A packed house will bid farewell to cricket at Ormeau, in Northern Ireland, today as the touring Australian team make their sole venture outside of English-Welsh territory to take on Ireland in the Northern Bank Challenge match.A crowd of about 4000 people is expected, with tickets having already sold out. The game is the last major representative fixture to be played at the Belfast ground, which is to be turned into a housing development. The home of the North of Ireland Cricket Club, Ormeau has been used for cricket since 1859, and saw its first visit by an Australian team when Bradman’s 1938 tourists played the Gentlemen of Ireland. Australian teams have also played at Ormeau in 1961 and 1968.Ricky Ponting will captain the Australians in the absence of Adam Gilchrist, who is resting from this game, and Steve Waugh (who actually played for Ireland as a guest against Australia ‘A’ in 1998), who is recovering from a leg injury. Ponting, who scored 147 not out in Australia’s victory over Sussex on Friday, was man of the match in Australia’s last meeting with Ireland on their 1997 tour. The Tasmanian batsman scored 117 in that game, played at Eglinton.The match will create an unusual double for Mark Waugh, who, like his brother, has appeared for Ireland as a guest player – against Zimbabwe in 2000.For Ireland, it’s the first game together since their unsuccessful bid for World Cup qualification at last month’s ICC Trophy tournament in Canada. Ryan Eagleson, Ed Joyce, Mark Patterson and Desmond Curry are unavailable from the team that visited Canada for a variety of reasons. Curry has not played for Ireland since being sent home in the middle of the ICC Trophy following a public falling-out with coach Ken Rutherford, a disciplinary committee yet to deliberate on his representative future. Conor Armstrong and Richard McDaid come into the Irish squad for this game.Play begins at 11am local time (1000 GMT) with BBC2 in Northern Ireland showing an hour’s highlights in the evening. The match is not an official one-day international.Ireland: Kyle McCallan (capt), Jason Molins, Conor Armstrong, Peter Davy, Matt Dwyer, Derek Heasley, Dominick Joyce, Adrian McCoubrey, Richard McDaid, Paul Mooney, Andrew Patterson, Andrew White. (12th man to be named)Australia: Ricky Ponting (capt), Michael Slater, Matthew Hayden, Justin Langer, Simon Katich, Mark Waugh, Damien Martyn, Wade Seccombe, Shane Warne, Colin Miller, Glenn McGrath, Brett Lee, Damien Fleming. (Two to be omitted)

Sussex face an uphill battle to avoid their first ever Championship defeat by Durham after they were dismissed for their lowest total of the season on the second day at Hove.The second division leaders were bundled out for just 117 in 35.4 overs and only avoided the follow on thanks to a determined 38 from Matthew Prior and Jason Lewry’s belligerent 23 batting at Number 10.Martin Love scored his 13th half-century of the season when Durham batted again with a lead of 137 and by the close the visitors, who have lost eight and drawn the other of their nine previous Championship games against Sussex, were well placed on 179-5, a lead of 316, when bad light ended play five overs early.James Kirtley took the final first innings wicket in the first over of the day to finish with 5-48 and there was no hint of the drama to come when Murray Goodwin and Richard Montgomerie put on 33 in seven overs for Sussex’s first wicket.But Steve Harmison took four wickets, including Chris Adams, Bas Zuiderent and Michael Yardy for ducks, James Brinkley three and Nicky Hatch one as the Durham attack exploited ideal bowling conditions and exposed flimsy batting technique against the moving ball to reduce Sussex to 70-8.But Prior and Lewry added 31 for the ninth wicket and although Prior was run out with four still needed to avoid the follow-on, Lewry averted the crisis with some lusty hitting.Batting conditions noticeably improved during the afternoon and Love added 117 in 30 overs with his captain Jon Lewis after Gary Pratt had fallen to Kirtley in the second over.Kirtley and Mark Robinson both took two wickets after tea with Love falling leg before to Kirtley for 82, but salvation is still a long way off for Sussex.

West Indies scheduled tour of Sri Lanka in November will be reviewed by theWest Indies Cricket Board (WICB) after the recent terrorist attacks in theUS.According to WICB Chief Executive Greg Shillingford "all future tours" willbe re-considered when the board directors meet on September 28 and 29.The West Indies were also scheduled to tour Pakistan early next year. Thattour is looking increasingly unlikely with the military build-up in theregion.The Sri Lankan tour, however, is expected to go-ahead as planned, as therehas been no noticeable increase in tension after attacks in the US.Shillingford added that there has been "great consultation" with the SriLankan and Pakistan cricket boards but it was too early to make definitivestatements.West Indies are scheduled to play three Tests and a triangular tournamentduring November and December in Sri Lanka.

