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Test cricket was hit hard by the two World Wars, and this topic has been brought into focus by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission this weekend as they seek to raise money and awareness during their 90th anniversary.A total of 21 Test players died in service, including several from the Commonwealth such as Albert ‘Tibby’ Cotter, the Australia fast bowler, and Reginald Schwarz, one of the quartet of South Africa googly bowlers in the Edwardian era. The War Graves Commission has set up an on-going exhibition in the Lord’s museum and has organised a charity match at Arundel on Sunday, August 12, featuring an Old England XI against a team of Anzac-South African club cricketers.Dozens of first-class players were lost, though the Commission – prompted no doubt by the current England-India series – could find only one Indian in the list. The Rawalpindi-born Vivian Chiodetti, a regular British Army soldier, played a match for Hyderabad before he was killed in Burma in 1942. The museum at Lord’s tells the Chiodetti story and features England players such as Hedley Verity, Colin Blythe and Ken Farnes.Cricket, with crude equipment, was played in unlikely places by battle-ready troops. The Australians played a game in view of the Turks at Gallipoli in 1915, trying to give the impression of normality and confidence while the entire force was being secretly evacuated from the beach area.Robert Graves recounts a game between officers and sergeants at Vermelles in France in 1915, when a bird cage with dead parrot in inside was used as the wicket. The game was abandoned when German machine gun fire at an aeroplane sprayed falling bullets dangerously close to the pitch. Jim Laker played in a match at El Alamein.Cotter was hit in the head by a sniper’s bullet in Palestine as he peered over a trench parapet and he died the same month in 1917 as his brother John, killed in France. Schwarz, twice surviving wounds, was admitted to hospital on the day of Armistice in 1918 and died of pneumonia seven days later.Blythe, the Kent left-arm spinner, is the only Test player with a gravestone inscription alluding to his cricketing eminence. He lies at rest in Belgium, killed by a shell blast at the age of 38 while working as an engineer in 1917.During the second World War, Lord’s was requisitioned by the War Office for the RAF and Te Oval was prepared as a prisoner of war camp that was never used, complete with wire cages on the playing surface.The Commission cares for graves and memorials for the 1.7 million dead at almost 23,000 locations in 150 countries.This article first appeared on https://www.charlierandallcricket.com/.

