shardul thakur replaces axar patel in billion cheers: fan

AARHUS (DEN-MARK), OCTOBER 13:Indian women team pro-gressed to the quarterfinalsof the Uber Cup with a con-vincing 4-1 victory overScotland as shuttlers AditiBhatt and Tasnim Mir regis-tered confident singles winshere today.

India are now sitting sec-ond in Group B with twowins from as manymatches.

They had beaten Spain 3-2 on Sunday when topplayer Saina Nehwal wasforced to retire from hermatch due to a groin issue.Taking the court first,Malvika Bansod lost toKirsty Gilmour 13-21 9-21before Aditi got the better ofRachel Sugden 21-14 21-8to level the scores.

The doubles pair of Tan-isha Crasto and RutaparnaPanda then beat JulieMachperson and Ciara Tor-rance 21-11 21-8 to hand In-dia a 2-1 lead.

Tasnim sealed the tie inIndia’s favour by defeatingLauren Middleton 21-15 21-

6.In the reverse doubles,

the young pair of TreesaJolly and Gayatri Gopic-hand, daughter of nationalcoach Pullela Gopichand,

fought hard before gettingthe better of Gilmour andEleanor O’Donnell 21-8 19-21 21-10 in an exciting clashthat lasted for 55 minutes.

The Indian team will now

take on Thailand onWednesday. India has twice(2014, New Delhi and 2016,Kunshan) reached thesemifinals of the tourna-ment.

Uber cup: Women steal the showagainst Scots to make quarters

PARIS, OCTOBER 13:Another hat trick for Cris-tiano Ronaldo, another win— and qualification for theWorld Cup — for Denmark.

And yet more crowd trou-ble in a game between Eng-land and Hungary.

There was a sense of fa-miliarity to the World Cupqualifiers in Europe onTuesday, not least in Farowhere Ronaldo extendedhis men's record tally of in-ternational goals to 115 byscoring the 58th hat trick ofhis career for club andcountry in Portugal's 5-0win over Luxembourg.

Denmark became the sec-ond European nation toqualify for next year's tour-nament in Qatar, after Ger-many on Monday, by secur-ing an eighth straight win ingroup play by beating Aus-tria 1-0.

The decisive win — sealedby Joakim Maehle's sec-ond-half goal — came at theParken Stadium in Copen-hagen where star play-maker Christian Eriksencollapsed in June during aEuropean Championshipgame. It is still unclear ifEriksen can resume his ca-reer to play at the WorldCup in 13 months' time.

England is likely to bethere, but was made to waitbefore booking its place afterbeing held to a 1-1 draw byHungary at Wembley Sta-dium.

Events on the field wereovershadowed by clashes

between police officers andHungary supporters at thestart of the match, sparked— according to police — by avisiting fan making "raciallyaggravated" comments to-ward a steward.

Disorder by Hungary fans— including racism — dur-ing the first group matchbetween the teams, in Bu-dapest last month, led to theHungarians having to playa game in an empty sta-dium.

Sweden climbed aboveSpain into first place inGroup B with a 2-0 win overGreece, and Switzerlandmoved level on points withItaly in Group C with a 4-0victory over Lithuania.

In Group A, Portugal is apoint behind Serbia, whichbeat Azerbaijan 3-1, but hasa game in hand.

Only the top team fromeach group qualifies auto-matically for the WorldCup. The second-place fin-ishers go into the playoffs.

A pair of penalties, in the

eighth and 13th minutes, setRonaldo on his way to arecord 10th internationalhat trick for Portugal thatwas completed in the 87thminute.

The 36-year-old Man-chester United striker wasplaying his 182nd interna-tional game.

Bruno Fernandes andJoão Palhinha also scoredfor Portugal in its fourthstraight win in qualifying,which left a straightshootout with Serbia forfirst place.

Serbia's last game is atPortugal, which will firstplay its game in hand awayto Ireland.

Denmark is continuing itsgood form from the Euro-pean Championship, wherethe team surged to thesemifinals despite losingEriksen in distressing cir-cumstances in the openinggame.

The clean sheet againstAustria meant the Daneshave yet to concede in

Group F, while they are theonly team with a 100%record in qualifying.

Maehle scored with asweeping shot that was teedup by Thomas Delaney's di-rect run, taking Denmark to27 goals — second only tothe Netherlands.

Denmark holds an unas-sailable seven-point leadover Scotland, which is stillon track to finish runner-upafter a 1-0 win at the FaeroeIslands.

Scotland is four pointsclear of third-place Israel,which beat visiting Moldova2-1.

Crowd trouble marredboth of the games in Group I— at the start of the Eng-land-Hungary game andnear the end of Albania-Poland.

