A target of 419 in the first Test at North Sound, with well over a day's play to go, was always going to be tricky for West Indies, but 100 all out in 26.5 overs was perhaps a notch or three lower than where the team wanted to be. West Indies Captain Jason Holder said their batsmen need to "look at themselves seriously in the mirror" after that display.
"Our batters did not come to the party," Holder said after the game in North Sound, where Jasprit Bumrah's "magic balls" hastened West Indies' end as he finished with incredible figures of 8-4-7-5.
The magic on the day came in the form of the outswinger, a delivery Bumrah hadn't used much in match play before this, and sent down with devastating effect, especially to Shai Hope and Holder. Both played the angle but the ball swung away to hit the off stump, while John Campbell and Darren Bravo, both left-hand batsmen, were bowled through the gate.
"Today he proved difficult [to negotiate]. He bowled some magic balls today and got quite a few of our batsmen with some very good balls," Holder agreed." Having said that, we have just got to find ways to negate him. He is a quality bowler yes, but definitely, solutions are there.
"He got the ball to swing quite late this evening as well. He was difficult. He bowled quite a few inswingers to me. It (the dismissal delivery) angled in and left me at the last moment, so I give him all credit for that one.
"Bumrah bowled an exceptional spell, Ishant [Sharma] was very supportive, as well as [Mohammed] Shami. Just one of those spells in Test cricket when the opposition gets on top and stays on top. We've seen it happen in so many occasions around the world. These things do happen in Test cricket, but it's a matter of it not to happen very often."

What did happen twice over two innings was a rather tame West Indian capitulation. The first time out was better - 222 - but, even then, the best individual score was Roston Chase's 48 when each of the top-eight batsmen got into double-digits but couldn't kick on. The second time was more abject, and might have been even worse but for an entertaining 50-run stand for the last wicket between Kemar Roach and Miguel Cummins.
"Our batters definitely did not come to the party in this game. We fell short [by] quite a few runs. I think the wicket has been a very good one [for batting]. The initial phase with the new ball was the hardest, as a batsman, you should fear, but after that it gets pretty easy," Holder said. "It's just a matter for us to dig a little deeper, we've got to fight hard initially upfront in our innings. Give ourselves a fair chance at succeeding.
"Looking back at this game, everyone who was successful really gave themselves a good chance upfront. Our bowlers have to look at two-three spells before they start to expand; it's going to pretty much going to be similar in Jamaica [in the second Test]."
What's the solution? Chase, after the first innings, had pointed to the openers not providing a platform for the middle-order batsmen and then the other batsmen giving their wickets away too easily. The sentiment was the same, but Holder went a bit deeper when asked the same question.
"We've been looking for solutions for a little while. Each batter's just got to look at themselves seriously in the mirror, and we've just got to find solutions," he said. "I think more often than not we have been gifting our wickets instead of letting the opposition work for the wickets. That's one area we can definitely draw on, make the opposition work really hard for the wickets. If we go through the dismissals in this match, there were quite a few soft dismissals."
Now it's over to Sabina Park after a short "refresh and recuperate" period, and Holder, who defended the decision to field four fast bowlers - including himself - with just the lone spinner in Chase, hoped the team would use the break to lift themselves.
"[The defeat] definitely doesn't dent my confidence personally, and the group I think should be out lifting themselves," Holder said. "We have a lot to be disappointed about, we didn't perform as well as we'd like, but there's no point dropping our heads, that's not the solution, in my opinion. We've got to find a way to bring ourselves back after this defeat and rally around one another."