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

At Johannesburg in March earlier this year, Mark Boucher provided the finishing touches to South Africa’s epic chase of 434 against Australia. Today, however, he was their chief destroyer as they stacked up more than 400 for the second time in four matches and swept the series 3-0. Zimbabwe were beaten to their knees by a brutal display of power that began with the openers Loots Bosman and Alviro Petersen before Boucher shot from the hip and reached his first one-day century in his 220th match.The contest effectively ended after the first innings. At no stage did Zimbabwe make any attempt to get near the target although, to their credit, they did bat solidly. Terry Duffin led the resistance with a defiant 88 and ensured that Zimbabwe put in a commendable performance. He was ably supported by Chamu Chibhabha and Hamilton Masakadza, with whom he added 94 and 102 for the second and third wickets. Zimbabwe finished with 247 for 4, thier highest total of the series but it was after the proverbial horse had bolted.After chasing targets to win their previous two matches, Jacques Kallis had no hesitation in batting first when he won the toss for the first time in the series. South Africa wanted batting practice; instead Zimbabwe’s bowlers gave them hitting practice. Ed Rainsford and Tawanda Mupariwa paid the price for spraying it liberally and the support cast of Chibhabha, Elton Chigumbura, and the usually parsimonious Prosper Utseya were hapless as South Africa ran riot. The pitch was as flat as a tarmac and Zimbabwe’s shoddy fielding – Boucher was dropped on 7, 59, 105, 123, 140 and 144 – only added to their misery.Earlier Bosman and Petersen had added 160 off 126 balls for the first wicket but by the time Boucher was done, that partnership was put firmly in the shade. Sixes rained from Boucher’s bat as Zimbabwe’s boundary riders became full-time ball-boys. His third six – there were ten in all – brought up his fifty off just 26 balls and he needed only 18 more more to cudgel the fastest century by a South African and the second fastest after Shahid Afridi. Boucher formed the mainstay of a 91-run partnership, off 61 balls, with Kallis for the third wicket and left an indelible mark on Chibhabha whom he clouted for 26 runs in an over.To put Zimbabwe’s bowling effort in perspective – they bowled only five dot balls in Boucher’s innings, and when he offered one of umpteen catches, Brendan Taylor was heard pleading on the stump microphone “Catch it, please!” Inevitably, it was dropped.The carnage, however, had started with Bosman and Petersen. Both batsmen scored their maiden half-centuries and both reached their fifties with a six as they laid the platform for Boucher’s assault. The first Powerplay cost 67 runs, and Utseya postponed the next till the 15th over at which point Bosman cut loose. They scored 59 runs off the second Powerplay before a rush of blood eventually did Bosman in for 88. He charged Tafadzwa Kamungozi once too often and gave the debutant his first wicket.However, Petersen picked up the pace, Kallis provided the glue with a relatively pedestrian 50 off 59 balls, and Boucher was the wrecking ball as South Africa added 219 runs in 22.1 overs after Boucher’s arrival.South Africa’s bowlers will be disappointed that they weren’t more incisive when Zimbabwe batted. Andre Nel and Johannes van der Wath hit the deck early on but after Nel drew Vusi Sibanda into an indiscreet shot, they had little success. Andrew Hall and Charl Langeveldt strangled the run flow in the middle overs, Roger Telemachus knocked over Chibhabha and Masakadza and the innings merely played out its destined course as South Africa swept the series.

South AfricaLoots Bosman st Taylor b Kamungozi 88 (160 for 1)
Alviro Petersen c & b Utseya 80 (199 for 2)
Jacques Kallis c Chigumbura b Utseya 50 (290 for 3)
Justin Kemp st Taylor b Kamungozi 10 (317 for 4)
Johannes van der Wath b Rainsford 5 (351 for 5)
ZimbabweVusi Sibanda c Langeveldt b Nel 1 (9 for 1)
Chamu Chibhabha c Boucher b Telemachus 46 (103 for 2)
Hamilton Masakadza c Boucher b Telemachus 55 (206 for 3)
Terry Duffin lbw Nel 88 (212 for 4)

Shane Warne, Australia’s legendary legspinner, arrived home on Thursday pleading for the media to respect his privacy as he attempts to save his failed marriage.Warne, who was outstanding in a beaten Australian side in the Ashes series loss to England earlier this month, told reporters at the airport here that he is seeking a reconciliation with his estranged wife Simone. Warne separated from Simone, the mother of his three children, following a string of lurid tabloid newspaper revelations.Warne asked the Australian media to give him and his family space while he tried to settle his personal issues. He said he had spoken to his wife and children at least twice a day since they returned to Australia.”It’s not an easy situation to be in. It’s something I haven’t experienced before in my life,” Warne said. “I tried to concentrate as hard as I could when I was at the cricket ground but away from that there were some tough times. There were nights when you would sit in your hotel room and think about all the different things.”Warne said he had never wanted to separate from his wife and would try hard to repair the marriage. “It’s not the way I wanted it to be,” he said. “We’re still friends, we still speak all the time, but we’ve just got to work out what we both want, which way we’re going to go and which road we go down. That’s on the agenda – we’ve got lots of things to talk about.”Warne said the Australian media hounded him and urged them to give his family privacy. “Hopefully, you guys [reporters] will respect that and leave us alone, not following us and camping outside our house but I doubt it,” he said. “I doubt whether you guys will, so that will probably make it harder.” Warne said lurid stories about him in the British tabloids were lies, rubbish and fabrication. “I’m not going to sit and defend myself every time some silly person makes up lies and talks rubbish,” he said. “What am I supposed to do, call a press conference? You’ve got to live your life. The public are not dumb, the public understand what is absolute lies and rubbish when it happens. They know exactly what the truth is.”Warne hinted he was nearing the end of his international career, saying the constant travel was beginning to tire him. “I enjoyed living in England but I have to weigh up the whole package, the travel and so on.”

