Bangladesh keep Super 12 hopes alive Quitting FIFA mulled in Europe
Wiese leads Namibia to big win over Dutch
AL AMERAT, Oman, Oct 20, (AP): Bangladesh overcame sloppy fielding and erratic bowling to beat co-host Oman by 26 runs and keep their hopes alive of advancing in the T20 World Cup.
Scotland, which upset Bangladesh in their Group B opening game, eliminated spirited debutant Papua New Guinea by recording a 17-run victory earlier . The top two teams advance to the Super 12. Scotland face Oman on Thursday, when Bangladesh meet PNG.
Opening batsman Mohammad Naim, who replaced Soumya Sarkar, reached 64 and Shakib Al Hasan scored 42 off 29 balls before Bangladesh was bowled out for 153 off the last ball. Mustafizur Rahman bowled five wide balls in his first over and also dropped one of the two early catches before bagging 4-36 as Bangladesh got its act together in the latter half of the innings and restricted Oman to 127-9.
“We’ll take this win, but I think there are a lot of areas we need to improve,” Bangladesh captain Mahmudullah said. “Shakib and Naim batted brilliantly ... but we should have done better with the new ball, bowled a lot of wides. We need to see those areas and correct them.” Oman had a sniff until opener Jatinder Singh (40) was at the crease, but once Shakib (3-28) had him caught in the deep and off-spinner Mahedi Hasan bowled an economical spell of 1-14, the co-host capitulated.
Earlier, after losing the toss, Oman also had a below-par performance in the field with Naim twice getting dropped. Shakib and Naim both shared 80-run third wicket stand but Bangladesh lost eight wickets for 52 runs once careless Shakib got run out in the 14th over.
Fast bowlers Bilal Khan grabbed 3-18 and Fayyaz Butt, who took a spectacular diving catch off his own bowling to dismiss Mahedi for 0 early on, took 3-30.
“It was quite a chaseable target,” said Oman skipper Zeeshan Maqsood. “We needed 50-odd runs in 36 balls, it’s not a big margin … sorry to the people, we couldn’t make them happy. We have to see where we went wrong, come back and
CRICKET
crack that.” David Wiese’s unbeaten 60 off 40 balls helped Namibia beat The Netherlands by six wickets in Abu Dhabi .
Wiese struck five sixes and four boundaries as Namibia reached 166-4 with an over to spare in Group A.
The Netherlands had earlier scored 164-4 with opening batsman Max O’Dowd getting 70 off 56 balls. Scott Edwards added 21 off 11 balls.Wiese qualified to play for Namibia because his father was born in the country. It is Wiese’s second World Cup after representing South Africa five years ago in the T20 World Cup.
“It (feels) is awesome, to be honest,” Wiese said. “Means a lot to me, in a World Cup on international stage is special and to put in a big performance for Namibia, I’m glad to get this opportunity to play international cricket.” The experience of Wiese came in handy for Namibia as he dominated a 93-run partnership with captain Gerhard Erasmus, who made 32.
LONDON, Oct 20: More than a dozen European nations are considering the option of last resort in the fight to prevent biennial World Cups: quitting FIFA, according to two people with knowledge of the talks.
Plans to double the frequency of World Cups were pitched by FIFA President Gianni Infantino on a private call on Tuesday with many leaders from the 55 European member associations that are resisting the transformation of the global game.
Behind the scenes, European soccer body UEFA has already heard from more than a dozen federations contemplating informing FIFA of their intention to withdraw their membership of the global governing body, people with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss confidential talks. A threat of leaving FIFA would confirm what the Nordic federations referenced as options open to them when the six-nation group attacked the plan last week.
“If a majority in FIFA decides to adopt a proposal on (biennial) FIFA World Cups, the Nordic football associations will need to consider further actions and scenarios that are closer to our fundamental values than what the current FIFA proposal stands for,” said the joint statement from Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland and the Faeroe Islands.
Infantino, who is working with former Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger to gain support for World Cups every two years, claims the plans would help more nations qualify to play on the biggest stage. But support for sticking with a four-year cycle is coming from nations like Finland and the Faeroe Islands which have never qualified for the World Cup.
Leaving FIFA would not affect any UEFA member’s national or club teams playing in European competitions. Gibraltar gained UEFA membership in 2013 to play in continental games before being admitted into FIFA three years later.
Any country quitting FIFA could have the backing of UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin. He has already dangled the prospect of Europe boycotting a World Cup if Infantino pushes through a radical overhaul of the calendar of national-team games.
FIFA’s proposal foresees a tournament in every off-season, rather than one edition each of a World Cup and European Championship in the current four-year cycle. Rather than there being match windows in September, October, November and March for men’s international games, Wenger favors just one month-long block of games around October and November for tournament qualifiers.
That would restrict cash flow from matchday revenue to potentially just one period of the year, while creating uncertainty about whether fans would want to watch games in such quick succession and impede the qualification hopes of teams who lose key players through injury in October.
Article 18 of the FIFA statutes set out how a member association can quit the body by providing notice of six months before the end of the calendar year.
SOCCER
Nations leaving FIFA would be an unprecedented escalation of the dispute splitting the global game and it would be hard to see it fully activated if just a few nations go it alone without the backing of the confederation like UEFA.
While UEFA is only one of six continental confederations it generates more cash than FIFA, which serves as the umbrella organization overseeing football worldwide. FIFA generates about $6 billion in a four-year cycle compared to UEFA’s $14 billion fueled by the lucrative men’s version of the annual Champions League for elite European clubs.