Lahore is set to host three T20Is and two ODIs between Pakistan and Bangladesh Women starting late October, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) revealed on Friday (August 30).
This will be the third international series in Pakistan this year after having hosted Windies Women in January while the men's team is scheduled to play six games (three ODIs and three T20Is) against Sri Lanka in the white-ball format, starting next month.
Last year, Pakistan Women toured Bangladesh for four T20Is and an ODI and therefore, the aforementioned tour is understood to be a part of a reciprocal arrangement between the two national boards. This is also Bangladesh Women's second tour to Pakistan in the last four years and the last time they toured, the hosts handed them a whitewash across formats that included two ODIs and as many T20Is.
Earlier this year, West Indies Women played three T20Is in Karachi which the visitors won 2-1 before losing the ODI series 1-2 in Dubai.
Series schedule
26 Oct - 1st T20I, Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore
28 Oct - 2nd T20I, Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore
30 Oct - 3rd T20I, Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore
2 Nov - 1st ODI, Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore
4 Nov - 2nd ODI, Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore

India made a rollicking start to their Test championship campaign, bulldozing West Indies across the two-Test series and securing their third successive Test series victory on the trot. The 257-run win in Jamaica, courtesy a West Indies collapse in the second session on Day 4, makes Virat Kohli India's most successful Test captain ever – taking his tally of wins to one more than MS Dhoni (28).
West Indies began Day 4 with a show of resistance, but that didn't quite stand the test of time. They lost Darren Bravo to a delayed concussion effect, but his replacement Jermaine Blackwood put his hand up to join in the hosts' mission to drag the Jamaica Test. He was summoned in just after 10 overs since Bravo had to trudge off because Ravindra Jadeja ended the resilience shown by Roston Chase and Shamarh Brooks, trapping the former leg before. Shimron Hetmyer soon followed suit through a soft dismissal, but Blackwood and Brooks kept the plan of frustrating the visitors alive with a stand that took West Indies to Lunch without further damage and with the addition of 100 runs to their overnight score.
But all that vigil wilted in the post-Lunch period. After resisting the urge to fall for the traps laid out by India in the opening session, Blackwood nudged at a length ball outside the off-stump from Bumrah early in the second session. Brooks carried on to get to his maiden Test fifty, but right after, triggered a collapse that the hosts couldn't recover from.
The procession began courtesy of utter complacency from the half-centurion combined with brilliant ground fielding from Virat Kohli. Brooks nudged the ball on the off-side past the silly point fielder and set off for a run, only to be sent back by his batting partner after taking a few paces. He was casual in his approach back to the crease, but Kohli ran in to pick up the ball and threw on the turn to break the stumps with a direct hit. Replays showed Brooks was slightly short of the crease, leaving the lower-order exposed.
Ravindra Jadeja then took out Jahmar Hamilton just two balls later, caught at first slip by KL Rahul after the batsman nicked a ball that surprised him because of a bit of extra bounce. The umpires checked for no-ball and though replays seemed to suggest it was very close to call, the umpire ruled in India's favour.
An over later, Rakheem Cornwall fell through an inside edge off Shami acrobatically taken by Pant behind the stumps, leaving India just two wickets away from 60 more points to their Test Championship tally. That came within the next five-and-a-half overs, with Shami and Jadeja picking one each to finish with three-fers.