Write to 23 YardsClick here for the 23 Yards homepageClick here or scroll down for the first post on this topicThursday, September 23, 20044.00pm IST – Woolmer, Botham and Kapil’s four sixesI’d wagered with a friend that after my last post I’d get at least 20 emails with goofy smilies in them, and it pains me to have to inform you that I have lost that bet. Most correspondents, however, agreed with me on the broad theme that I’d set out, though some disagreed with the specifics.Matt Merritt pointed out that positivity “was one of the things stressed by Bob Woolmer when he coached Warwickshire to great success in English domestic cricket in the 1990s, and by his club captain, Dermot Reeve. On the evidence so far, I think we might soon see a happier, smilier Pakistan team, with a corresponding upturn in consistency of results.” Matt continued:

Another example, to my mind, was in the debate during the 1980s over who was the world’s greatest allrounder. Hadlee was the best bowler, Imran probably the most complete allround player, but Botham and Kapil Dev both had a certain magic about them that, in my opinion, was inextricably linked to the fact that they played as though they loved the game and were enjoying every minute of it.

The best example where Kapil Dev was concerned was in 1990 at Lord’s when he smashed Eddie Hemmings for four sixes in four balls to save the follow-on. Probably only he or Botham would have considered even trying such a thing (in fact, even in these much more attacking times, I can’t think of many players who might have tried it), but he made it look like the obvious thing to do, flashed a few dazzling smiles, and carried on. Probably that’s why even people not much interested in cricket (my mum, for example), liked him.

Matt, along with a couple of others, gently chided me for suggesting that Gough is crabby, and endorsed my disclosure of not being too knowledgable about English cricket. Tom Lloyd said that Gough was “from the same mould as Flintoff”, and that the first paragraph about Flintoff could “equally apply to Goughie”. Matt wrote that “Goughie was often the only player who remained buoyant and upbeat during some very dark times, although he could get a bit snarly with opposition batsmen at times”. Hmmm … well, that must be why I referred to him as crabby, he is more crabby than shiny in my memories of England playing India, but I’m happy to admit that I probably got this wrong. Tom suggested that he might not have been displeased if I’d described Andrew Caddick as crabby, and I just realised that would also be an alliteration. Should I change it on the sly? Nah …Matt also said that I was too harsh on Hussain. “He took over as captain with England at a very low ebb,” he wrote, “and his tough-minded approach laid all the foundations for the success England are now having. Under different circumstances (if he had had the young players coming through that we have now) I think he might have been every bit as upbeat as Vaughan. Certainly in his new role as a TV commentator over here he is excellent – very shrewd, and often drily funny. I think history will judge him as one of the best England captains, but I don’t think he’ll mind if the equally excellent Vaughan takes some of the credit that is rightfully his. As he showed with the timing of his retirement earlier this summer, unselfishness was one of his greatest virtues.”Tuesday, September 21, 20049.20pm – The joy of cricketWhen 2004 is done and dusted, one enduring cricketing image from the year will stand out for me: Andrew Flintoff smiling. Smiling after being out for 99; smiling after being hit on the body by a short ball; smiling after a catch is dropped off his bowling; and smiling after hitting one of those sixes that, in their exuberance, are quite of a piece with that smile of his. Flintoff plays his cricket with a delight that is, like delight always is, infectious. The man enjoys playing; but does his enjoyment help him become a better cricketer? And does it help his team become a better side?I believe it does. I was reading Malcolm Gladwell’s wonderful book, , recently, and in it he describes a fascinating experiment carried out by the social scientists Gary Wells and Richard Petty. This is how the experiment went, in Gladwell’s words:

A large group of students were recruited for what they were told was a market-research study by a company making high-tech headphones. They were each given a headset and told that the company wanted to test to see how well they worked when the listener was in motion – dancing up and down, say, or moving his or her head. All of the students listened to songs by Linda Ronstadt and the Eagles, and then heard a radio editorial arguing that tuition at their university should be raised from its present level of [US]$587 to $750.

