is back in action. Another promising left-arm spinner Raza Hasan was left out due to his career-threatening spine injury, which had also ruled out him from the ongoing tour of India.RawalpindiIt is always difficult to see a Rawalpindi side without Mohammad Amir and the dashing Mohammad Wasim but life goes on. A hugely talented side, Awais Zia, Umar Amin and Mohammad Nawaz are the spirit of the team now. Rawalpindi perhaps never were the favorites and have never won the title but the region is always busy in producing quality players for the national level.Umar Waheed, a promising middle-order batsman from the Under-19 circuit will kick off his first-class career this year while all-rounder Nawaz will have to shift gears after his showing for Pakistan U-19s last year. Zia, who has been desperately waiting for the trophy to start, is ready to take flight. Amin has already asserted his case in the President Trophy. He was the leading run-scorer, with 767 in nine matches at 45.11 and will be put through another test ahead of the South Africa tour.Lahore ShalimarIt has been more than ten years now since Lahore -believed to be the biggest nursery for national cricketers in the country – won a national title. The last time was in 2001. Like Karachi, Lahore also have two teams. They had a poor season last year, finishing second-last in Division Two, and managed to win only one match against Multan, who were glued tightly to the bottom with zero points. Shalimar suffered seven defeats with one drawn game against a depleted Quetta side.This year, they start their campaign after losing key players to the national side for the India tour, leaving Shalimar with the inexperienced lot. In the absence of Mohammad Hafeez, Umar Akmal, Kamran Akmal and Wahab Riaz, Shalimar will have to rely on the veteran batsman Mohammad Yousuf. Along with fast bowler Aizaz Cheema, Zia-ul-Haq and Mohammad Irfan will be the core of the bowling attack.PeshawarPeshawar have retained the core of the side that beat Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited in the final of the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy Division Two last year. They were the underdogs but finished unbeaten in the division and were supposed to be promoted to Division One if the same structure had been followed this year.Peshawar are mainly centered on their batsmen Akbar Badshah and Mohammad Fayyaz, who were the second and third-leading run-getters in their division. Adding Israrullah to the mix makes it a formidable batting line-up. Their bowling attack is dominated by fast bowlers such as Imran Khan, the President Trophy’s third-leading wicket-taker, and Waqar Ahmed, who picked up 60 wickets last year for Peshawar.This year, they are entering the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy with a reputation to carry on. They are certainly the favorites on paper and look good to finish among the top teams before going into the super-eight. They have earlier won the national championship in 1998-99 and 2004-05.

Match facts

January 6-10, 2012
Start time 0930 (0400 GMT)Mohammad Kaif is one of the three players with international experience in the UP squad•Sivaraman Kitta

Big Picture

Men in uniform do not like to leave anything to chance but Wing Commander Deepak Bhaskar, the Services manager, knows his side needs all the luck it can get. Services are up against a team so formidable it can afford to go without the services of several India players, for it still has another three of them, and a bunch of other solid performers. Punjab, with all their early-season dominance, may have grabbed the headlines, but Uttar Pradesh also racked up four outright wins in the group stage, the same as Punjab. UP are also one of only two unbeaten sides among the quarter-finalists, Mumbai being the other.Services have toiled their way up from Group C with five draws and wins over Jammu & Kashmir and Assam but have a look at the kind of opposition UP have tamed. A Delhi side that had Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Virat Kohli, Unmukt Chand, Ishant Sharma and Ashish Nehra. Batting powerhouses Tamil Nadu managed 179 and 225 against UP, at home in Chennai.But men in uniform do not care about reputation and history. “What is a star player?” said Soumik Chatterjee, the 24-year old Services captain from Howrah, who can easily pass off as a student from a Kolkata college. “If you perform on a given day, you are a star then. If you cannot perform, how are you a star?” Chatterjee said, when asked about the big players in the UP team.UP are definitely ahead on quality of players and big-match experience but facing up to adversity is second nature for Services, not only as part of their jobs in the Army, Navy and Air Force but also in cricketing terms. They can’t afford the range of facilities and support staff the state associations can with BCCI money, though the pitch and outfield at their home ground at Palam in Delhi have recently been upgraded with support from the board.Here’s another example of the ways in which the departmental sides Services and Railways operate. The visiting England team are playing India A at Palam in a practice one-dayer on Sunday, and the Services coach is at the ground helping to organise the match. He is expected to reach Indore well after the start of the quarter-final, but Bhaskar made sure Services were not lacking, keeping a close eye on their nets and helping out with slip catching practice. Despite Bhaskar’s efforts, though, it will be an achievement for Services to take this quarter-final into fifth day.

