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The scene isn’t quite this bad at New Road this time…yet © Getty Images

For the second consecutive match torrential rain has forced Worcestershire to abandon a Championship game without a ball bowled. This time the clash against Lancashire has been called off on the first day after further rain lashed New Road. Worcestershire are now bracing themselves for their home season being a write-off if the ground floods for a second time.The band of heavy and thundery rain moved slowly up the country overnight and came to a standstill over the Midlands. The umpires called off play well before the scheduled 11am start and later in the afternoon news came through that the whole match was off.A statement said: “Due to severe weather and a warning from the environment agency about the impending flooding of Worcestershire’s ground it has been decided to abandoned the County Championship match against Lancashire.””Another flood would probably put us out of action for the remainder of the season,” Worcestershire chief executive Mark Newton told Cricinfo earlier. “There are not any flood warnings out for the River Severn or the River Teme but we are monitoring them closely. We are not expecting the ground to flood but clearly it becomes a possibility the longer the rain stays around.”A decision to stage the current Championship match was taken by Worcestershire, Lancashire and the ECB on Monday and Newton says that even if they had relocated to another venue it wouldn’t have helped them in this situation.”No ground in Worcestershire, or the country, could cope with this rain,” he said. “There would have been no point moving to an outground because they don’t have the same level of covering and hard-standing areas to take the rain.”We could have staged a full day of cricket here yesterday without any problems. The ground was fully prepared and up to standard but there is nothing we can do about the rain. And another month of this is forecast.”The ECB now face a potentially difficult situation after their decision last week to order a replay of the match against Kent later this month. It has set a precedent and Lancashire, along with Yorkshire and Hampshire, have already registered their protest at the ruling. It has gone before an ECB appeals panel and the outcome is still awaited, but this further torrential rain will put more issues on the table.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out

Mohammad Asif took four wickets as he and Umar Gul bowled England out for 173 © Getty Images

In the days following Pakistan’s defeat at Headingley, Bob Woolmer has been consoling himself with the fact things are not be as bad as they seem for his team. On the first day at The Oval he was given a glimpse of what might have been as Mohammad Asif, returning to the side after recovering from his elbow injury, helped skittle England for 173. Asif and Umar Gul finished with four wickets apiece before Imran Farhat cemented the advantage with a shot-filled half-century.Asif’s last Test match was in April against Sri Lanka, at Kandy, and he ended with figures of 11 for 71. Since then he’s been sorely missed by a team also shorn of Shoaib Akhtar and Rana Naved-ul-Hasan but spent the early part of this summer showing his potential with Leicestershire. It was a gamble by the Pakistan management to select him for this match – he only arrived back in England three days ago – but that makes his figures of 4 for 56 in 19 overs even more commendable.The pre-lunch action was limited to just eight overs as heavy showers scudded across the ground, but Asif had already slotted into the ideal line and length for the muggy conditions, after Inzamam-ul-Haq’s brave call to bowl first. The first breakthrough went to Gul, as an out-of-sorts Marcus Trescothick slashed to gully, but it was Asif that opened up the match for Pakistan.His wickets came from perfect swing and seam bowling at a lively pace. Andrew Strauss, after again producing some fluent shots, was pushed back before reaching out for a pitched-up delivery. However, Asif outdid himself with the next ball as he produced a full, swinging beauty that kissed the edge of Kevin Pietersen’s bat as it moved late in the air. A little under 12 months ago Pietersen secured the Ashes with 158 at this ground; his stay couldn’t have been any shorter this time around.England’s man for a crisis in recent times has been Paul Collingwood, but Asif soon added him to the wicket column with a delivery that nipped back and would have taken middle. Asif was making the ball move at will, but also knew how to utilise the conditions to his advantage and made clever use of the short ball.For the first time in the series England’s batting had its back to the wall and Inzamam took the chance to give Danish Kaneria a bowl. As if to epitomise the turnaround he struck with his fourth ball after having to wait an eternity in the previous three Tests. Ian Bell propped forward and got an inside-edge onto his pad and out to silly point as England stumbled to 91 for 5.Chris Read played two fine innings at Headingley but the situations were not quite as tricky as the one facing him this time. His task became no easier when he lost Alastair Cook, who had played with a calm assurance as all around him fell, when he was trapped by a yorker from Shahid Nazir. Billy Doctrove eventually raised his finger as he started to wander away from the stumps.