By Romeo Kaseram

Jeffrey Baxter Stollmeyer was born in Santa Cruz, Trinidad, on March 11, 1921. According to the Trinidad and Tobago Sports Hall of Fame biography, Stollmeyer was nicknamed, “Night Singer”. He was a third generation Trinidadian, born from English and German stock, Martin Chandler writes in the website Cricketweb. Born into privilege in what then was a hierarchical, colonial era, Chandler notes Stollmeyer’s father was “a man of considerable wealth, derived from the cocoa plantations” he had established in Trinidad.
However, Chandler reports the young Stollmeyer did not benefit wholly from the largesse of his father’s wealth. Declining world fortunes during the Great Depression found its way into Trinidad’s cocoa market, and the ripples almost bankrupted the Stollmeyers. Consequently, the young Stollmeyer did not receive the same opportunity as his older siblings, and so did not attend a foreign university.
As Chandler reports, the senior Stollmeyer was a resourceful man, and successfully rebuilt the family’s business. Thus, while the young Stollmeyer missed out on a university education, during the 1940s and early 1950s he devoted the time to bettering his cricket.
According to the Hall of Fame biography, Stollmeyer’s cricketing career took off at age 17, when he scored a debut century of 118 with the team Rolph Grant’s XI versus British Guiana during a goodwill tour to Bourda in 1938. Chandler notes Stollmeyer’s performances following the 1938 success were “unspectacular”; yet somehow, he made the pick to join the West Indies team touring England in 1939, a selection that may have been a result of his Bourda debut century not being “forgotten”. In the words of cricket historian Christopher Nicole, quoted by Chandler, it seems Stollmeyer was chosen “entirely upon the strength of his obvious ability, for he had not as yet played any great innings”.
It seemed good fortune also smiled on the young Stollmeyer in the run-up to the first Test in England. Having not “as yet played any great innings”, he still received the nod to join the West Indies team for the first Test when his older sibling, Victor, was afflicted with tonsillitis. Stollmeyer scored 59 in his first knock, a performance that received a positive review from Wisden, which Chandler quotes as proof the “innings was one of quality and not good fortune”.
As Wisden noted, “Possessing a beautiful style, Stollmeyer rarely missed an opportunity to score on the leg side. His most profitable stroke, a forcing shot off his legs, he used to great advantage when dealing with the in-swingers of [William ‘Bill’] Copson, who aimed repeatedly at the middle and leg stumps. Stollmeyer also drove and cut smartly, though there were only three boundaries in his 59.”
By the time the third Test came around in 1939, the winds of a world war were swirling in Europe; no Tests were played for the next seven years. Meanwhile, back in Trinidad, Stollmeyer was performing with the bat as a prolific scorer in inter-colonial cricket, as the Hall of Fame indicates. Playing in goodwill games during the war years, he scored 84 and 92 in 1941; a year later in 1942, the scoreboard tallies were 106 and 43 runs; in 1943, 107 and 77. There was a 210 double century in 1944; and his 1945 scorecard showed 40, 31, 45, and 27. Stollmeyer missed the 1946 series versus Barbados due to injury; in 1947, he led the Trinidad team to Jamaica, hitting a high score of 74 runs in partnership with an emerging talent, the batsman/wicketkeeper Andy Ganteaume.
Any postcolonial study of Stollmeyer’s contribution to West Indian cricket is incomplete without exploration of Ganteaume’s unfortunate treatment at Test cricket. The resumption of Test cricket following World War II saw an English tour of the West Indies in 1948, with Stollmeyer scoring 78 and 31 in the first Test. However, a torn hamstring saw him missing the following two Tests, and with this omission, an ascending opportunity to captain the West Indies team.
What Stollmeyer’s second match omission did was it opened up a crack in a colonial structure then dominated by West Indian elites that saw Ganteaume’s entry into the Test cricket firmament. However, his call-up was replete with the injustices of a time when a hierarchy of colonialist elites determined through preferentiality who climbed upwards, and who did not. According to Peter Mason, writing in The Guardian, the call-up to Ganteaume for the second Test came “through the gritted teeth of the selectors and because of an injury to… Stollmeyer, a white Trinidadian batsman”.
Ganteaume was of mixed African and Indian heritage, and had the “misfortune to be playing in an era when the team was still picked and captained by members of the white establishment”, Mason notes. Additionally, “Summoned to hear the news of his selection at the Queen’s Park Oval cricket ground, Ganteaume was confronted by the West Indies administrator Edgar Marsden who, Ganteaume later recalled, ‘could not disguise his resentment at having to announce something that he did not want to happen’.”
Ganteaume played just one Test match in his entire professional career, with a top-score innings that read, caught J.T. Ikin, bowled H. Holworth, 13 fours, 112 runs. It was an innings that retains its irony in the face of British West Indies colonial privilege, where today Ganteaume’s 112 remains cricket’s highest Test average, surpassing Donald Bradman’s 99.94. It is a record achieved through an inadvertence, in an interstice that opened up inside an unjust structure of racial privilege, a one-time opportunity only, allowing Ganteaume to leave forever his privileging mark in the annals of Test cricket history.
The Hall of Fame biography tells us following Stollmeyer’s Test debut at 18, and until he left the international cricketing stage, he was an “automatic choice as opening batsman”; he became captain in 1953, a position he held until retirement in 1955.
Stollmeyer played 32 Tests, scoring 2,159 runs for an average of 42.33, with four centuries and 12 half-centuries; his top-score was 160. In his First Class career, he played 117 matches, for an average of 7,942 runs, with an average of 44.61; he scored 14 centuries, and 38 half centuries, with a top score of 324 runs. He was also a useful leg-spinner.
Stollmeyer died tragically at 68 after being attacked and shot on August 6, 1989, by intruders at his house near Port-of-Spain in Trinidad. He passed away at a Florida hospital on September 10 that year.