In the spotlight

This is the only neutral venue for the quarter-finals, the match having been shifted from Palam to Indore because of the England practice game. The Indore pitch has steadily acquired a reputation of being one of the most sporting ones in the country. While most of its bite used to last a day, that is no longer the case, according to locals. Samunder Singh Chouhan, the man behind the belters on which ODI cricket’s two double-centuries were scored, is a curator who loves grass when it comes to first-class cricket.The Duleep Trophy final here in February 2012 lasted two-and-a-half days and Mohammad Kaif, leading UP in Suresh Raina’s absence, recalled how there had been help for the bowlers throughout that game. Two of this Ranji season’s three games at the Holkar Stadium yielded results, and Madhya Pradesh barely avoided losing the third. One had to squint to be able to make out the pitch this morning from the rest of the green square before the crease markings were made. It being a neutral venue – though UP do belong to the same zone as MP – Chouhan is under no pressure to shave off the grass.The Services batsmen will be up against the Uttar Pradesh fast bowlers, who will be led by the strongly-built Imtiaz Ahmed, who has had a breakthrough season with 34 wickets. Services’ veteran Yashpal Singh and young Rajat Paliwal, with 724 and 629 runs in the season, will be looked upon to deliver again.

Squads

Uttar Pradesh: Tanmay Srivastava, Mukul Dagar, Mohammad Kaif (capt), Parvinder Singh, Prashant Gupta, Arish Alam, Amir Khan (wk), Ali Murtaza, Umang Sharma, Ankit Rajpoot, Imtiaz Ahmed, Sudeep Tyagi, Praveen Gupta, Amit Singh, Eklavya Dwivedi, Piyush ChawlaServices: Soumik Chatterjee (capt), Pratik Desai, Anshul Gupta, Yashpal Singh, Soumya Swain, Rajat Paliwal, Sarabjit Singh (wk), Penta Rao, Suraj Yadav, Nishan Singh, Shadab Nazar, Muzzaffaruddin Khalid, Avishek Sinha, Shakti Malviya, Nakul Verma

Stats and trivia

• The only time Uttar Pradesh came up against Services in the Ranji Trophy was in 2005-06. They went on to win their maiden title while the latter were sent back to the Plate League.
• The last occasion the two-time Ranji finalists Services progressed beyond the league stage, they lost the Plate final to Haryana in 2004-05.
• Mohammad Kaif needs 27 more to reach 9000 first-class runs

Quotes

“It is a good decision by the board. Five days make a huge difference. If one team does not play well in the first innings, it has the chance to come back in the second innings. In a four-day game on a flat track, once you get the first-innings lead, the last day-and-a-half is very boring, for spectators and for us.””We wanted to reach this stage when we started preparing for the season in May and we have done so.”

