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Sanju Samson came into Indian cricket with the reputation that he could become the next big thing. He was 16 when he made his T20 debut for Kerala, and in little over a year, was part of an IPL franchise. The teenager’s temperament stood out, to the point that he made a half-century batting at No. 3 in only his second game for Rajasthan Royals. Eventually though, the surprise factor faded, and the pressure got to him. Two middling IPL seasons followed in 2015 and 2016 but, on Tuesday, he took a step towards putting those memories behind him with a maiden T20 hundred that set up Delhi Daredevils’ biggest ever win.”I am very happy about this day. It’s one of the special days of my life,” Samson said at the post-match press conference. “Every cricketer here in India, his dream is to play for Indian team, which is the world’s best cricket team. So if you want to get into it, you have to be something special, you have to do something special. So I’m happy that I played one innings but there’s a long way to go.”He was bought by the Daredevils in 2016, and despite playing all 14 matches that year, he was dismissed for less than 20 seven times and finished with an unimpressive strike-rate of 112. Now, after his team had begun the new season by losing a game they should have won, Samson walked out to bat in the second over and was 35 off 19 balls with six fours by the end of the Powerplay. Then after seeing off the Rising Pune Supergiant spinners, Imran Tahir, the No. 1-ranked bowler in limited-overs cricket, among them, he made 41 off 16 balls to help push the total to 205. There were times in the past when quality bowling would force Samson into choosing the wrong shot, but he was able to keep that weakness in check and later praised the Daredevils support staff for backing him.”I think Rahul Dravid, Zubin Bharucha, Paddy Upton and each member of the team who has supported me throughout,” Samson told . “Last IPL season was not a great season for me, but they supported me throughout and I dedicate this knock to them.”I was 17 when I was with the Rajasthan Royals and since then I have been working with Dravid and feel very blessed to be learning under his guidance. Not too many people get this chance and I feel I am extremely lucky to have him around and guide me.”This success came on the back of a disappointing first-class season for Samson. Besides the lack of runs – he averaged 30.36 from 11 innings for Kerala – he was pulled up for disciplinary issues by the state association. It was alleged that he had left the team in the middle of a match, after being dismissed for a duck, and did not return until 8 or 9 pm. This led to an in-house inquiry and a KCA panel let Samson off with a warning. On Tuesday night, he said lows like that helped shape the person he was.”You need to have bad times to learn what life is about, I think. If you keep on achieving success, I think, you do not learn. If you do mistakes in cricket, or if you do mistakes in life, you learn from it and you become a better person. I think my past has helped me become a better cricketer and a better human being.”

Mumbai batsman Shreyas Iyer has been called up to Dharamsala as cover for Virat Kohli, who still hasn’t completely recovered from his shoulder injury.Even as India maintained Iyer is cover – and not a replacement – for Kolhi, ESPNcricinfo understands that the team is sweating over the fitness of the captain, who took a pain-killing injection two days before the Test and didn’t bat in the nets.Iyer is expected to join the team on Friday, the eve of the match. Besides a hundred for India A against the touring Bangladesh side in Hyderabad, Iyer smashed an unbeaten double hundred against Australia in a tour game at Brabourne Stadium last month.”It made sense to have a back-up batsman because in case of a contingency it is very difficult to reach a place like Dharamsala,” a BCCI source told ESPNcricinfo. “We will know more on Virat tomorrow.”Kohli hurt his shoulder while making a diving stop on the boundary on the first day in Ranchi. He spent the rest of Australia’s first innings off the field, but batted at his usual No. 4 slot and fielded in the second innings – though at slip even against the spinners rather than his usual station in the covers or midwicket.Iyer had initially been named in the India Blue squad for the Deodhar Trophy one-day tournament scheduled to also begin on Saturday in Visakhapatnam. He had a breakout first-class season in 2015-16 where he scored 1321 run to become the leading scorer in the Ranji Trophy. He finished as Mumbai’s highest run-getter (725 runs at 42.94, including two hundreds) in Ranji Trophy 2016-17, when they finished runners-up.

