Gaurav Ghei

Kuala Lumpur: Jeev Milkha Singh, who has played just one event on the Asian Tour in the second half of the season, maintains his huge lead on the Tour’s UBS Order of Merit list, but lower down there are five other Indians in the top-30.

The stars this week were Gaurav Ghei and Rahil Gangjee, who finished one-two at the $500,000 Mercuries Masters in Taiwan. Ghei’s winning cheque of $100,000 took him to tenth spot, up from previous 24th while Rahil Gangjee moved to 18th up from 29th. Shiv Kapur, with his fifth place in Singapore Open, is sixth. Jyoti Randhawa (25th) and Amandeep Johl (27th) are the other Indians in top-30.

 

Chopra, Atwal slide

Madison: Daniel Chopra and Arjun Atwal disappointed in the final round as they slipped down the ladder with their worst rounds of the week at the $3 million Southern Farm Bureau Classic Golf tournament. Chopra, tied third overnight shot a three-over 74, ended at seven-under 281 for the tied-16th place while Atwal’s struggle for his card continued as he played a five-over 76 in a roller-coaster of a week and at one-over 289 was tied-67th at the Annandale Golf Club course.

Benaud flays ICC

Sydney: Richie Benaud says last week’s International Cricket Council (ICC) hearing into ball tampering arising from last month’s forfeited fourth Test between England and Pakistan has hurt world cricket. The former Australian captain said the ICC hearing was “crass and unbecoming” and he criticised Pakistan’s decision to refuse to re-enter the field instead of accepting the umpire’s ruling at The Oval.

“Why didn’t he get a Test ban?” Benaud told a paper Monday. “His proven offence was committed in a Test. “Instead, he got the minimum one-day ban of four matches when the minimum Test ban was 10 days of cricket.”

Bradman losing appeal

Sydney: The Bradman Museum, established to honour Australia’s greatest cricketer Don Bradman, is facing dwindling visitor numbers and may have to be reinvented for a generation more familiar with Shane Warne and Ricky Ponting, reports said. Situated in Bowral, an hour’s drive south-west of Sydney where Bradman lived his early years, the museum is experiencing a decline in income since the 2001 death of Bradman, aged 92.

“Business has been difficult since Sir Donald died,” Richard Mulvaney, the museum’s founding director, told a paper. In its heyday, in the late 1990s, 85,000 cricket lovers visited the museum every year, but that has fallen to about 40,000 per year.

Mankad Baroda coach

Vadodara: Ashok Mankad has been appointed as the new coach of the Baroda Ranji team, Baroda Cricket Association secretary Kiran More said. The post fell vacant after former Test cricketer Balwinder Singh Sandhu switched over to Madhya Pradesh as coach.

Tough for Flintoff: Akram

Karachi: Andrew Flintoff faces a difficult time as England captain in next month’s Ashes in Australia, his long-time friend and former Pakistan captain Wasim Akram said. “The choice of Flintoff as captain is good but I fear he will be leading a losing team in the forthcoming Ashes. The Australians are going to crush England and only an extraordinary performance can avert the outcome,” Akram said.

BCCI bid

Mumbai: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has decided to bid for the rights of all the events to be held by the International Cricket Council (ICC), including two editions of the World Cup, for the next eight years till 2015. “We had decided at the recent AGM to bid for the rights of the ICC’s global events from 2007 to 2015,” said a senior BCCI functionary. Meanwhile, being a co-host for the 2011 World Cup, the BCCI has adopted a scheme under which any state association building an international stadium will get financial support of Rs 25 crore.

Van Basten snubbed

Utrecht: Bayern Munich midfielder Mark Van Bommel rejected an offer to play for The Netherlands, three days after he was called up. Real Madrid striker Ruud Van Nistelrooy also turned down Netherlands coach Marco Van Basten to play in 2008 European Championship qualifiers against Bulgaria on October 7 and Albania four days later.

Negi awarded GM title

New Delhi: Parimarjan Negi has been officially awarded the Grandmaster title by the games governing body Fide at its meeting in Elita in Russia.

Negi, who became the second youngest-ever Grandmaster after Sergey Karjakin of Ukraine in July, has a current rating of Elo 2538. Meanwhile, Viswanathan Anand (Elo 2779) maintained his second place behind Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria (2813). Russians Vladimir Kramnik and Peter Svidler (both 2750) were following at the third and fourth spots, respectively. Krishnan Sasikiran and P Harikrishna were the other Indians in top-50.

Kramnik, Topalov draw

Elista: Classical world champion Vladimir Kramnik and world chess champion Veselin Topalov played out a draw Monday after Kramnik agreed to resume the chess unification match at a score of 3-2 in his favour.

“I came to the conclusion of proceeding under protest because I do not want to disappoint the overwhelming majority of chess fans, who has been hoping for the unification for so many years,” Kramnik said in a statement. (Agencies)