Australia fast bowler Mitchell Johnson retires from internationals

Mitchell Johnson took 37 wickets at 13.97 in Australia's 5-0 Ashes whitewash in 2013-14

Australia fast bowler Mitchell Johnson has retired from all forms of international cricket.

The 34-year-old took two wickets on the final day of the drawn second Test against New Zealand in Perth.

"I feel now is the best time to say goodbye," he said. "I have been lucky to have a wonderful career and enjoyed every moment playing for my country."

He is Australia's fourth-highest Test wicket-taker, with 313 in 73 matches, and also took 239 one-day wickets.

Johnson was also a useful lower order batsman, scoring 11 half-centuries and one century during a career run haul of 2,034.

Shane Warne and ex-fiancee Elizabeth Hurley in Los Angeles

Let’s just be friends: Shane Warne and Elizabeth Hurley shared a warm embrace in front of the crowd at the Cricket All-Star tournament in Los Angeles on Saturday. Photo: Shane Warne/Instagram

The old adage of "let's just be friends" seems to be working out just fine for Shane Warne and his ex-fiancee 

Elizabeth Hurley.

The retired cricketer and the actress shared a warm embrace in front of the crowd at the Cricket All-Star tournament in Los Angeles on Saturday.

The 50-year-old The Royals star headed out onto the pitch at Dodger Stadium after Warne's Warriors were victorious.

Ricky Ponting steps down as captain

Ricky Ponting has stepped down as Australia's captain in Tests and ODIs following their quarter-final exit from the World Cup but will be available for selection as a batsman in both formats. Ponting made the announcement at the SCG on Tuesday, and backed Michael Clarke to take over the leadership of the team.

Ponting said the World Cup exit had prompted his decision and that "no one has tapped me on the shoulder asking me to go."

"I have resigned as captain of both the Test and one-day Australian teams. I will continue to play and am available for selection in both the one day and Test teams," Ponting said. "I have thought long and hard about what Australian cricket needs. Now is the right time for the next captain to assume the responsibility for both the Test and one-day teams. We have to be doing everything we can to win back the Ashes in 2013-14 and the World Cup in 2015. It is highly unlikely that I will be still playing so it is the right decision for Australian cricket that the next captain now be appointed. This will give him the opportunity to create his own direction and legacy.

"Today is a new start for me and I am very excited about the future. I will give my complete support to our new captain and continue to do my best to set the best possible example for my team-mates and emerging cricketers alike."

Ponting expressed his desire to travel to Bangladesh for three limited-overs matches next month. The team for the tour will not be named until Wednesday, but Ponting's announcement should allow Clarke to assume the captaincy on the tour, before difficult assignments against Sri Lanka and South Africa later in the year.

On his arrival home from an unsuccessful World Cup defence, Ponting had said he was prepared to give up the captaincy and also move down the batting order if it was in the interests of the Australian team. With the benefit of a day's reflection, he decided that now was the best time to go. At 36, Ponting believed he can still enjoy the type of renaissance that has sustained Sachin Tendulkar in recent times.

 

Ponting held the Australian Test and one-day captaincy since he took over from Steve Waugh. He led Australia in 77 Tests of which 48 were wins, the most for any captain. He also captained Australia in a record 228 ODIs and won 164, including two World Cups in 2003 and 2007. Ponting's fortunes as captain, however, waned along with those of the team as a series of retirements weakened its resources. His Test captaincy culminated in the 3-1 home Ashes defeat in 2010-11 and his one-day reign ended after the elimination from the World Cup.

Cricket is a 'runaway train' - impossible to clean completely said Hayden

Former Australian opener Matthew Hayden has said it is practically impossible to completely eradicate corruption from the game of cricket. 

"The investment the game places in protection strategies to mitigate against corruption is minuscule compared to the vast geographic areas the game is played in and the level of illegal gambling activity," the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Hayden, as telling the Hindustan Times. 

"It really is a runaway train," Hayden said, adding that the only the way to counter the threat of gambling was for every individual player and administrator to decide to personally uphold the integrity of the game. 