The XXXX Queensland Bulls will confront a full-strength NSW Blues teamin the top of the table ING Cup match at the Sydney Cricket Ground onSunday.The Queensland selectors today named the same team that defeatedVictoria in their most recent ING Cup match, with Test players MatthewHayden and Andy Bichel returning to the squad.NSW will field a team that consists almost entirely of internationals,with only in-form pace bowler Stuart Clark yet to represent his country.For Queensland, Clinton Perren, James Hopes and Nathan Hauritz fit intothat category although Hopes and Hauritz have represented Australia inYouth internationals.NSW and Queensland share the lead in the ING Cup with NSW two pointsahead of Queensland in the Pura Cup competition.Meanwhile pace bowler Joe Dawes hopes to make his return from a kneeinjury in the Brisbane XXXX First Grade competition this weekend in abid to make his Bulls comeback in the Pura Cup match against NSW at theGabba next week. The Pura Cup match starts on Sunday, November 25 andwill be a “Dollar Day" promotion.Dawes aborted his planned comeback for the Pura Cup match against theWestern Warriors when he reported residual soreness in his knee afterbowling for Valley and the Queensland medical staff elected to rest himfurther.XXXX QUEENSLAND BULLS v NSW, ING Cup, SCG, Sunday: Stuart Law (c),Matthew Hayden, Jimmy Maher, Martin Love, Clinton Perren, AndrewSymonds, Wade Seccombe, Andy Bichel, James Hopes, Ashley Noffke, MichaelKasprowicz, Nathan Hauritz.NSW: Mark Waugh, Michael Slater, Michael Bevan, Mark Higgs, Shane Lee,Steve Waugh (c), Brad Haddin, Brett Lee, Nathan Bracken, Stuart MacGill,Stuart Clark, Glenn McGrath.

A century from Kiran Powar brightened up the first day of play inTamil Nadu and Goa’s Ranji Trophy tie at Chennai.Winning the toss, Goa’s openers were separated early. One-down batsmanPowar, however, batted resolutely, shrugging off the regular loss ofpartners at the other end.Making 111 off 282 balls, with five fours and three sixes, Powar wasfinally out with the score on 206, being the fifth wicket to fall. Noother batsman really contributed to Goa’s total.At stumps, Goa were 217 for six, with Rajesh Naik (12*) and HAS Khalid(2*) at the crease.

The Zimbabwe Under-16 team to tour South Africa in December was selected over the weekend of Saturday 20 and Sunday 21 October. The side is made up of 13 players, namely: Duncan Bradshaw, James Cameron, Graham Cremer, Colin de Grandhomme, David Irvine, Tinotenda Mawoyo, Tafadzwa Mufambisi, Ross Nel, Brighton Ngarava, Steven Nyakunhuwa, Kumbirai Nzenza, Brendon Taylor and Sean Williams.Keith Saich and Square Square will travel with the side to South Africa as manager and coach respectively. The team will play in the PG Bison Week in East London, which will take place between 11 and 15 December.A good indication of the talent the side possesses is given by the fact that the side’s wicket-keeper, Brendon Taylor, is a high-order batsman for Harare Sports Club First XI, and both James Cameron and Colin de Grandhomme play for Alexandra First XI, for whom they often play a major role. Also encouraging is the number of players of colour who have been selected for the under 16 side, and indeed all of the Zimbabwe schools sides. One just hopes for the sake of Zimbabwe cricket, that the potential possessed by the players now is one day converted into real international class at Test level.