Pat Cummins exceeded expectations of even Australia’s coaching staff by snaring three wickets on the third day in Ranchi, to add to his one from Friday. Cummins finished the day with 4 for 59 from 25 overs, bowling with pace and venom on a good batting pitch. Among his victims were Virat Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane, two key batsmen who fell cheaply.Sending Cummins to India to replace the injured Mitchell Starc was always going to be a gamble for Australia’s selectors, given his history of significant injuries. Although he was Man of the Match on his Test debut in Johannesburg as an 18-year-old in 2011, Cummins has spent such long periods in injury recovery that this Test is just his 10th first-class match.Earlier this month, he completed his first Sheffield Shield game in nearly six years. That game was also his first first-class game of any type since mid-2015. But with the series locked at 1-1 and a historic series win in India up for grabs, Australia risked rushing Cummins in for the Ranchi Test, and his efforts on day three have given them hope.”It’s superb. I thought last night he bowled particularly well, but today he backed that up and to produce some of the balls he produced to get wickets is pretty exciting,” David Saker, Australia’s bowling coach, said. “Hats off to the selectors to go with him. Ball speed in India is a big thing because the wickets don’t generate any pace. But he was way higher than the expectations we had.”Cummins has sent down the fewest overs of any of Australia’s four frontline bowlers so far in this Test, but has looked by far the most dangerous. Saker said no restrictions had been placed on Cummins’ workload in this Test, but they did not expect him to have too much to do over the next two days.”It’s a really important Test match for us,” Saker said. “If he ends up bowling more overs than first expected, then so be it. It’s tough cricket over here and because he’s bowling so well the captain will want to keep going to him. I can’t see him bowling too many overs tomorrow and maybe if we do have a bowl on the final day, I think it will be more a spinning wicket.”The return of Cummins at Test level has also coincided with a strong domestic comeback from James Pattinson, another injury-prone fast bowler who has thrived when available. Their respective returns will leave Australia’s selectors salivating over the prospect of having Cummins, Pattinson, Starc and Josh Hazlewood all available at the same time.”It will be a bit of a headache for the selectors when it does happen,” Saker said. “It’s really good to see. Patty [Cummins] today going really well, Josh and Mitch had a fantastic summer. Then we’ve got Jimmy Pattinson, the way he’s come back in the last few Shield games and he’s got another chance in a Shield final, so that’s really good for him and good for Australian cricket.”To be strong in world cricket and especially the Australian team you need a good crop of fast bowlers and we’ve got that at the moment. But we’ve had a lot of problems getting them on the park. There are still other back-up bowlers.”Jackson Bird is here, he does a fantastic job when he’s called upon. Peter Siddle’s been outstanding for long periods of time. Chadd Sayers again, probably one of the unlucky fast bowlers in Australian cricket. We’ve got a good crop so that’s exciting for me and the Australian cricket team.”

AB de Villiers was frustrated that South Africa lacked a “spark” in the field in Hamilton but defended the team selection believing an extra spinner would not have made a difference.The opening match of the series had been played on the same ground (this was the game moved from Napier due to their outfield problems) and batting was difficult throughout. The latest surface, an adjacent strip, was not expected to be quite so helpful but spin and the use of cutters was still likely to be a key weapon.New Zealand played two frontline spinners, plus cutters from Tim Southee and James Neesham proved effective in the middle of the innings, but South Africa chose Chris Morris over left-arm wristspinner Tabraiz Shamsi to replace Andile Phehlukwayo who had a groin injury. There was also less variation from the South Africa pacemen in conditions that de Villiers felt had eased up towards the second innings.”They played Imran Tahir, who is the No. 1 bowler in the world, very well tonight. I’ve no reason to think it would have been different with another spinner,” de Villiers said. “I tried to bowl JP Duminy, but it didn’t turn as much as I expected it to. I felt there was more turn very early on in the afternoon, which was weird because in the last game it turned in the evening. But all in all, the wicket played pretty well over the 100 overs and we were beaten by the better team.”Given memories of the previous game, where conditions prompted de Villiers to call them the toughest he had faced, he admitted thinking South Africa’s 279 for 8 – which included 100 off the last eight overs – would be a winning total only for Martin Guptill to make it look wholly inadequate.”I thought it was enough because of what happened in the last game. The wicket started breaking up, turned a lot, got really slow, it was exploding, but there was not a lot of that tonight which means it was a really good ODI wicket. We just came unstuck against a better team and didn’t play our best especially in the second half. I wasn’t entirely happy with our skills. While in the rest of the series we have been bowling really well, there wasn’t a spark in the field [on Wednesday] so we need to get our act together for the final now.”Throughout the series, South Africa have needed de Villiers and the lower to bail them out of middle-order wobbles. In Hamilton they lost for 4 for 30 to slip to 158 for 6 before Chris Morris and Wayne Parnell helped haul the innings around. Duminy, who was promoted to No. 4 in this game, and David Miller have had a lean time with 108 runs in seven innings but they retained the utmost faith of their captain.”They are world-class players and will come to the party when it matters most which is hopefully the next game. We all go through patches but luckily we bat deep. There is no need to panic. I believe our top order is the best in the world.”