The Daily Times further quoted him as saying: "We play a great game, and as players we are honoured to uphold its integrity as a product." (ANI)

PCB chairman hooted by cricket fans at airport in Lahore

Pakistan Cricket Board Chairman Ijaz Butt was on Wednesday hooted and jeered by angry fans when the veteran administrator landed in the country for the first time since the spot-fixing scandal shocked the world cricket. As soon as Butt came out of the airport terminal, fans raised slogan against him and shouted 'Shame Shame', expressing their anger over the alleged betting scam which hit the image of the country globally.

Butt, who was in London since the expose, was his usual secretive and defensive self, refusing to give out any new details on the ongoing investigations into the scandal involving Test captain Salman Butt and pace bowlers Mohammad Aamir and Muhammed Asif.

But he did say that if any player is found guilty of fixing matches, he would be dealt with severely.

"Right now the PCB can't take any action against the players because the ICC anti-corruption unit is carrying out an inquiry into this matter. But if any player is found guilty he will not be spared," he said.

"Even the police interrogated them for nine hours but let them go without pressing any charges. So we are also waiting for the ICC and Scotland Yard to come up with their findings into this matter," he added.

Butt said the PCB had filed detailed replies to the charge-sheets issued to the players by the ICC but the world governing body wanted the players to respond themselves.

"We had given the ICC a detailed reply to the charge-sheets sent to the players but the ICC said the players themselves must answer the charge-sheet," he said.

Butt was evasive when asked about reports that the ICC was also investigating the Sydney Test between Pakistan and Australia.

"I think we shouldn't be talking about such old issues we need to focus on this current problem and hope it is resolved soon," he added.

Australia Cricket Contracts Announced

Batsman David Hussey and pacemen Nathan Bracken and Stuart Clark have lost their Cricket Australia contracts along with Brad Hodge and wicketkeeper Graham Manou to make way for five new players for 2010-11.

The newcomers announced on Wednesday were fast bowlers Ryan Harris and Clint McKay, wicketkeeper-batsman Tim Paine, all-rounder Steven Smith and batsman Adam Voges.

Those five all started the 2009-10 period without CA contracts, but picked them up by the end of the season after receiving sufficient upgrade points during that time.

Veteran paceman Brett Lee retained his contract, despite his recent injury and form struggles. He will likely play only limited-overs and Twenty20 matches. 

Surrey take a gamble on Australian Badboy Andrew Symonds

Badboy Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds has been given another chance to prove his worth in English cricket when Surrey signed him up for their Twenty20 campaign this season on Wednesday.

The 34-year-old - whose natural talent has been overshadowed on occasion by his exploits off the field that have seen him disciplined by Australia - has previously played for Kent, Lancashire and Gloucestershire.

Read More at : NDTV

ICC Champions Trophy 2009 Winner - Australia

Australia took their second consecutive ICC Champions Trophy title with a six-wicket win against New Zealand in Centurion

ICC Cricket Champions Trophy 2009 - Final - Australia Vs New Zealand

TWO Former ICC CHAMPIONS TROPHY WINNER (AUSTRALIA - 2006 & NEW ZEALAND - 2000) BATTLE  TO GET TITLE FOR SECOND TIME

Daniel Vettori and Ricky Ponting with the trophy on the eve of the ICC Champions Trophy final in Centurion at SuperSport Park.

Symonds' exit upset 20-20 team balance: Ponting

Symonds was sent home in disgrace over drinking and disciplinary issues on Thursday, two days before Australia's first match of the tournament, which the West Indies won by seven wickets.

The Australians were then dumped out of the competition following Monday's six-wicket loss to Sri Lanka.

"It upset a lot of our structures around the team. Andrew is one of those guys that's just been over in the IPL for the last couple of months. He's one of the best individual players in this form of the game anywhere in the world, so when you lose someone like that out of your side it does throw a spanner in the works for sure," the Herald Sun quoted Ponting, as saying.

But he refused to use Symonds' absence to explain Australia's disappointing performance.

"We're not going to use that as a reason or as an excuse. We had 14 other guys here that had to step up in his absence. We've been able to do that and good enough to do that in the past when we've lost some of our better players out of the side and over the last few days we haven't been good enough," Ponting said.