The auction for the upcoming season of the Bangladesh Premier League, which is set to happen on December 20, has become the Pakistan Cricket Board’s bargaining chip with the Bangladesh Cricket Board over their ‘written commitment’ to tour Pakistan. The PCB is yet to handover No-Objection Certificates to its players to participate in BPL 2013, and without them the tournament will be without 20 of its star overseas players from the inaugural edition.The PCB and BCB have been discussing a short tour of Pakistan, which would mark the return of top-flight international cricket to the country for the first time since the March 2009 attack on the Sri Lanka team bus in Lahore. The PCB is seeking an official announcement from the BCB, regarding the proposed tour. A window has been created by the PCB to accommodate an ODI and T20 between January 10 and 15 ahead of the BPL, which starts from January 17.”Onus is on Bangladesh now, whether they want to honour their commitment or not as we have already honored out commitment [by nominating Bangladesh’s candidate for the ICC presidency],” a top PCB official told ESPNcricinfo. “We did everything to ensure our full support to Bangladesh every time, now it’s time for BCB to do it.”The Bangladesh delegation was satisfied with the security plan [for the proposed tour] and we are committed to give them the best security. The window is open for the series of two matches, preferably when we return back from the India tour.”Earlier, Bangladesh was all set to tour Pakistan in April this year after a deal had been cut between the two boards, by which the PCB would back the BCB president Mustafa Kamal as the nominee for the ICC vice-presidency and Bangladesh would tour Pakistan in 2012. However, the tour was postponed after a Dhaka court order embargoed the series.In view of the tour, the ICC had introduced a special dispensation, to be made in exceptional circumstances, by which bilateral series can take place even if the ruling body determined it unsafe to appoint its officials for the series. As per the dispensation, such series could be manned by “non-neutral match officials”.

India’s captain Unmukt Chand has said winning the World Cup in Townsville was a fitting end for an Under-19 side that began its journey over a year ago and has enjoyed so much success along the way. The World Cup was the fourth tournament Chand’s team has won, after two quadrangular titles and a shared Asia Cup trophy.”It has been a great journey and a great finish I can say,” Chand said after scoring an unbeaten century in India’s chase of 226. “We don’t know when we will play again [as a team], probably we won’t play again together, so that’s a bit of an emotional thing as well. Really happy that we could pull it off and finish it on a high.”India’s World Cup campaign was not entirely smooth: they lost the first game against West Indies and it wasn’t until the semi-final that their batting began to show collective promise. “That’s the good part,” Chand said of the challenges India had overcome. “Initially we have had a few jitters but we carried on really well and that’s what matters the most. We peaked at the right times and that’s a quality of good teams.”In the final, the bowlers, after reducing Australia to 38 for 4, had a rare off day and India’s batsmen needed to achieve the highest successful chase of the tournament at Tony Ireland Stadium to win the World Cup. Chand, however, praised his bowlers for keeping Australia to a total as low as 225 for 8.”It happens at times. Our bowlers have done really well in all the previous matches and I guess they bowled really well today as well,” Chand said. “You can’t expect a bowling side to restrict the opposition to 150 all the time. 225, we have restricted them to a very low target I feel.”India’s chase got off to a poor start, when Prashant Chopra was caught down the leg side in the second over. That changed quickly, though, when Baba Aparajith joined Chand and gave a masterclass in driving on the off side. They added 73 in quick time and gave India a buffer in case they lost quick wickets, which they did.”It’s only a matter of one partnership. One good partnership on this wicket, it was a dream wicket to bat on,” Chand said. “We knew that we would pull it off if we had one good partnership and that’s what I was telling the other batsmen with me. To back yourself, believe yourself and keep communicating.”India went from 75 for 1 to 97 for 4, though, but Chand found another steady partner in Smit Patel, who had scored a fighting half-century in difficult conditions against West Indies in the opening group game. Both were dropped, when Chand was on 38 and Smit on 2. India needed 91 off 90 balls when the batting Powerplay had to be taken but Chand and Smit did not change their approach much, scoring only 18 off the first four overs during the restrictions.”What I was thinking inside, and I had heard Dhoni speak of this before, that in the 38th over I won’t take a risk because the bowler is not under as much pressure as he is in the 46th or the 47th over. I was just thinking that I should take it to the last moment, because you know six, seven or eight runs, you can get anytime in an over. The important thing was to save wickets. If you have wickets in hand, even eight or nine [per over] on this track was not a difficult task.”As it so happened, Chand carted Ashton Turner’s off-spin over the midwicket boundary in the last over of batting Powerplay, the 40th. After three more overs of accumulation, India needed 49 off 42 when Chand chipped Alex Gregory to midwicket, where William Bosisto dropped the chance. Chand hit a six down the ground two balls later.”I was not thinking anything at the time,” he said about the drop and the following six. “I was just thinking to get to 226. I was talking to Smit, I didn’t look at the score … I didn’t know I had scored a century until the crowd shouted and that’s when I took out my bat and all. I was in … what do people call it? The zone? I was trying to stop Smit from hitting unnecessary shots, I was going and speaking to him and telling him to play within his limits.”The boundaries came quickly after that as India made a dash for the target, Smit achieving it with a pull to the midwicket boundary in the 48th over. India’s coach Bharat Arun said their success was in part due to the manner in which his team approached the final. The Indians had appeared remarkably relaxed on the field in the lead-up to the toss. Arun, Chand and Kamal Passi were in conversation while sitting on the grass, and a few of the others were having low intensity warm-ups and drills.”We felt we needed to be absolutely relaxed. We’ve been insisting right from the beginning,” Arun said. “You cannot ask the boys to relax and then be intense with these guys, so you’ll have to be cool. Unless they are relaxed they won’t focus on the process, if they are pressurised the process goes kaput.”We said today’s game was just another game for us. There was a big tag attached to it, added pressure, I guess we played by what we decided we would.”