Umar Gul wrapped up England’s tail to end with four wickets © Getty Images

The innings was given a brief revival through its best stand with Read and Sajid Mahmood adding 46. Kamran Akmal missed a chance to stump Mahmood before he had scored but the rally was unlikely to last long with the ball now reversing, a potent threat against the tail.After Asif’s work against the top-order it was Gul – deservedly so – who wrapped up the tail in a manner that revived memories of Pakistan’s last visit to The Oval, in 1996, when Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis produced a fine display of reverse swing. Gul has been the stand-out performer in Pakistan’s struggling attack and here benefited from having a reliable partner at the other end. He ended the innings in two balls by bowling Read – who’d faced just five balls out of 31 – then yorking Monty Panesar first ball.England’s bowlers didn’t heed the lessons of watching the Pakistanis and fed Hafeez and Imran Farhat – the fourth opening combination of the series – a series of loose deliveries. Still, though, Pakistan’s opening jinx struck when Hafeez was forced to retire hurt with a leg injury as the pair were on the verge of a rare fifty stand.Mahmood handed England a fillip before the close when Younis Khan was caught down the leg-side but Farhat moved to an aggressive fifty off 63 balls. However, Mohammad Yousuf was spilled twice when Read and Trescothick couldn’t decide between them who should take an edge off Hoggard, on 5, then Cook missed a low effort in the gully four runs later from the same bowler. For a day, at least, it was hard to believe which team holds the 2-0 advantage.

How they were out

Click here to read Cricinfo’s description of each wicket

Ramnaresh Sarwan and 20-year-old offspinner Omari Banks have been drafted into the West Indies squad for the second Test against Australia in Trinidad starting on Saturday (April 19).If the recall of Sarwan, who has recovered from a fractured finger in his left hand, was not surprising, then the continued omission of Chris Gayle was. Gayle was left out of the squad for the Guyana Test after he opted to play in a double-wicket competition rather than the Carib Beer Series final. His continued exclusion indicates that despite comments to the contrary, he is still very much out of favour with the selectors.The 15-man party retains the entire squad chosen for the first Test, including the injured Ridley Jacobs. A decision will be taken on his fitness in the next 24 hours, although it seems extremely unlikely that he will recover from his groin strain in time to play. Jamaica’s 20-year-old Carlton Baugh is likely to be brought in for his Test debut.The inclusion of Banks is a reward for a solid first-class season in which he took 25 wickets at 36.40 and scored 270 runs at 33.75 for the Leeward Islands. He is the first cricketer from Anguilla to be picked for a senior West Indies side.West Indies squad Wavell Hinds, Devon Smith, Daren Ganga, Brian Lara (capt), Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Marlon Samuels, Ridley Jacobs/Carlton Baugh (wk), David Bernard, Omari Banks, Vasbert Drakes, Mervyn Dillon, Pedro Collins, Jermaine Lawson.

