Saudi Arabia keep ICC U19 Cricket World Cup qualification hopes alive after Bhutan thriller

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s fiery right-arm pacer Haris Rauf put injury fears to rest this week by saying he felt comfortable bowling during practice and was “personally satisfied” with his fitness ahead of the Champions Trophy opener. 

Rauf sustained a muscular sprain in his lower chest during Pakistan’s match against New Zealand earlier this month, triggering fears the bowler would be ruled out of the tournament. Along with pacers Naseem Shah and Shaheen Shah Afridi, Rauf is an essential part of the South Asian country’s pace attack.

Pakistan will face New Zealand in the first match of the ICC Champions Trophy tournament on Wednesday, Feb. 19, in the southern port city of Karachi. Two days before the clash, Pakistan’s cricket team held a training and practice session at the Oval Ground of the PCB’s Hanif Muhammad High Performance Center in Karachi on Monday. 

“I am feeling very good and have been practicing with high intensity for the past two days,” Rauf told reporters on Monday. “I did a bit of bowling today as well and did not feel any pain. Personally I am satisfied but will follow the management’s plan.”

In response to a question, Rauf said Pakistan had plenty of spinners in the form of Khushdil Shah, Abrar Ahmed and Salman Ali Agha apart from pacers. 

“We have a whole bowling unit and we properly utilize it as such,” Rauf said. “As a bowling unit, we have a lot of belief in ourselves.”

The Pakistani pacer pointed out that the green shirts have played the semifinal and final of two ICC T20 World Cups since 2021 and had also played the final of the Asia Cup in 2022. 

“We have together as a group for quite good time and wish to be remembered as the ones who won an ICC event for the country,” he said.

Pakistan are in Group A of the Champions Trophy tournament along with India, New Zealand and Bangladesh. Australia, England, South Africa and Afghanistan comprise Group B. The top two teams will qualify for the next round of the tournament. 

DOHA:  Novak Djokovic on Monday urged tennis authorities to overhaul the sport's anti-doping system, pointing to "inconsistencies" in cases involving top stars Jannik Sinner and Iga Swiatek and those of lower-ranked players.

World No. 1 Sinner agreed to a three-month ban on Saturday, admitting "partial responsiblity" for mistakes by his team which led to him twice testing positive for traces of clostebol in March last year.

Sinner was facing a potential ban of two years after the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) against his initial exoneration by the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA), announced in August.

In a surprising move, WADA withdrew its appeal and came to an agreement with Sinner to accept a three-month ban.

In another high-profile case last year, five-time Grand Slam champion Swiatek accepted a one-month ban after testing positive for the banned heart drug trimetazidine.

"There's a majority of the players that I've talked to in the locker room, not just in the last few days, but also last few months, that are not happy with the way this whole process has been handled," said Djokovic.

"A majority of the players don't feel that it's fair. A majority of the players feel like there is favoritism happening. It seems like, it appears that you can almost affect the outcome if you are a top player, if you have access to the top lawyers."

In contrast, the recently retired Simona Halep, a former world No. 1, was handed a four-year ban by the ITIA in 2022 after testing positive for the blood-boosting drug roxadustat.

She argued it was the result of a tainted supplement and successfully appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which reduced her suspension to nine months.

"Simona Halep and (Britain's) Tara Moore and some other players that are maybe less known that have been struggling to resolve their cases for years, or have gotten the ban for years," said Djokovic.

"There is so much inconsistencies between the cases."

Djokovic, who is returning to action this week at the Qatar Open for the first time since retiring injured from last month's Australian Open semifinals, believes a change is needed.

"Right now it's a ripe time for us to really address the system, because the system and the structure obviously doesn't work (for) anti-doping, it's obvious," he said.

"I hope that in the next period of the near future that the governing bodies are going to come together, of our tours and the tennis ecosystem, and try to find a more effective way to deal with these processes.

"It's inconsistent, and it appears to be very unfair."

"If you are going to treat every case individually or independently, which is what's happening, then there's no consistency, then there is no transparency, and some cases are transparent, some are not," he continued.

"The problem is that right now there is a lack of trust generally from the tennis players, both male and female, towards WADA and ITIA, and the whole process.