Dhoni ready to handle the pressure

With the cream of IPL in his side, India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni today said his men are more equipped than their counterparts to handle pressure situations associated with the shortest format of the game when they defend their Twenty20 title.

Dhoni said although other teams have players who featured in the IPL, his side has an upper hand in the biennial event starting here on June 5 as all the 15 members of the Indian squad have featured in the just-concluded IPL in South Africa.

"The best thing is that we will know more how to handle pressure, when in the last over you need 10 or 15 runs, everyone in our side has faced that situation. There are quite a few players from other countries but most of our players were in the Indian Premier League," Dhoni told reporters at the official press conference here.

"In IPL you have limited talent in your side, but here we have plenty of options. We have the cream of the IPL so there is less pressure on each and every individual," he added.

Dhoni, however, warned his team-mates against complacency and said the defending champions cannot afford to take any side lightly.

"In Twenty20, there is no such thing as a weak side, any individual can take the game away from you. We also can't live on or relish the memories, we have to turn up and do everything from scratch again, it's not about the past," Dhoni said pointing to their triumph in the inaugural World Twenty20 in South Africa two years back.

Indias IPL men in form for title defence

As the Indian Premier League draws to a close, it’s comforting to see that those Indians, selected for the Twenty20 World Cup, are in roaring form.

Of course, Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir are notable failures but the rest are warming Indian hearts and who knows the Delhi openers might come back to form in the remaining games to make India firm favourite.

You have a middle-order of Suresh Raina, Rohit Sharma, Yuvraj Singh and Ravinder Jadeja who are all exceptional players. Yuvraj Singh is a known six-hitter but Raina and Sharma have overtaken him.

Raina, in his small frame, packs enormous power. He is a young man of strong arms and wrists and can murderously pull even good length balls beyond the boundary.

Sharma is an effortless timer who moves in or outside the line of deliveries to make soaring hits over extra cover and mid-wicket. Jadeja is one clever manipulator of field who is just about coming on to his own.

The teamhas allrounders in Pathan brothers, Yusuf and Irfan, who can win matches on their own. When put together, they are just sensational. Both are good with bat and ball and no slouch on the field either.

Zaheer to join up with Indian Twenty20 squad

Pace spearhead Zaheer Khan, who is recovering from a shoulder injury, is set to leave with the India's Twenty20 squad for the World Cup in England.

"The team is set to leave tomorrow. If there was anything about it (concerns over Zaheer's fitness) we would have let it be known to the media," BCCI sources told PTI.

Doubts had cropped up about Zaheer's availability for the World Championship when he stayed back in South Africa after the conclusion of IPL for a treatment to his injury.

Zaheer, who played for the Mumbai Indians in the Indian Premier League, suffered the injury on his bowling shoulder while diving to stop a drive off Royal Challengers Bangalore batsman Robin Uthappa in Johannesburg.

He underwent a scan that indicated some inflammation and the team management said the injury was not as serious as was thought before the scan. But he did not take part in the remaining matches of Mumbai Indians.

The left-arm pacer, who was not a part of the triumphant squad that clinched the title in the inaugural edition two years ago in South Africa, has emerged as chief wrecker for India in the recent series against Sri Lanka and New Zealand.

Fri 5 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 1st Match, Group B - England v Netherlands
Lord's, London

Sat 6
10:00 local, 09:00 GMT 2nd Match, Group D - New Zealand v Scotland
Kennington Oval, London

Sat 6
14:00 local, 13:00 GMT 3rd Match, Group C - Australia v West Indies
Kennington Oval, London

Sat 6 Floodlit Match
18:00 local, 17:00 GMT 4th Match, Group A - Bangladesh v India
Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Sun 7
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 5th Match, Group D - Scotland v South Africa
Kennington Oval, London

Sun 7 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 6th Match, Group B - England v Pakistan
Kennington Oval, London

Mon 8
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 7th Match, Group A - Bangladesh v Ireland
Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Mon 8 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 8th Match, Group C - Australia v Sri Lanka
Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Tue 9
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 9th Match, Group B - Netherlands v Pakistan
Lord's, London

Tue 9 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 10th Match, Group D - New Zealand v South Africa
Lord's, London

Wed 10
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 11th Match, Group C - Sri Lanka v West Indies
Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Wed 10 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 12th Match, Group A - India v Ireland
Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Thu 11
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 13th Match, Group F - TBC v TBC
Trent Bridge, Nottingham
D1 v A2

Thu 11 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 14th Match, Group E - TBC v TBC
Trent Bridge, Nottingham
B2 v D2

Fri 12
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 15th Match, Group F - TBC v TBC
Lord's, London
B1 v C2

Fri 12 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 16th Match, Group E - TBC v TBC
Lord's, London
A1 v C1

Sat 13
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 17th Match, Group E - TBC v TBC
Kennington Oval, London
C1 v D2

Sat 13 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 18th Match, Group F - TBC v TBC
Kennington Oval, London
D1 v B1