Fans in Sri Lanka read about Muralitharan’s fantastic achievement© AFP

As a child I can remember the headlines when Lance Gibbs passed Fred Trueman’s then world record of 307 Test wickets. In an era when sport was given a page – occasionally two – in most newspapers, and when saturation radio and television coverage was a generation away, the column inches devoted to the feat were the modern equivalent of a week of nonstop programming.There were few dissenting voices back in February 1976 when Gibbs overhauled Trueman – although Fred himself muttered that Gibbs, an offspinner, had bought many of his victims.On Saturday, Muttiah Muralitharan passed Courtney Walsh’s record of 519 wickets. The media coverage was extensive, the celebrations in Harare more exuberant than they were in 1976, but the overall reaction – outside Sri Lanka, anyway – has been more low-key. Lingering doubts regarding Murali’s action have led to a less-than-comfortable recognition of his achievement.In The Times, Tim de Lisle wrote that the reaction was “muted, hollow, underwhelming”. He continued: “There were two reasons for this. The first is that Muralitharan was playing the Zimbabwe 3rd XI. He would have faced stiffer resistance from Devon or Ireland. The second reason concerns Muralitharan himself and the legality of his bent arm. Until very recently, almost everyone in cricket, bar Bishan Bedi and a couple of Australian umpires, was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt. But with his latest trick, the doosra — or offspinner’s legbreak — Muralitharan has tipped the balance of opinion against him.””Few world champions have divided opinion like Muralitharan,” wrote David Hopps in The Guardian. “For every person who proclaims him a wonder of the age, there is another lining up to condemn him as a cricketing pariah. It is best to adopt a position from the outset: Murali is a genius, a flawed genius perhaps, but a bowler who deserves to have his greatness universally recognised. Sadly, this will never be the case. His world record will forever be tarnished by the endless debate over his bowling action.”In The Independent, Angus Fraser admitted that the action might not be perfect, but added that “I turn up at cricket matches hoping to be entertained, and Muralitharan seldom lets me down. What if Muralitharan does throw the odd ball? Cricket is littered with bowlers with questionable actions, and he is not going to kill anyone. It still takes an enormous amount of skill and practice to bowl as he does, and if it was that easy, why is the game not full of similar bowlers?”Peter Roebuck espoused similar sentiments in the Indian Express: “Now Murali stands at once as a champion and an outcast. His record-breaking performance will provoke a mixture of congratulation and resentment. Even in triumph, Murali cannot command the respect sought by every man and craved by every performer. His head must be spinning as much as his sharpest offbreak. He has deserved better from the game than a mixture of hysterical support and abject condemnation.”And that theme was amplified by Kevin Mitchell in The Observer. “Whatever the earnest mien of some Test players, cricket is a game best played with a smile and a flourish. Give me Gower before Boycott, Sehwag ahead of Ganguly. And most definitely give me Muttiah Muralitharan above his army of mean-spirited critics.” And Mitchell dismissed those who accused Muralitharan of having an illegal action. “Why is chucking inherently wrong?” he asked. “Because the rule-makers, who have always sided with batsmen, say it is. Once, bowling roundarm was illegal. So, too, was bowling overarm. The action has evolved, not always smoothly and often with a lot of arguing. He is unquestionably a genius and should be cherished, not admonished.”The reaction in Sri Lanka was, quite understandably, whole-hearted and enthusiastic. Most major newspapers devoted their front pages to the feat. “Murali on top of the world,” proclaimed the Sunday Observer, which went on to add: “Had Muralitharan been a boxer like Muhammad Ali, the former world heavyweight champion, he would have proclaimed to the world in typical Ali style: 1I am the greatest’.” The Sunday Island‘s headline was “King Murali”, while Colombo’s Sunday Times echoed: “King Murali does it!”Meanwhile, the former Indian offspinner Erapalli Prasanna expressed happiness at Murali’s feat. Speaking to The Telegraph newspaper in Kolkata, he said: “I am delighted spinners can now be placed on a par with fast bowlers. That spinners are setting targets for pacers is highly satisfying. It caused a lot of pain to hear that spinners have no role to play in modern cricket. People started saying cricket lacks quality spinners. It’s a matter of great pride that Murali and Warne’s achievements will be widely talked about now.”If one person was unhappy about Murali’s achievement, and had no problems saying so, it was Barry Jarman, the former Australian captain and wicketkeeper. Jarman was the first match official to raise suspicions about Murali’s actions. “It makes a joke of the game – it makes me sick talking about it,” Jarman was quoted as saying in the Sydney Daily Telegraph. “Everyone knows he bowls illegally. I saw his photo in the paper the other day and put an old school protractor on his arm. It was bent at 48 degrees [the legal limit for spin bowlers is 10]. I put it up in the pub to show everyone. He is a lot worse than the University of Western Australia people reckon he is.”

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Veteran fast bowler Venkatesh Prasad returns to the Indian cricketteam for the three Test series in Sri Lanka which comences on August14.The national selection committee, which met in Mumbai on Thursdaypicked a squad of 16 for the tour which included one three day game.Sourav Ganguly (captain), Rahul Dravid (vice captain), Shiv SunderDas, Sadagopan Ramesh, Hemang Badani, Javagal Srinath, HarvinderSingh, Dinesh Mongia, Samir Dighe, Rahul Sanghvi, Mohammad Kaif,Sachin Tendulkar, Sairaj Bahutule, Zaheer Khan, Venkatesh Prasad andHarbhajan Singh.Sachin Tendulkar has been picked conditionally. He has to undergo afinal bone scan on his injured foot on August 10. If after that,Tendulkar is still unfit, Baroda’s Jacob Martin will replace him inthe squad.Ashish Nehra and VVS Laxman were both ruled out through injury.