The unrest at Wembleyunfolded after officers en-tered the away stand "to ar-rest a spectator for a raciallyaggravated" comment to-ward a steward," the Metro-politan Police said in astatement.

Police were seen wieldingbatons to hold back the visit-ing fans but the rest of thegame passed off largelypeacefully.

The English Football As-sociation said it was report-ing the incident to FIFA,which has previously putHungary on probation withthe threat of another gamebeing played without fans ifthere was further disorderat games.

Cristiano Ronaldo scores hat trick,Denmark qualifies for World Cup

AARHUS (DEN-MARK), OCTOBER 13 :The Indian men’s bad-minton team hammeredTahiti 5-0 to enter the quar-terfinals of the Thomas Cupfor the first time since 2010but the women’s team suf-fered a crushing 0-5 defeatagainst a strong Thailand inits last group match here.

It was the first defeat forIndian women after beatingSpain (3-2) and Scotland(4-1). The women’s teamhas already reached thequarterfinals.

The men’s team, on Tues-day, recorded its secondstraight 5-0 win, havingbeaten the Netherlandswith an identical margin onSunday. The team is now inlast-eight stage and the lasttime Indian men made thequarterfinals of the tourna-ment, they had lost to In-donesia.

In the Uber Cup, the In-dian women’s team

wrapped up its Group B en-gagement with a drubbingat the hands of Thailand.

Malvika Bansod lost theopening women’s singles15-21 11-21 to PornpaweeChochowong.

India needed to win thenext doubles match butAshwini Ponappa and SikkiN Reddy went down fight-ing 16-21 12-21 to Jongkol-phan Kititharakul andRawinda Prajongjai.

For India to stay alive, itwas imperative for AditiBhatt to win the next singlesmatch. She fought her heartout but lost 16-21 21-18 15-21

to Busanan Ongbamrung-phan in a match that lasted59 minutes.

Treesa Jolly and GayatriGopichand then foughthard before losing 17-21 16-21 to Puttita Supajirakuland Sapsiree Taerat-tanachai. Tasnim Mir tookthe court with an aim toavoid a whitewash but lost19-21 15-21 to SupanindaKatethong. Tasnim had agood chance to win the firstgame as she was leading 17-14 but lost points in a jiffy tolet slip advantage.

Meanwhile, Tuesday’swin over Tahiti ensured that

Indian men’s team will fin-ish in top-two in the four-team Group C. India willtake on traditional power-house China in the finalmatch on Thursday.

B Sai Praneeth began theproceedings with a 21-5 21-6win over Louis Beaubois injust 23 minutes in the open-ing singles.

Sameer Verma made it 2-0 with an easy 21-12 21-12victory over Remi Rossi in41 minutes.

Kiran George sealed thetie for India with a 21-4 21-2thrashing of EliasMaublanc in the thirdmen’s singles that got overin only 15 minutes.

In the inconsequentialdoubles matches, the pair ofKrishna Prasad and VishnuVardhan achieved a 21-821-7 win in 21 minutes be-fore SatwiksairajRankireddy and ChiragShetty beat Maublanc andHeiva Yvonet 21-5 21-3.

Indian men reach Thomas Cup quarters, womenlose 0-5 to Thailand in Uber Cup last group match

MELBOURNE, OCTO-BER 13: Cricket Australiachairman Earl Eddings re-signed on Wednesday, a daybefore he was due to standfor re-election at the board'sannual general meeting.

Eddings, whose three-year chairmanship wasmarked by near-constantdivision between memberstates, was under pressureafter fellow board directorsnominated by New SouthWales and Queenslandwithdrew their support forhim this week.

Western Australia alsopulled its support after ameeting late on Tuesday,dealing a terminal blow tohis re-election hopes, Aus-tralian media reported.

"It has been an honour

and a privilege to be able toserve the sport I love as aCricket Australia director,"Eddings said.

"It is my sincere hope thatfollowing my resignationthe state and territory asso-ciations can unite and worktogether in the best inter-ests of cricket, allowing thefocus to return to the sportahead of the 2021-22 sea-son." Director RichardFreudenstein was installedas chairman in his place andwill serve for a short perioduntil a permanent replace-ment is elected, CA said in astatement on Wednesday.

Eddings' resignationcomes only weeks after CAsaid he had the full supportof the board despite statemembers New South Wales

and Queensland publiclyopposing his re-election.

A CA director for 13 years,Eddings replaced DavidPeever in 2018 as interimchairman after the formermining executive resignedfollowing the release of ascathing cultural reviewinto the Newlands ball-tam-pering scandal.

Eddings was quickly in-stalled as permanent chair-man, triggering an embar-rassing complaint from hishome state Victoria, whichhad opposed his appoint-ment. Victoria removedhim as its nominated direc-tor the following year butEddings managed to clingto the chairmanship as anindependent director.