A third were told that while they listened to the taped radio editorial they should nod their heads vigorously up and down. The next third were told to shake their heads from side to side. The final third were the control group. They were told to keep their heads still. When they were finished, all the students were given a short questionnaire, asking them questions about the quality of the songs and the effect of the shaking. Slipped in at the end was the question the experimenters really wanted an answer to: “What do you feel would be a appropriate dollar amount for undergraduate tuition per year?”

The students who kept their heads still were unmoved by the editorial. The tuition amount that they guessed was appropriate was $582 – or just about where tuition was already. Those who shook their heads from side to side as they listened to the editorial … disagreed strongly with the proposed increase. They wanted tuition to fall on average to $467 a year. Those who were told to nod their heads up and down, meanwhile, found the editorial very persuasive. They wanted tuition to rise, on average, to $646.

Thus, the mere act of nodding their heads made the students who did so agree, subliminally, with the advertorial, with the opposite effect on the ones who shook their heads. The physical expression of an emotion actually brought about the emotion itself – even when it began as a meaningless gesture, something they did because they were asked to. Of course, they would all have rationalised it differently, but they allowed their opinions to be shaped not by thinking about the problem, but by acting out a reaction to it that they did not probably feel to begin with.Interestingly, Gladwell quotes Wells and Petty as concluding that “television advertisements would be most effective if the visual display created repetitive vertical movements of the television viewers’ heads (eg, bouncing ball).” My lesson of the day from this: never try to convince someone of something while they are watching a tennis match.Gladwell, after also discussing how emotions are contagious – when someone smiles at you, you instinctively smile back, don’t you? – sums it up beautifully. He writes:

We normally think of the expressions on our face as the reflection of our inner state. I feel happy, so I smile. I feel sad, so I frown. Emotion goes inside-out. Emotional contagion, though, suggests that the opposite is also true. If I can make you smile, I can make you happy. If I can make you frown, I can make you sad. Emotion, in this sense, goes outside-in.

Well, Flintoff makes me smile every time I see him strut his stuff, and you can bet that his team-mates feel the same way. (Another of my favourite players, Adam Gilchrist, also smiles a lot on the field.) There are plenty of social-science studies that demonstrate that our efficiency and productivity are higher when we are happy than when we are sad. Happiness is infectious, and self-reinforcing, and you will often find that the happiest team in the business is the most successful – and that victory and joy do not necessarily come in that order.We all know that confidence and diffidence can be self-reinforcing. You feel confident, you play better, that gives you more confidence, and so on. (This is why that term “momentum” is used so often in a cricket context.) But what do you do when you are in the middle of a bad run, with the losses piling up, and self-belief getting progressively less? Well, what Wells’s and Petty’s study, along with many others, indicates is that a happy, confident could be a useful start to a resurgence. What you show outside, you may well begin to feel inside, and that could, in turn, begin to affect the way you play. (This does not mean, of course, that wandering around with a goofy smile is enough; you also need talent and hard work, along with that positive attitude, and Flintoff and Gilchrist are a delightful confluence of all three.)I am not very knowledgable about English cricket, but from a distance it seems to me that they have turned a corner in the last couple of years – and the difference in their approach has preceded the upturn in their performances. Stressed-out Nasser Hussain replaced as captain by chilled-out Michael Vaughan, crabby Darren Gough giving way to shiny happy Flintoff. When Flintoff won the ICC One-Day Player of the Year award recently, he thanked Vaughan for allowing him to . With a player like Flintoff in his ranks, who plays cricket with such obvious joy and relish, that is quite the smartest thing that any captain could have done.Amit Varma is managing editor of Wisden Cricinfo in India.Write to 23 YardsClick here for the 23 Yards homepageMore 23 Yards
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South Australia’s build-up for the forthcoming season got underway today with fitness testing at the Kidman Park Sports Institute in Adelaide.The squad got together yesterday to lay some programs and put plans in place for the new season. The rest of the week will be occupied with a variety of speed and agility, weight and fitness programs.The squad has been bolstered by the return from Britain of vice-captain Greg Blewett, wicketkeeper Graham Manou and 2003 Bradman medalist Ryan Harris. New state coach Wayne Phillips said he was looking forward to getting the team together.”The physical side of pre-season starts tomorrow, and we will be usingexperts at SASI to help with the physical preparation of the squad,” hesaid. “I’ve been in the job for a month now, have talked individually with theplayers and I’m now looking forward to getting into the physical side oftheir preparation.”