Colin de Grandhomme and Tom Bruce played knocks of 59 and 53 respectively to give New Zealand a win by four wickets against Sri Lanka in the second T20I of the three-match series at Pallekele.
With this win, the Kiwis also clinched the three-match series as they have gained an unassailable 2-0 lead.
Chasing 162, New Zealand got off to a bad start as Akila Dananjaya dismissed opener Colin Munro (13) in the second over of the innings.
Soon after, Dananjaya sent both Tim Seifert (15) and Scott Kuggeleijn (8) back to the pavilion to reduce Kiwis to 38/3 in the fourth over. The spinner had both batsmen caught plum in front and as a result, the duo was adjudged leg-before wicket.
De Grandhomme and Bruce got together in the middle and they steadied the innings for the Kiwi team. They did not allow the asking run-rate to get beyond the reach.
The duo stitched together a partnership of 109 runs, but with 15 runs required from 11 balls, De Grandhomme (59) perished, giving Sri Lanka hope of victory.
With 7 runs needed from the final over, the Kiwi were given a big blow as both Bruce (53) and Daryl Mitchell (1) were sent back to the pavilion in successive balls. However, on the third ball of the over Mitchell Santner found the fence despite the fielder taking the catch at wide long-on boundary as he crossed over the boundary after a collision, and a six was awarded to New Zealand.
In the end, New Zealand won the match by four wickets with two balls to spare.
Earlier, fast bowler Seth Rance claimed three wickets as New Zealand kept down Sri Lanka to 161 for nine.
The hosts lost regular wickets after electing to bat first in their bid to stay alive in the three-match series led by New Zealand.
Kiwi skipper Tim Southee returned impressive figures of 2-18 and fellow paceman Scott Kuggeleijn also took two wickets.
Avishka Fernando and Niroshan Dickwella put on 68 runs for a crucial third-wicket stand but the rest of the batting did not make an impression.
Kusal Mendis let go off a brisk start to be out for 26 off Rance and his opening partner Kusal Perera followed him to the pavilion after being bowled by Ish Sodhi.
The right-left batting pair of Fernando, who made 37, and Dickwella, who hit 39, then got going to take the attack to the opposition bowlers.
Southee broke the stand with the wicket of Fernando, and Rance trapped the left-handed Dickwella lbw.
Shehan Jayasuriya remained the only other notable scorer with his 20 off 13 deliveries.
Brief Scores: New Zealand 165/6 (Colin de Grandhomme 59, Tom Bruce 53, Akila Dananjaya 3-36) defeat Sri Lanka 161/9 (Niroshan Dickwella 39, Avishka Fernando 37, Seth Rance 3-33) by four wickets.

Raj, 36, who is highest run-scorer in the women's international game, will focus on the one-day World Cup in 2021 and has pulled out of the upcoming T20 series against South Africa.
The batter, who made her India T20 debut in 2006, says it is her "dream" to win the 50-over World Cup.
Raj led India in 32 T20 matches, including three World Cups. She amassed 2,364 T20 runs in 89 matches and hit an unbeaten 30 off 32 balls in her last T20 outing against England in March.
New Zealand will host the 2021 World Cup.

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