Investec are to end their sponsorship of England’s Test side four years early after the ECB chose a rival financial services company to become their “principal partner”.Investec, the specialist bank and asset manager, were five years into a 10-year deal with the ECB – dubbed, at the time, as “the longest sponsorship agreement secured in ECB’s history” – when it was announced that rival banking firm NatWest would be taking over as the team’s main sponsor from May 2017. As part of that deal, the players’ shirts will carry the NatWest logo.NatWest themselves had stepped into the role after the supermarket giant, Waitrose, announced last year that it would not be renewing its own three-year sponsorship of all levels of English cricket, a decision that came as a blow to the commercial team, and one that was partially attributed to the changes in the ECB hierarchy since the original deal had been struck in May 2013.While Investec will continue to sponsor the side until the end of the 2017 season – meaning they will be in place for the home series against South Africa and West Indies, including the first day-night Test in England which is to be staged at Edgbaston in August – the ECB will need to find a new partner ahead of the 2018 season. They do have an attractive range of fixtures to offer, though, with the new deal containing a series against India, the primary tourists in 2018, and an Ashes series in 2019.The Investec deal, which provides naming rights and branding at home Tests in England and Wales, is understood to be worth around £4million a year. It is understood there was a break clause in the contract which has allowed them to pull out without incurring any penalty.While it is not unique to have rival brands within their array of sponsors – several of the ECB’s two-dozen or so business partners offer alcoholic drinks, for example – the decision to sign two competitors as such high-profile sponsors does not reflect especially well on their commercial team. In particular, it doesn’t suggest great loyalty towards a sponsor in the middle of a long-term deal.But NatWest have themselves been involved as partners for the best part of four decades. And, until recently, there was little conflict between their sponsorship – which has traditionally been focussed on limited-overs cricket – and that of Investec, who have focused on the Test team. It may also be relevant that the Investec business has evolved in recent years to include more services that replicate those offered by NatWest.Both Investec and the ECB would agree the deal has proved successful. An unusually proactive sponsor, Investec has made a much stronger impression upon the players and the media than most rivals and has, therefore, gained greater goodwill and probably column inches.”Investec have been our official partner for Test match cricket since 2012,” Sanjay Patel, Commercial Director of ECB, said. “They have worked hard to bring their distinctive personality to cricket and the relationships they’ve created in the game. In doing this, they’ve helped to promote Test cricket and to connect England’s players to the public.”