India has yet again lost the first Test of an away series. It comes as no surprise then to see Sourav Ganguly and his men being roasted by all and sundry. Rahul Dravid opening the Indian innings, meanwhile, has also figured prominently in many dinner-table discussions across the country.According to present indications, Dravid might continue at the top of the order in the second Test too, despite his failures at Bloemfontein. Ganguly said in the post-Test conference that it was Dravid who volunteered to take up the job. If that indeed was the case, there was very good logic behind having him, and not the untried Connor Williams, do the job. As for those saying that Dravid was being treated as a sacrificial goat and that we would have been better off making an offering of a lesser player, say Deep Dasgupta, is that not taking a tinted and very negative view of the whole affair?A lack of a stable opening pair has been the bane of Indian cricket for a long time. In fact, since Sunil Gavaskar’s glorious leave-taking at Bangalore, which saw him break up with long-time partner Krishnamachari Srikkanth, there has been no pair that has offered either stability or hope. Shiv Sunder Das’ arrival on the international scene last year has meant that we now have at least one opener of potential. But the problem of a proper opening partner for Das has persisted.

Sadagoppan Ramesh, his partner during the Sri Lankan tour, for instance, has so many technical flaws that, based on them, you can probably write a best-seller, photos and all, on how not to open a Test. Connor Williams, the latest in the list, is another opener whose technique has not yet been fully tested at the highest level.So, considering all this, Dravid being promoted to opener can only be seen as a good move with the future in mind. The 28-year-old has an excellent defensive technique and has scored tons of runs against the new ball. In fact, as a No. 3 batsman, home and away, he has scored 2,931 runs with seven hundreds and 15 fifties at an average of 56.36. If we narrow our search down to his innings as a one-down batsman on foreign soil, his record is all the more impressive – 1,405 runs, including four hundreds, at an average of 58.54. No Indian batsman across the eras has done better. Sachin Tendulkar, one of the few other Indian batsmen to do well abroad, for instance, has an average of 54.52 in comparison.On most of the above-mentioned occasions, Dravid would have, considering our opening stands in recent times, walked in during the first 10 overs of the innings. That he has scored so many runs at such an excellent average indubitably proves that he has the technique to open the innings. Moving to his perceived lack of comfort in the opener’s slot, that is an argument best stowed away if Ganguly used volunteered in the sense that all dictionaries use it. And knowing Ganguly and his straight-talking ways, it could not have been otherwise.

Let me then end by saying that we would do well if we avoid reading too much into Dravid’s first two dismissals. The Indian vice-captain has in the past bounced back spectacularly after failures in the first Test of a series; the previous South African tour, the 1998-99 New Zealand tour, and the recent series against Australia at home are all noteworthy instances. For all we know, if Dravid is left at peace to prove himself, he might well do that against what is the weakest South African attack in years. And Dravid’s success could consequently make a world of difference to the Indian team in the coming years.