Such were the exertions that Alastair Cook had put himself through in nearly 14 hours at the crease in temperatures easily in the high 30s – and the convention that the England captain usually only speaks after a Test match is finished, except for the occasional TV grab – that for the second day running it was left to a team-mate to marvel at the captain’s qualities.This time it was Joe Root, seemingly leader-elect and a player who will go onto challenge whatever stack of records Cook leaves behind, after he made 85 in dominating a fourth-wicket stand of 141, who was the spokesman.”As you can imagine being out there for two days it’s taken a lot out of him, but I’m sure it’s a good pain and one at the start of the week he’d have loved to have had,” he said. “I’m sure he’ll rest up tonight and be as fresh as a daisy tomorrow.”It was a hell of an effort, two days in that heat showed huge amounts of skill, concentration and fitness. We spoke a lot as a side about batting long periods of time out here and how important it will be if we are to give ourselves a chance of winning. Our captain has led from the front and set the example for the rest of the series.”Such have been the conditions in the UAE that even Cook – who is well known for not sweating – has had to change his gloves more than ever. There is, as yet, no count on the exact number of pairs or volume of shirts that the third longest Test innings required. Root did, though, say that while Cook may have changed gloves he did not change persona at any stage whether in the middle or the dressing room.Joe Root shows his frustration at a century that eluded him•Getty Images

“He was just the same as always, pretty down to earth chats about rubbish. It’s a bit like batting in the middle, he doesn’t give you any banter or doesn’t look like he’s overly concentrating. He’s just a model professional, he knows what he needs to do and he can switch off when he needs to. I think that’s one reason he can bat long periods of time.”Cook’s innings, which made him the leading non-Asian batsman in Asia ahead of Jacques Kallis, eventually ended with a top-edged sweep to short fine leg – a shot that had been a key part of his stay – but replays showed that Shoaib Malik’s delivery was a no-ball. Although Malik’s foot did drag back, it is the first point of planting that matters and he had nothing behind the line. It was one of the increasingly rare dismissals where the front line was not checked, so there was no recourse.Root, though, acknowledged how the energy-sapping conditions that the players have gone through are the same for the umpires, two men who have to stand in the middle throughout.”It’s disappointing,” he said of Cook’s dismissal. “It’s tough, the umpires are in a position where they can never win. If they make a good decision they are expected to do it, if they make a bad one everyone wants their heads. I have a little of sympathy for the umpires out there in that heat as well, they have to concentration for just as long as we have but you want to see those decision go the right way. Unfortunately everyone makes mistakes.”

Italian football hasn’t had a great decade. Corruption, debt, plummeting crowd attendances and a subsequent decrease in league status have plagued a period in Italian football that won’t leave many feeling nostalgic. Champions League victories for Inter (2010) and Milan (2003, 2007) and the brief tenure of Jose Mourinho spiced up life in Serie A for moments in an otherwise uncompetitive era. We can look to our Mediterranean counterparts with a vague sense of sympathy and superiority but the reality is that in this country that we are not a million miles away on many of these issues. Italy is there to serve as a warning for Premier League clubs, in the same way that the Bundesliga should stand out as a positive example. The fate of our league rests with a few laws and attitudes and we would do well to pay heed to the situations in nearby countries.

Whilst corruption may be endemic in football it seems to be arguable that the Premier League is relatively clean cut in comparison to Italy and Turkey, however the other issues are more pressing.

Club debt

The debts of Serie A clubs can be seen as a metaphor for their national economic crisis. For years they have simply borrowed and spent too much whilst doing little to increase their actual revenues. The combined revenue of the top three Italian clubs for last season (as stated in Deloitte’s Football Money League) was €166m which was significantly less than that of Spain’s top three (€295m). English clubs too have a long way to go before they reach the commercial heights they should be. Only Man Utd is anywhere near to reaching its potential but they still lag behind the Spanish giants by around €50m. The astronomical debts of Chelsea, Man City and Man Utd don’t really bare thinking about in comparison to their revenues and although they have wealthy backers the FFP rules will make for uncomfortable times at the top of the English game. Club debt at the end of 2010 reached over £2.5b for the Premier League clubs alone, a figure that has surely risen in 2011 due to increased club spending from clubs such as City, Chelsea and Liverpool (The Guardian). Italy’s combined debt for all three of its top leagues was recorded in 2010 as €2.9b (World Soccer), and they think they’re having a crisis.