New Zealand’s bid to finish the summer as the third-ranked team in Test cricket could be foiled if bad weather continues to disrupt the Bangladesh tour and prevent any results in the two Test matches.Today’s heavy rain in Hamilton for all of the morning and well into the afternoon left the covers saturated in water, and the outfield pooled with puddles.There was a brief period when the skies lightened and a break in the weather looked possible. However, no sooner had the ground staff started their preparations than the weather closed in.Lunch was taken at the regular time of 2pm but almost straight afterwards the umpires, Dave Orchard of South Africa and Tony Hill of New Zealand called play off for the day and scheduled the start for 11.30am tomorrow with play continuing until 7.30pm.New lighting towers are in place at the ground and if there is a problem with the light they will be brought into use.There was a long period without rain later in the day, but the ground staff had commented it would take them at least three to four hours to prepare the ground and there would not have been sufficient time left to make a start.There are genuine prospects for play tomorrow with heavy rain warnings to the east of Hamilton having been withdrawn.New Zealand needs to win this National Bank series, and then beat England later in the summer to achieve that goal.But without a success against Bangladesh, New Zealand would not be able to pass Sri Lanka on the table. If Sri Lanka beat Zimbabwe it would retain its points and remain on 1.14.If New Zealand beat England, but had been unable to take a win from a drawn Bangladesh series, whether by rain or Bangladesh defiance, then it would end the summer on 1.13.The only way to avoid that would be the unlikely event of Zimbabwe taking pre-existing points off Sri Lanka by drawing or winning the series.The more bad weather reduces the time available in matches, the tougher it gets for New Zealand to claim the required victory.There is also the possibility that the International Cricket Council could decide that if one match was abandoned without a ball being bowled, the series had become a one-Test series and that the series was then discounted as a Test series for the purposes of the ICC Test Championship.The forecast for tomorrow is not especially bright and every hour of without play minimises New Zealand’s chances to take a result from the match.So it is in New Zealand’s interests to get play in whenever they can in the series to try to force a result, a different form of pressure, but pressure nonetheless. And certainly a handy vehicle in the fight against complacency if, in fact, that had ever been a problem.

An unbeaten century from Damien Martyn and an excellent bowling and fielding effort has seen Australia break its VB Series points duck with a27-run victory over South Africa here at the ‘Gabba ground in Brisbane tonight. In front of a record crowd, the Australians held their composure tobowl the Proteas out for a total of 214 in the 49th over as they chased the home team’s 4/241.Martyn’s innings of 104 (from 121 deliveries), which ultimately secured him the man of the match award, was the key component in Australia’s win.He came to the crease with his team in trouble after another poor start but proceeded to take the match out of the South Africans’ clutches as hecompiled a defiant 171-run stand for the third wicket with Ricky Ponting (80).After a run of outs that had netted the Australians losses in each of their first three matches of the tournament, the new opening combination of MarkWaugh (15) and Matthew Hayden (10) found no ready cure to their team’s ills. Waugh survived two confident lbw appeals before inside edging tobe brilliantly caught by wicketkeeper Mark Boucher off paceman Steve Elworthy (2/53) while Hayden, dropped at 8, then mistimed a pull to beheld at mid off from the same bowler.The Australians also lost their way at the other end of their innings, watching as Ponting drove a Lance Klusener (1/48) delivery to Herschelle Gibbsat cover and Andrew Symonds (3) play off a leading edge at spinner Nicky Boje (1/43). Only 42 runs were collected from the final eight overs asMartyn and Steve Waugh (22*) were pegged back by Shaun Pollock (0/28) and Boje in particular.In between times, though, Martyn and Ponting made batting look easy on a true surface. Driving was a feature of their respective innings: Pontingregularly finding the boundary while Martyn’s excellent placement and running between the wickets also cleverly accelerated the scoring rate.In the context of South Africa’s later inability to mount any more than one half-century partnership, their ability to guard against the consistent loss ofwickets also proved crucial.”There is always pressure to win and we knew we had to win the game,” said Australian captain, Steve Waugh, at the end of a match played before35,671 people – an all-time record attendance for a one-day international match in Brisbane.”We wanted to make sure we improved tonight.”Waugh later added that he was “disappointed” by recent media criticism of his side though “not surprised” by the attacks in the wake of Australia’ssurprisingly slow start to the tournament.Neil McKenzie (68) led a determined South African chase, and received useful support from Jacques Kallis (37) along the way. But thecomparatively early surrender of openers Gary Kirsten (22) and Gibbs (18) always made life difficult for the tourists.The South Africans had begun their pursuit aggressively, reaching a mark of 0/34 in the seventh over before Gibbs hit Glenn McGrath (4/37) toAndy Bichel at mid on for an easy catch. His error set the tone for generally indiscreet shot selection and the fall of wickets on a regular basis.McGrath, though he dropped a comfortable catch off Bichel’s bowling as Kirsten top edged a cut to third man, was a persistent thorn in the tourists’side, snaring a pair of wickets at either end of the innings. Symonds (3/48) and Jason Gillespie (2/60) combined to wreck the middle order andBichel (1/27) – arguably the pick of the attack – restrained the run flow superbly.Gillespie snared the two key wickets, trapping Kallis in front of his stumps as the talented right hander shuffled marginally across his crease and thenluring McKenzie into playing one of the few false stokes of his innings.McKenzie, though starved of meaningful support at the other end, had still been threatening to steal the game at that stage – and almost any hope ofa finals appearance away from the Australians as well.But when he tried to guide a Gillespie delivery through the slips in the 41st over only to see the ball disappear into wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist’sgloves, the Proteas’ aspirations of victory suffered a major setback.Pollock (18) followed him to the pavilion three overs later, mistiming a pull at Symonds to hit a catch to Hayden at deep square leg and effectivelyend the contest.Symonds had earlier induced Jonty Rhodes (2) to thin edge a catch to Gilchrist and had also caused the demise of Boucher (10) as he divedforward to complete an inspirational caught and bowled dismissal.