The Supreme Court of India has dismissed BCCI’s plea seeking review of an earlier verdict that struck down the controversial amendment to the conflict-of-interest clause. The BCCI had filed a review petition soon after the verdict, but the apex court dismissed it, reckoning there was no merit to the case.A legal expert told ESPNcricinfo that review petitions were “rarely entertained.” “Ordinarily, these reviews are heard in the chambers,” he said. “If there is an error apparent in the face of the judgment, then they will review it.”It’s an extraordinary power and is not meant to be used lightly. If they have made a glaring error, then they will review it and correct it, otherwise they won’t exercise powers.”In January, the Supreme Court, in a landmark judgment pertaining to the 2013 IPL corruption case, struck down the amendment to the BCCI constitution’s clause 6.2.4 that allowed board officials to have a commercial interest in the IPL and the Champions League T20, calling it “the true villain of the situation at hand.” The amendment to the clause was effected in September 2008, six months after the Chennai franchise was sold to India Cements, a company owned by then BCCI secretary N Srinivasan.The judgment had far-reaching consequences with the court ruling that while the BCCI was a private body, it performed a public function and was therefore amenable to judicial law and review. It was the first instance of an external agency amending the BCCI’s constitution.The rule was deemed by the Court to be “void and ineffective”, “unsustainable and impermissible in law” as it was said to have “authorised” the “creation and continuance” of a conflict-of-interest situation. The two-man bench of Justice TS Thakur and Justice FMI Kalifullah said the amendment had perpetuated the conflict.In an ostensible bid to act on the Supreme Court’s ruling, the BCCI’s current dispensation had in July asked representatives of state associations and members of the Board to sign a declaration stating they had no conflict of interest. The decision, however, met with resistance from some of the members associations, and the issue was slated to be raised at the working committee meeting on August 28, which was subsequently adjourned owing to Srinivasan’s presence.

ScorecardDawid Malan top-scored for the Lions with 51 but it was not enough to secure victory•Chris Whiteoak

An unbroken century stand between Iftikhar Ahmed and Babar Azam helped Pakistan A to a seven-wicket win in the first unofficial T20I against England Lions at the ICC Academy in Dubai.Dawid Malan top-scored with 51 from 44 balls, including three fours and three sixes, for the Lions and they looked to be in control when Pakistan A slipped to 25 for 3 in the fifth over. However, Iftikhar and Azam, both of whom featured in the recent ODI series against England, successfully regrouped with unbeaten half-centuries as they finished off the chase with an over to spare.Jake Ball claimed the scalps of Shahzaib Hasan and Sohaib Maqsood in the space of three balls after Reece Topley had found Fakhar Zaman’s edge in the opening over of the innings. But with canny strike rotation and selective hitting, particularly against the spin pairing of Liam Dawson and Stephen Parry, Pakistan A’s fourth-wicket pair turned the tide.Iftikhar struck two fours and three sixes in 66 not out while Azam finished unbeaten on 53, with six fours and a six.With the World Twenty20 looming in March, the Lions fielded four members of the team that beat Pakistan 3-0 last month – and it would almost certainly have been a fifth had it not been for the decision to allow David Willey to take up an offer to play for Perth Scorchers in Australia’s Big Bash League.James Vince, who impressed in each of his three innings for the senior team, fared less well as the Lions captain on this occasion. He fell in the second over of the match for 2, bowled by the impressive Aamer Yamin, who delivered a similar knockout to Jason Roy in Sharjah last week to claim a wicket with the first ball of his T20I career.Tom Westley made 11 from 17 balls before being stumped off the bowling of Bilal Asif, but the arrival of Sam Billings at No. 4 helped to kick England’s innings into action. He made 31 from 21 balls, with three fours and a six, and added 47 for the third wicket with Malan in the space of 6.1 overs.Two overs later, Billings became Bilal’s second victim as he holed out to midwicket but Ross Whiteley ensured that the Lions’ tempo was maintained in the closing overs with two sixes in a 15-ball 22. His stay was ended by a Rumman Raees slower ball, and Raees then added his second with the penultimate ball of the innings to remove Joe Clarke for 15.The second of the five-match series will take place under lights in Dubai on Thursday.