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Attendance

Attendance in Italy has been a real problem recently with the average for the league at just over 23,000 for this season, a drop from last seasons tally (ESPN). Although England’s is considerably higher at around 34,000 this figure too has fallen from last season despite the presumed increase in popularity for teams like Man City. Teams like Arsenal and Man Utd make a considerable amount of their money from their stadiums but if we look at the risks we face in domination from the top few clubs whose spending power vastly outstrips the rest of the league then we can see a startling similarity to the reason Italian football is experiencing low crowds. This has been perpetrated by the unequal television rights distribution that was only changed back to collective selling two years ago. People like Liverpool’s Ian Ayre should take a look at Italy and their forced abandonment of individual television rights before they start clamouring for it.

Obviously there are huge differences between the Italian and English leagues; the pace and style of the football here is considered to be more entertaining hence its worldwide appeal. However that doesn’t mean that there aren’t warning signals for us to heed coming from Italy and other nations whose leagues are infested with unmanageable debt and a lack of competition. Instead of waiting for FIFA or UEFA to take action perhaps it is time the Premier League attempted to combat the rising and unsustainable spending in our league.

Follow me on Twitter @H_Mackay

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Swansea’s challenge for an automatic promotion spot took a blow after a 2-1 loss to lowly Preston North End in the Championship.Trailing Norwich by just one point heading into the match, Swansea knew a victory away at bottom-side Preston could move them back into the top two.

Ashley Williams? 24th minute goal looked like it would at least give Swansea a share of the points after Iain Hume scored from the penalty spot on three minutes for Preston.

But a second from Hume in the 83rd minute gave Preston a much-needed three points, while Swansea drop down to fourth.

It was a much different story for Norwich City, who cemented their top-two spot with a 6-0 hammering of 10-man Scunthorpe United.

Scunthorpe were already a goal down when Paul Reid saw red in the 31st minute and Norwich went for the kill after that, with both Grant Holt and Simeon Jackson scoring hat-tricks.

Cardiff City broke their four-game winless streak and moved into third with a 4-1 thrashing of Derby County.

Jay Bothroyd, Dekel Keinan, Paul Quinn and Peter Whittingham were all on the scoresheet for Cardiff, with Robbie Savage’s late penalty a mere consolation for Derby.

Leeds jumped to fourth after a 4-1 win over Nottingham Forest in a heated battle at Elland Road.

The dismissal of Forrest?s Chris Cohen in the first half saw tempers boil over, with several scuffles breaking out across the pitch.

It took Leeds until the 51 minute mark to make the most of their numerical advantage, with Jonathon Howson eventually putting them ahead.

Luciano Becchio doubled their lead soon after only for Garath McCleary to pull one back for the visitors on 65 minutes.

A late double from Max Gradel settled the matter, consigning Forest to their eighth successive game without a win.

A Shane Long double gave Reading a 2-0 win at home to Portsmouth, while Coventry City won by the same margin against Watford.

Ipswich Town won 2-1 on their trip to Burnley thanks to first-half goals from David Norris and Connor Wickham, while a late penalty from James Vaughan gave Crystal Palace a 2-1 win at home against Barnsley.

A last-gasp goal from Shane McManus salvaged a 3-3 draw for Middlesbrough against Leicester City after a Yakubu hat-trick had earlier put the visitors 3-1 up.

Britsol City beat Doncaster Rovers 1-0 courtesy of Nicky Maynard’s 76th minute goal.

You may love or loathe the transfer windows but it certainly has most football supporters fixated to the rumour mills on a daily basis. I don’t know many fans that don’t go straight to the BBC’s gossip column as a first port of call every morning, before they move on to SkySports.com. Most of what is written is complete tosh; however it doesn’t stop many buying into what they have read. I guess everyone just loves a rumour, despite how outlandish they might be.

One thing that does amuse me about those who bite at the rumours is their sheer naivety and this belief that the club have a bottomless pit of money and cannot understand why player X Y and Z won’t be playing for their club next season. There is a lot to be said for a little bit of realism and general understanding of the complexity of club finances. Sometimes players have to be sacrificed in order to raise funds to strengthen elsewhere, or clubs have a restricted budget due to incompetent owners or the need to finance new stadia. Money doesn’t grow on trees and therefore clubs have to live within their means.

So what about your club this summer? No doubt you have been taken in by some of the rumours, poured cold water over some and I’m sure there is a long list of players that you will be happy to see the club cash in on during the coming weeks. The transfer window, with the exception of City, has been somewhat constipated up to this point, although I’m sure it won’t be long before the transfer storm starts to erupt.

Who would you like to see arrive at the Emirates during the next five weeks, and equally who should be issued with their P45?

Click on image to see a gallery of the BEST BABES at the World Cup this summer

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