Scorecard
File photo – Hashim Amla had scored only 48 runs in four innings on this tour before this game•AFP

Chinaman bowler Tabraiz Shamsi put himself in contention for a Test debut with a four-wicket haul in the pink-ball warm-up match at the MCG. Although expensive, Shamsi proved difficult to pick and profited more than any of the other South African bowlers to set up an intriguing selection question for the final Test.The day-night game could see South Africa make some changes to their attack especially considering Vernon Philander was rested from the warm-up fixture as a precaution. Philander hurt his shoulder during an on-field collision with Australian captain Steve Smith in the Hobart Test. Should Philander’s niggle not clear, they might have to look for a third-prong in the pace pack to accompany Kagiso Rabada and Kyle Abbott, who both delivered strong opening spells.Rabada’s four-over burst brought three wickets, including Rob Quiney’s. The left-hander scored nine, exactly the same number of runs he made against South Africa in the only Test he has played, in 2012. Abbott was economical and found some nip, but more eyes were on Morne Morkel, the only quick to deliver more than one spell.Concerns over match fitness had kept Morkel out of the first two Tests and he sought to allay those with six-overs initially and three more later on. He sent down some testing short balls with no reward. Reserve bowler Dwaine Pretorius delivered six impressive overs – he pitched the ball up and managed to nip it around a touch – but it seems unlikely he will be promoted into the Test XI.The real debate will be over Shamsi and left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj, who hasn’t done much wrong in the two matches he has played. Both were expensive in this game, but Shamsi made more of an impact. He bowled Sam Harper and Blake Thompson and his variations proved tough for the Victoria batsmen to read as they folded up for 258. Seb Gotch (53), Matthew Short (52) and Evan Gulbis (53) scored half-centuries.South Africa opted to bat under lights but before they could take full effect, their struggling opener Stephen Cook had been dismissed. Not for the first time on this tour, Cook was found wanting with his footwork and faced 18 balls before he was trapped lbw on the backfoot for 11. His opening partner Dean Elgar found the going much easier and retired on 40 to give the middle-order time at the crease.Runs were secondary to South Africa’s intention to spend time in the middle and Hashim Amla made the most of it. He batted from the eighth over to the end of the innings and scored 81, after being dropped on 17 at first slip.Amla became more assured as the innings went on and seemed to want to get his eye in, having only contributing 48 runs on the tour so far. He had Temba Bavuma (33*) for company after JP Duminy (17) and Faf du Plessis (12) were both dismissed cheaply. Duminy was caught at slip while du Plessis fell to a half-hearted pull shot. Bavuma batted through the twilight period with characteristic caution. Quinton de Kock opted not to play the game at all.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsSri Lanka had been changing their side every match and Australia had already sent several men home, but like a well-heeled theatre troupe, the players that remained delivered the same performance they seemed to have given many times over this series.Sri Lanka won the toss again, batted again, did well for a little while, but mainly collapsed to a modest 128 for 9. Australia were disciplined with the ball, and athletic in the field, bruising at the top of their innings, a little shakier in the middle against spin, but got home with some comfort. The margin of this particular victory was four wickets, and they had 13 balls to spare – Glenn Maxwell providing the game’s best innings again. If you have been following this series closely, though, this report may feel familiar.One point of difference was that this was Tillakaratne Dilshan’s final international. What didn’t change, really, was his limited impact with the bat. He was out for one, edging an attempted cut off John Hastings to slip, before the stadium had even properly filled. Kusal Perera dazzled briefly before sending a top edge off James Faulkner to a running, diving David Warner, to be dismissed inside the Powerplay, for 22. That wicket brought two more in quick succession. Dinesh Chandimal and Kusal Mendis were both out in single figures, seven runs apart.Steering clear of trouble at the other end, was a serene Dhananjaya de Silva, who had leant into a flowing cover drive off Mitchell Starc’s fourth ball, and set about gracefully collecting runs into the outfield after that. He was light on his feet to spin, and was wise to the seamers’ pace variations, hitting five fours in his 62 off 50 balls. One of the more memorable of his strokes was a delightfully late dab to third man, off Maxwell. At the other end, teammates played out a series of forgettable innings. Only de Silva and Kusal Perera made double figure scores.Chamara Kapugedara and Thisara Perera were both out slogging Adam Zampa, and Seekkuge Prasanna holed out at long on, to Faulkner, and it was these two bowlers who each collected three wickets this time around. They were economical as well as penetrative – neither conceding 20 runs off their four overs. John Hastings was also effective taking two for 23, while Mitchell Starc ensured he would not go wicketless in a single innings of the tour, when he had de Silva caught at mid off in the final over of the innings.The first over of Australia’s response produced just two, but the remainder of the Powerplay was full of Maxwell and David