The SLPL has unveiled Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M), one of India’s largest automobile manufacturers, as the title sponsor of the inaugural tournament that begins on Saturday. This announcement ends a run of bad news for the league, including the withdrawal of its biggest draw, Chris Gayle, and other top international players in the past few days.The addition of one of India’s prominent business groups as the title sponsor is further evidence of the appeal of Twenty20 cricket to companies wishing to promote their brand and products. S.P. Shukla, the head of Group Strategy at the Mahindra Group said Sri Lanka is a “strategic market for the Mahindra Group”, and that cricket was the best way for the company “to connect and engage with audiences as it is the most followed sport in the sub-continent with a fan base of approximately 1.5 billion fans across India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh alone.”However, the tournament has been hit by the loss of some important names. Gayle has been ruled out due to a serious groin strain. Two other overseas players – Pakistan’s Abdur Rehman and West Indies’ Fidel Edwards – have also withdrawn from the tournament, while Bangladesh allrounder Shakib Al Hasan was denied permission to play in the tournament by the Bangladesh Cricket Board last week.The Uva Next franchise have replaced Gayle and Rehman with Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Fawad Alam and Jacob Oram. The Uthura Rudras have drafted in Kyle Mills and Australia batsman Rob Quiney to replace Shakib and Edwards.The seven-team SLPL kicks off on August 11 and will feature a round-robin stage where the teams will play each other once. The top four teams will then go through to the semi-finals. All the games will be split between Colombo and Pallekele. A total of 56 overseas players had initially been signed. But some of those players will only take part if other overseas players became unavailable.

Allrounder Javed Ahmadi will lead Afghanistan at the Under-19 World Cup in Australia in August. Batsman Shabir Noori, who scored two fifties in the recently-concluded Under-19 Asia Cup, will be the vice-captain.Afghanistan had impressed in the Asia Cup in June, making it to the semi-finals alongside India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, by comfortably beating Bangladesh. The selectors have made three changes to the squad that played that tournament, leaving out Sharafudin, Zia-ul-Haq and Fitratullah Khawari. In their place, two batsmen, Younas Ahmadzai and Abdur Mangal, and left-arm spinner Abdul Naseri come in.For the World Cup, Afghanistan have been placed in group B, with Pakistan, New Zealand and Scotland. They will play Pakistan on August 11, the opening day of the tournament, in Buderim.Squad: Javed Ahmadi (capt), Shabir Noori (vice-capt), Abdul Naseri, Abdur Mangal, Afsar Khan, Aftab Alam, Fareed Ahmad, Hashmatullah Shaidi, Mohibullah Paak, Najibullah Zadran, Nasir Ahmadzai, Noor-ul-Haq, Sayed Shirzad, Yamin Ahmadzai, Younas Ahmadzai