Sun 14
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 19th Match, Group F - TBC v TBC
Lord's, London
A2 v C2
Sun 14 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 20th Match, Group E - TBC v TBC
Lord's, London
A1 v B2

Mon 15
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 21st Match, Group E - TBC v TBC
Kennington Oval, London
B2 v C1

Mon 15 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 22nd Match, Group F - TBC v TBC
Kennington Oval, London
B1 v A2

Tue 16
13:30 local, 12:30 GMT 23rd Match, Group F - TBC v TBC
Trent Bridge, Nottingham
D1 v C2

Tue 16 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 24th Match, Group E - TBC v TBC
Trent Bridge, Nottingham
D2 v A1

Thu 18 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 1st Semi-Final - TBC v TBC
Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Fri 19 Floodlit Match
17:30 local, 16:30 GMT 2nd Semi-Final - TBC v TBC
Kennington Oval, London

Sun 21
15:00 local, 14:00 GMT Final - TBC v TBC
Lord's, London

World T20 won't repeat mistakes of World Cup

World T20 won't repeat mistakes of World Cup

Andrew Miller

May 28, 2009
Steve Elworthy addresses the media at Lord's, April 6, 2009
Steve Elworthy: 'Exclusivity is the key' © Getty Images

Steve Elworthy, the ICC's tournament director, believes that the allure of international competition will enable the forthcoming World Twenty20 to rise above the fears of overkill that are currently circulating in English cricket, but warned that the ECB will have missed a trick if they fail to use the three-week event to attract a new audience to the game.

Speaking to Cricinfo on the eve of the tournament, Elworthy admitted that the game's administrators had learnt their lessons from the disastrous Caribbean World Cup in 2007, and were also mindful of overloading the calendar with too many marquee events. But regardless of the hype and glamour of the recently completed Indian Premier League, he insisted that tickets for the World Twenty20 were proving extremely popular in what he described as a "unique summer" for the ECB.

"The key point with any product is the exclusivity," said Elworthy. "You want people walking away at the end of a match wanting more, you want them to say: 'I can't wait for next season because I can't wait for the next Twenty20 competition'.

"[It's true that] there've been a couple of very big competitions in a fairly short space of time, but it'll settle down. It is a massive summer of cricket for the ECB, but it's a unique summer. It doesn't happen very often to get the Ashes and a world event in the same year and hosted by the same board."

Elworthy was appointed to his role by the ECB back in January, having successfully overseen the inaugural World Twenty20 in September 2007 in his native South Africa. That tournament was won in a thrilling final by India, who chose to return to the country to stage last month's IPL, when the competition was forced overseas by the unstable political climate in the subcontinent.

"The IPL is a fantastic domestic product and its success is widely recognised," said Elworthy. "But this is nation versus nation, and everything we are doing goes back to that pride of pulling on your shirt and representing your country. What's the hook when you're watching the match? It's the fact that you want your country to do well."

According to Elworthy, the ICC is still heeding the lessons learnt at the 2007 World Cup, which featured 47 matches in 51 days, unrealistic ticket prices and some grindingly dull cricket between ill-matched teams. The original World Twenty20 took place just six months on from that event, and was an unqualified success thanks largely to a rock-bottom pricing policy that opened the gates to a whole new audience.

"Twenty20 is deemed a development product," said Elworthy. "It is for attracting new markets and new spectators and fans, who will hopefully go on to play cricket and participate. You've got to be able to get to the youth market, because what you're trying to achieve is dictated to you by your ticket price."

Tickets for the 2007 event ranged from the equivalent of £1.50 for the opening rounds to a top-tier cost of £11 for the final, and even allowing for a stronger UK economy and the knowledge of the event's popularity, those prices are considerably lower than the ones on offer in 2009. This time around, adult tickets will range from £20 at Trent Bridge to £90 at Lord's, even though Under-16s will be able to watch the final for as little as a tenner.

"You can't have an elite ticket price and expect it to be attended by loads of families and kids," said Elworthy. "The structure of our ticket prices there was one of the key successes [of the 2007 tournament]."

While South Africa proved to be an outstanding venue for both the World Twenty20 and the IPL, England has a less auspicious track record when it comes to global cricket events. The last major tournament to be staged in the country was the 1999 World Cup, which was memorable for a fizzer of an opening ceremony and a poor showing from the host nation, who were ejected from the competition in the opening round.

Elworthy, however, is adamant that cricket fans in England will flock to the event, even though the Ashes remain the dominant attraction of the summer. "Twenty20 in this country is extremely popular," he said. "Our first set of ticket allocations went out just under a year ago, and over 100,000 tickets were sold out in 48 hours. There are still tickets available, but we expect 95-98% capacity at the key double-headers, and we are well on target in terms of our goals of over 80% attendance across the entire tournament."

"All the venues have been supportive," he added. "Our ticketing strategy didn't want to alienate the current markets and clientele that the venues have, but we wanted to reach new audiences and get new faces to the ground. All the dug-outs and DJ boxes and dance podiums, those have become part of the Twenty20 brand, and they'll be delivered at all these venues."