Eddings and the CA

board came under majorscrutiny after the governingbody stood down 80% of itsstaff and tried to ramthrough swinging cuts tostate grants as "proactivemeasures" to deal with thefall-out from the COVID-19pandemic.

Those moves, announcedby former CEO KevinRoberts but endorsed bythe board, were condemnedby eastern states and theplayers' union, which saidthey would prove "disas-trous" for the game.

With pressure mounting,Roberts resigned after los-ing support of the board butEddings pressed on for re-election despite reports ofdiscontent dogging him tothe eve of the AGM.

Earl Eddings resigns as Cricket Australia chairman ahead of AGM

NEW DELHI, OCTO-BER 13: Fast bowling all-rounder Shardul Thakur onWednesday replaced AxarPatel in India's squad forthe T20 World Cup to beheld in the UAE and Omanfrom October 17.

The 29-year-old Thakurhas impressed with his 18wickets in the ongoing IPLfor Chennai Super Kings.

"The All-India Senior Se-lection Committee after adiscussion with the teammanagement has addedShardul Thakur to the mainsquad. All-rounder AxarPatel, who was part of the15-member squad will nowbe on the list of stand-byplayers," BCCI secretaryJay Shah said in a state-ment.

With pace all-rounderHardik Pandya, who playsfor Mumbai Indians, notbowling during the IPL be-

cause of fitness issues, theselectors wanted a cover forhim. "The selectors felt thatthey were one pacer shortand also with HardikPandya not bowling, theyneeded an all-rounder inthe main squad," a sourceclose to the selection com-mittee told PTI.

"Axar remains in stand by

and if Ravindra Jadeja getsinjured, he will again beback in main team. TillJaddu plays, Axar won't berequired." As reported byPTI, the selectors also in-cluded Harshal Patelamong the net bowlers forthe Indian team.

"The following cricketerswill join the team bubble in

Dubai and assist Team In-dia in their preparations:Avesh Khan, Umran Malik,Harshal Patel, LukmanMeriwala, Venkatesh Iyer,Karn Sharma, ShahbazAhmed and K. Gowtham,"the statement said.

India will open their cam-paign on October 24 againstPakistan.

India's squad for ICC T20World Cup: Virat Kohli(captain), Rohit Sharma(vice-captain), KL Rahul,Suryakumar Yadav,Rishabh Pant (wicket-keeper), Ishan Kishan,Hardik Pandya, RavindraJadeja, Rahul Chahar,Ravichandran Ashwin,Shardul Thakur, VarunChakravarthy, Jasprit Bum-rah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar,Mohammad Shami.

Stand-by players:Shreyas Iyer, Deepak Cha-har, Axar Patel.

Shardul Thakur replaces Axar Patel inIndia's main squad for T20 World Cup

NEW DELHI, OCTO-BER 13: Claiming to be in-spired by the fans, the In-dian cricket team's jerseyfor the upcoming T20World Cup was unveiled onWednesday, days before thecountry opens its campaignwith a much-awaited clashagainst arch-rivals Pakistanin Dubai.

The tournament will beheld from October 17 to No-vember 14 in the UAE andOman.

The new shirt, called the'Billion Cheers Jersey', hasbeen inspired by fans andwas unveiled by MPLSports, the official kit spon-sor of the Indian men's,women's, and Under-19teams.

"This is the first time inthe history of Indian cricketthat fans have been memori-alised on a jersey. It carriestheir chants and cheersfrom iconic past matches,transformed into uniquesound wave patterns,"stated a release from MLSports. The jersey comes inshades of Prussian blue androyal blue.

BCCI president Sourav

Ganguly said, “The Indiancricket team enjoys supportnot just in India but aroundthe world, and there's nobetter way to celebrate theirexcitement and energy thanthrough this jersey.

"This will undoubtedlyprovide the team with themuch-needed enthusiasticsupport in their quest to

emerge as the T20 champi-ons of the world. We arealso pleased to see that MPLSports continues to delivermerchandise that is widelyaffordable and accessible."

The board's secretary JayShah echoed the view.

"The story behind the jer-sey is a story of every Indiancricket fan. We are sure that

wearing this will be a mat-ter of great pride for boththe team and supportersalike." The jersey will beavailable in stores for Rs1,799. Along with this, over10 variations, including aplayer edition jersey andskipper Virat Kohli's signa-ture number 18 jersey, havebeen launched.

Billion Cheers: Fan-inspired Team India jersey for T20 World Cup unveiled

THE HIMALAYAN MAIL 11JAMMU THURSDAY OCTOBER 14, 2021