"I haven't actually heard any talk about Symo not being around over the last few days, so I would like to think that that hasn't played on the minds of any of our players. But when you lose someone of the quality and the calibre of him out of the T20 team, it certainly leaves a big hole," The Australian quoted him, as saying.

Bad Time But Not Affect Ashes confidence: Ponting

Sri Lanka became the second team to beat Australia in three days with a six-wicket triumph at Trent Bridge and Ponting's side have now lost 13 of their 23 Twenty20 clashes.

They must now start preparing for a five-Test series against England starting in Cardiff on July 8.

"It's my job to make sure we get over this pretty quickly and start focusing on the red balls and white clothing over the next couple of months," Ponting told reporters.

"I certainly won't be focusing on the negative stuff that has happened over the last couple of days.

"It's about looking at the positives we have created with our test team over the last few months. I like to think that none of this will linger around.

"Being in England there is no better place to be as the excitement and atmosphere at the start of an Ashes is going to be tremendous and if we can get caught up in that there won't be any negatives hanging around from the last few days."

UNEXPECTED PRACTICE

The Australians' next match is on June 24 against Sussex, so they have 15 days, based mainly in Leicester, to prepare and Ponting said the practice time may yet be an advantage.

"I guess it can't hinder us to have more time with the red balls out and preparing for the longer form of the game, while England play Twenty20 for at least another week so maybe that is one thing we can take from our time at Leicester," Ponting said.

"I've never been a big believer in taking one series to another, particularly when it's different forms of the game. We have a vast changeover of players coming over for the Ashes and when they get here we will build on from the very good stuff we did in South Africa."

Despite his attempts to put a positive spin on Australia's elimination from cricket's premier 20-over event, Ponting did not try to hide from his team's vulnerabilities in that format of the game.

"I would love to be able to tell you what's going wrong as that's five international Twenty20 games we have lost in a row and that's a worrying trend for our team," he added. "We've got some thinking to do there's no doubt about that.

"We will have a chat about where our Twenty20 cricket is at tonight and then we have got to move on from it pretty quickly because we've got some test matches just around the corner and our test team has been our shining light recently."

Australia knocked out of ICC WT20

Sri Lanka Vs Australia ( ICC World Twenty20 2009 ) - Sri Lankan captain Kumar Sangakara and T.Dilshan played an important role in run chase against Australia to achieve the target of 160 runs with one over to spare and beat them by six wickets. For the first time Australia faces so much early exit from the tournament in a decade.

The win for Sri Lanka confirm their and West Indies berth in the Super Eight Stage.

Chasing the target of 160 runs for victory Sri Lanka got off to flying start with the help of in-form T.Dilshan (53 runs of 32 balls) despite loosing opener Sanath Jayasurya (2 runs of 7 balls) in the third over of an inning. Dilshan and K.Sangakara (55 runs of 42 balls) put on a valuable partnership 62 runs of just 42 deliveries to make the run chase comfortable for other batsman to follow.

However once Dilshan got out Australia did manage to get the match closer to the end overs but in the end it was captain cool Sangakara and Jehan Mubarak (21 runs of 12 balls) achieved the target with an over remaining.

Earlier Australian after put into bat got off to disastrous start loosing opener David Warner in the very first over. However R. Ponting (25 runs of 15 balls) and Shane Watson (22 runs of 21 balls) tried hard to put Australian inning back on track but once spinner introduced into attack they were struggled and kept loosing wickets at regular intervals.

At one stage they were struggling to get pass 150 run mark but thank to M.Johnson (28 runs of 13 balls) and David Hussey (28 runs of 22 balls) innings as they both collected 65 runs in the last five overs of Australian inning.

Kumara Sangakar was declared Man-of-the-Match for his superb unbeaten knock of 55 runs of 42 balls.

Yuvraj Singh Hits Longest Six in T20 World Cup 2008

It's 119m longest six of the t20 world cup. take a bow! chak de india

Hits By Yuvraj Singh Against the World's Fstest Bowler from Australia Brett Lee.