The national selection committee announced a squad of 26 players to attend the third and final training and fitness camp to be held in Karachi. The camp, that runs from July 27 to August 6, will be supervised by Talat Ali with Haroon Rashid and Aaqib Javed serving as batting and bowling coaches respectively.Asim Kamal, thought by many as the perfect heir to Inzamam-ul-Haq, has been omitted from the third fitness camp even after being part of the 22 that took part in the second camp in Lahore. Five new faces, including fast bowler Mohammad Irshad, batsmen Shahid Yousuf, Khalid Latif, Khurram Manzoor and left-arm fast bowler Sohail Tanvir have been added to the squad for the Karachi camp.Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, a prolific performer for Pakistan during the absence of Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif, has been overlooked again for the camps. Naved, currently playing for Sussex, was neither named in the first two camps nor was he awarded a central contract.A 15-man squad for the Twenty20 World Championship in South Africa will be named at the end of the camp. According to sources, Younis Khan, who is currently playing county cricket in England, is most likely to be selected in the 15-member squad despite not being included in the list of 26 probables. The selected squad would then attend the final phase of the camp at Gaddafi Stadium from August 19 to 26.Squad: Mohammad Asif, Mohammad Sami, Najaf Shah, Shahid Afridi, Mohammad Irshad, Khurram Manzoor, Shoaib Akhtar, Fawad Alam, Mohammad Yousuf, Abdul Rehman, Mohammad Hafeez, Rao Iftikhar, Imran Farhat, Sohail Tanveer, Yasir Hameed, Naveed Latif, Shoaib Malik, Faisal Iqbal, Abdul Razzaq, Umer Gul, Kamran Akmal, Salman Butt, Shahid Yousuf, Misbah Ul Haq, Imran Nazir, Khalid Latif

The $5 million winner-takes-all Stanford 20/20 SuperStar game between West Indies and South Africa due to be played on November 10 has been cancelled.The decision was made almost inevitable once the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) refused to amend the itinerary for the forthcoming West Indies tour to allow leading players to take part in the Stanford match.”To say I am disappointed is an understatement,” admitted Allen Stanford, the Texas-based millionaire who is the main organiser behind Stanford 20/20. “We are frustrated at the turn of events, especially in light of the fact that the date for the Stanford Super Star Match was approved by both the WICB and the ICC from January 2006. However, we have always said that we would not do anything which conflicts with, or compromises West Indies cricket and so we have decided that it is in the best interest of everyone involved, especially the players, that we cancel the Super Star Match.”Perhaps the most disappointing fact about the cancellation is that the West Indies tour to Pakistan was not finalised until August, more than two months after the agreement with South Africa for the November match was confirmed. The West Indies board informed Stanford that an application had been submitted to the PCB to delay the start of the tour so that the conflict could be resolved. The PCB was unable to accommodate the request.In a last ditch effort to salvage the match, Stanford asked if the WICB could provide the names of those players that would be on the team to Pakistan so that a side could be selected out of those not going on the tour, but a spokesman for Stanford said this was also “not accommodated by the WICB leaving no alternative but cancellation”.Some of the players training at the Super Star team camp would be a natural choice for the Pakistan tour. “We did not want to put these players in a position where they would have to choose between our event and playing for the West Indies,” explained Stanford. “This would be unfair to them, and one of our goals has always been to foster the positive and successful development of our athletes.”The Super Star camp began in Antigua on August 23 and yesterday Stanford himself gave the news to the players via teleconference. “I am very, very hurt and disappointed,” said Pedro Collins. “I wish that things like this could be resolved amicably in future. Playing against South Africa would have been a great opportunity for the young players to establish themselves in world cricket.”The Stanford 20/20 board will meet on Monday in Antigua where the future of the Stanford 20/20 programme will be discussed.