Shane Watson again showed why he is Australia's man for all occasions when he ground his way to a vital half-century on the first day of the second Test against West Indies on Sunday.
With the T20 frenzy catching up fast, Australia may have separate Test and Twenty20 teams in the near future, feels Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland.
'Someone's got to do it and I might put my hand up. It's part of the game and what happened the other day with Shane (Watson) and Wahab (Riaz) was exceptional'
Australia have named 18-year-old paceman Patrick Cummins in their 15-man Test squad for their two-match series in South Africa, while retaining Mitchell Johnson despite the mercurial paceman's struggles in Sri Lanka.
'After returning from Australia, I worked with my coach Prashant Shetty sir and also Pravin Amre sir before going to the Vijay Hazare Trophy, and it worked quite well. I played my natural game in Vijay Hazare Trophy, but I made a small technical change. After that, it's going well.'
Australia opened up a six-point lead over India at the top of the MRF Tyres ICC Test Team Rankings following the annual update, with the results from 2012-13 no longer included in the calculations and outcomes from the 2014-15 series weighted at 50 per cent.
The uncapped pair are the newcomers in captain Steven Smith's 15-man squad, which includes 10 players with less than 10 Tests, as Australia look to rebuild following a string of retirements after the Ashes defeat in England.
'With Virat it is a funny one, we love to hate him but we also love to watch him bat as cricket fans. He certainly is polarising in that type of scenario. We love watching him bat, but we don't like seeing him score too many runs'
Sachin Tendulkar (154 not out) registered his 38th century, extending his world record. It was his eighth against Australia, equal to the Indian record held by Sunil Gavaskar.
Sachin Tendulkar, with 314 runs (ave.78.50) in five innings is now the leading run-getter in the series. Matthew Hayden (307) and Andrew Symonds (302) have recorded 300-plus in this series for Australia.
India play three ODIs against Australia starting in Sydney on Saturday before travelling to New Zealand for a five-ODI and three-T20I assignment starting January 23.
One side was just 60-odd metres and Swepson said that he had to defend that side bowling wide off Kohli.
The four-match Border-Gavaskar Trophy is locked at 1-1 and the match at Jharkhand State Cricket Association (JSCA), which is organising it's first-ever Test, is set to be a make-or-break affair for both teams.
Pakistan's Sohail to return home after injury ends England tour
Late Phillip Hughes named 13th man in Australian squad.
Novak Djokovic will begin his Australian Open title defence against Frenchman Jeremy Chardy, while reigning women's champion Sofia Kenin meets wild card Maddison Inglis, following the draw for the year's first Grand Slam on Friday.
Babar Azam (104) hit his second Test century and Mohammad Rizwan 95 to stall Australia's march to victory and once they had departed, Pakistan were soon all out for 335.
The Indian team management's dilemma over Virender Sehwag's opening partner was evident during the training session as both Murali Vijay and Shikhar Dhawan were seen spending considerable time at the nets ahead of the first Test match against Australia on Friday.
Hazlewood also said that Cheteshwar Pujara is the one player who wears down the bowlers with his workman-like approach.
Very few young Australian cricketers have generated as much buzz in recent years as the 22-year-old, thanks to his prolific form in Sheffield Shield.
Another Michael Clarke masterclass helped Australia avoid total collapse on Day One of the opening Test against India at the MA Chidambaram stadium on Friday.
Indian batsman Ajinkya Rahane jumped three places to enter the top-10 in batsman's list while Ravichandran Ashwin maintained his pole position among all-rounders in the latest Test rankings released by the International Cricket Council (ICC).
There are those historic, memorable matches (the 1986 tied in Chennai, the Kolkata epic in 2001 and the Adelaide humdinger of 2015) that gripped our collective conscious.
Siddle broke the news to his team mates at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Sunday after being released from the squad for the third and final Test against New Zealand in Sydney.
'I think our bowlers' efforts were really good. If they can do the same thing tomorrow, get a couple edges first up, it could be totally different'
It is learnt that fielding coach Sridhar, who has watched Vihari from his junior days, is monitoring his training sessions and also giving him throwdowns.
Former champions Sri Lanka will look to exploit Australia's top-order woes when they clash in a group 1 Super 12 match of the ICC T20 World Cup here on Thursday.
Australian paceman Josh Hazlewood ripped through England with three crucial wickets in the final session to leave Joe Root's side trailing by 297 runs with five wickets remaining after the third day of the fourth Ashes Test.
Left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja's maiden 10-wicket match haul against England in Chennai has propelled him to second position behind teammate and India's star off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin in the ICC Test bowler rankings released on Wednesday.
Lisa Sthalekar said being looked after has become more important at the moment, with the pandemic wreaking havoc across the world.
Australia are likely to start the second Test against New Zealand unchanged after uncapped all rounder Dan Christian was added to the squad in place of injured 12th man Ben Cutting on Monday.
'BCCI at the outset committed to ensuring that they got home safely and as quickly as possible. They've delivered on that promise.'
A rampaging Roger Federer delivered a stunning reminder of his class at the Australian Open on Friday with a crushing 6-2, 6-4, 6-4 win over Tomas Berdych to storm into the fourth round.
It was the first cricket match Down Under in six months.
Australia reviewing DRS process after Headingley howler
Indian and Australian cricketers were engaged in a war of words on Tuesday, ahead of the crucial third Test in Perth, with senior players of both sides taking digs at each other after Brad Haddin started the jibes by calling India a "fragile" team.
Former Australia wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist feels India has a great opportunity to register their first Test series victory Down Under as the former world No 1 side is currently in a transitional phase.
Wicketkeeper-batsman Naman Ojha has been named in the squad for India's Test tour of Australia for just one match. He will return after the opening game at Brisbane.