Warner’s pyrotechnics. They struck their first boundaries in Sachithra Senanayake’s first over – Warner unleashing a particularly vicious reverse-sweep. Suranga Lakmal was carted for 13 in the next over, and Maxwell’s reverse-slap for six made an appearance soon after, when he hit the game’s first six off Sachith Pathirana.The fifth and sixth overs, bowled by Senanayake and Thisara Perera, were Australia’s most productive, yielding 20 and 19 respectively. Eighteen of those runs against Thisara came off four consecutive balls – Maxwell clubbing him over the deep square leg first up, then slapping three nonchalant fours.The Powerplay brought 75 runs, and the openers had virtually made the game safe by the ninth over, when Sri Lanka removed Maxwell for the first time in two games. He played on to a full delivery, and the bowler, Seekkuge Prasanna delivered a graceless send-off, which left the departed Maxwell fuming.That wicket, though, introduced a significant wobble to the innings. Pathirana claimed two wickets in the next over, and Faulkner was run out soon after. Australia needed fewer than 20 runs when Dilshan claimed his first wicket, and fewer than 10 when he took his second, but both breakthroughs prompted joy from the retiring star, and gave an adoring crowd a reason to chant his name. Travis Head finished the match with a slog-swept six that burst through the hands of Senanayake, at cow corner.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsRemember the way this series began? Angelo Mathews won the toss and chose to bat in Pallekele, and his men were bundled out for 117. They failed even to survive 35 overs. Eight days of cricket later, the series has been decided, and one of these two teams has been completely humiliated. And it’s not Sri Lanka. What a turnaround it has been. Mathews will lift the Warne-Muralitharan Trophy, and Sri Lanka could hardly have won it more comprehensively.In Pallekele, rain and bad light conspired to drag the first Test into its fifth day, but in Galle Australia could not even reach the scheduled halfway point of the match. In less than two and a half days, they had lost an eighth consecutive Test in Asia. The No.1 team in the world had been beaten – crushed, in fact – by No.7. Sri Lanka’s spinners have embarrassed Australia’s batsmen this series, and in Galle it was Dilruwan Perera who starred.Perera picked up 6 for 70 in Australia’s second innings of 183 and became the first Sri Lankan to take 10 wickets and score a half-century in the same Test. Only 25 times in all of Test history has a player achieved that remarkable feat. Along the way, he also became the fastest Sri Lankan to reach the mark of 50 Test wickets, reaching the milestone in this his 11th Test. Perera and Rangana Herath proved unreadable to the Australians, their sliders as dangerous as their spinners.The statistics of note did not end there. Only once in the past 87 years had Australia survived for fewer balls in a Test match they had lost: in Galle they lasted for 501 deliveries across the match, two more than the 499 they faced against West Indies in Port-of-Spain in 1995. It was thus their second-worst performance in that regard since the advent of covered pitches. And for the first time in 19 years, no Australian scored a fifty in a Test.The Sri Lankans were understandably jubilant when the result was confirmed, the final wicket coming from a brilliant run-out effected by Kusal Mendis at bat-pad. Peter Nevill, who had fought off the inevitable for 38 balls, flicked Herath off his pads and took a couple of steps out of his crease, but with remarkable reflexes Mendis managed to get the ball back onto the stumps to find Nevill short.It meant a 229-run win for Sri Lanka and an unassailable 2-0 series lead heading into the third and final Test in Colombo. The result was effectively certain when both teams arrived at the ground on the third morning, the only questions being the margin and the time that Sri Lanka would take to run through Australia’s final seven wickets. Australia started the day at 25 for 3, and before drinks in the second session they were bowled out for 183.David Warner was the first to depart, lbw to Perera when he missed a ball that failed to turn as he expected. Given out on field, Warner asked for a review but received no satisfaction, with replays showing the ball would have hit the leg stump. Steven Smith then departed on 30, caught at bat-pad off Perera, a not-out decision on-field overturned on review.It has been a match full of referrals, and Mathews has proven himself a five-star reviewer. Perhaps his best came when Richard Kettleborough turned down an appeal for lbw against Mitchell Marsh, who thrust his pad well outside off against Lakshan Sandakan. Marsh was not playing a shot, so being struck outside the line did not matter, and Sandakan’s big turn was enough to have the ball hitting the stumps.Marsh was out for 18, and the last of Australia’s specialist batsmen followed not far behind. Adam Voges had employed the reverse sweep liberally throughout his innings, without ever quite looking like he had it perfected, and on 28 the shot brought him undone when he failed to get bat on ball and was bowled by Perera. Sri Lanka were three wickets from triumph at lunch.After the break, it was only a matter of time. Mitchell Starc whacked a six and three fours before he was bowled by Herath trying another big shot, and Josh Hazlewood prodded a return catch to Perera to complete the spinner’s ten-wicket game. Then came the run-out, the celebrations, the glory. Sri Lanka had done it. A new generation had not only won the series but dominated it. And who’d have guessed that after day one in Pallekele?