A threat from the Asian Cricket Council directed at New Zealand Cricket appears to have crossed in the mail with news that New Zealand manager Jeff Crowe is to visit Pakistan next week to ascertain security coverage for the proposed tour by New Zealand in April.The ACC, meeting in Sharjah, yesterday issued a statement that if New Zealand did not fulfil its obligation to tour Pakistan in April, then India would pull out of its end of year tour to New Zealand.The threat is an attempt by India to have Pakistan’s backing as part of its bid to take on the International Cricket Council over the commission looking into the factors behind the abandonment of the third India-South Africa cricket Test last year – a match thrown into chaos after India rejected punishment dished out by ICC match referee Mike Denness.Last week’s meeting of the board of NZC decided to accept the new dates for the tour in April, subject to security concerns being met.NZC chief executive Martin Snedden said assurances had been received both from the Pakistan Cricket Board and the Pakistan Government that security “would not be compromised.”Snedden said he believed it also made sense to send Crowe to discuss specific security arrangements.Crowe will leave for Pakistan immediately after the last ODI in the National Bank Series with England at Dunedin. He will return before the first Test in Christchurch a week later.”Should issues surrounding player safety be satisfactorily resolved the Board is keen for the CLEAR Black Caps to play Pakistan as soon as practical to ensure the credibility of the World Test Championship,” Snedden said.Ever since the abandonment of the tour after the September 11 terrorist atttacks in the United States and in advance of the escalation or retaliation in Afghanistan, Pakistan’s neighbour, Snedden has said the obligation for the tour would be made.However, the threat by India to withdraw from its tour would have severe implications for the state of world cricket.NZC made their decision to send Crowe last week and only learned of the threat today through the news media. No formal notice has been received.”We’ve got a lot of goodwill towards Pakistan,” Snedden said.”We’re not getting too excited about this threat, it is an irrelevance in our thinking. We intend to meet our obligations,” he said.

Two brilliant knocks from Khaled Mashud Pilot and Anisur Rahman had postedRajshahi Division well into a commanding position after day-3 of IspahaniMirzapore Tea 3rd National League. Their opponent Khulna Division isfighting to evade the looming innings defeat with 147 for 4 at the close ofthe day.Rajshahi had amassed 536 runs for 8 wickets when their swaggering skipperKhaled Mashud decided to declare the innings against a Khulna first inningstotal of 239. Mashud hammered the second double century (201 not out) in theLeague (Minhajul Abedin got the first one) with good support he got fromAnisur Rahman (107) and the Shamimul Haque (43).Mashud, the skipper and wicket keeper of Bangladesh National team, has addedmore 144 runs to his overnight tally. To reach the double figure he sent theball 18 times to score boundaries and chose the aerial for a singleoccasion. Thanks to his fifth wicket stand with Anisur Rahman that procuredRajshahi 155 runs.With Shamimul he summed up another 108 runs in the next wicket and declaredthe innings soon after he reached his double hundred.Khulna Division suffered a middle order collapse after a good start.Sajjadul Hasan (45) and Nahidul Haque (43) set in motion auspiciously asthey gathered up 88 runs in the opening stand.However, after Nahidul’s departure Khulna middle order crumbled miserably asthey lost the next 3 wickets in quick succession. At stumps they werepulling out all the stops on 147/4 with Hasanuzzaman (31) and Asadullah Khan(19) on the crease.