Pakistan coach dies

Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer - a former England Test batsman - has died after being found unconscious in his hotel room in the West Indies.

The 58-year-old was discovered in his room at the Pegasus Hotel in Sabina Park on Sunday morning, and was immediately taken to the emergency department of a nearby hospital - but he did not recover.

A team spokesman said: "We saw him on Saturday night but having not seen him early on Sunday two of our officers went to his room and with the help of hotel staff entered. He was found unconscious there. It is too early to say whether he has suffered a heart attack. We are awaiting medical reports."

Lara satisfied with win

Here's what Brian Lara had to say following the West Indies opening World Cup win against Pakistan.

On the efforts of the team's young players:
"I think it was important they seized the moment. We said this was not a World Cup for the experienced players and we would be tapping on the shoulders of the younger players to win this World Cup."

On how well the side played:
"I think we played pretty well in the batting department. Marlon (Samuels) put us back in the game and Dwayne (Smith) at the end in his partnership with Corey (Collymore). We're happy with that."

"I was satisfied after the start we had and thought the guys played really well in the last 10 overs."

"The bowling was a very good team effort. We used just five bowlers and they all did very well."

And in regards to support from the home crowd:
"It was great to have the support we had (from the crowd) and our confidence will now be sky-high. We may have to come down a few levels over the next few days."

Result: West Indies vs. Pakistan

West Indies vs. Pakistan - World Cup (Match 1)
Sabina Park

West Indies Innings
Gayle c Akmal b Umar Gul 2 (6)
Chanderpaul c Akmal b Anjum 19 (63)
Sarwan c Khan b Anjum 49 (65)
Samuels c Malik b Hafeez 63 (70)
Lara c Akmal b Hafeez 37 (56)
Bravo c Naved-ul-Hasan b Anjum 16 (17)
Ramdin st Akmal b Kaneria 1 (4)
Smith c Inzamam-ul-Haq b Gul 32 (15)
Taylor run out (Anjum) 2 (4)
Powell not out 1 (1)
Collymore not out 8 (2)
Extras: (2lb, 6wd, 3nb) 11
Total: 241 (9 wickets; 50 overs)

FoW: 1-7 (Gayle, 2.2 ov), 2-64 (Chanderpaul, 19.2 ov), 3-77 (Sarwan, 23.5 ov), 4-168 (Lara, 41.1 ov), 5-181 (Samuels, 43.6 ov), 6-183 (Ramdin, 44.5 ov), 7-223 (Smith, 48.2 ov), 8-228 (Taylor, 49.1 ov), 9-232 (Bravo, 49.3 ov)

Bowling
Gul 9 - 1 - 38 - 2
Naved-ul-Hasan 9 - 1 - 49 - 0
Anjum 10 - 3 - 44 - 3
Kaneria 9 - 2 - 45 - 1
Hafeez 9 - 0 - 39 - 2
Malik 4 - 0 - 24 - 0

Pakistan Innings
Nazir c Ramdin b Powell 6 (3)
Hafeez c Lara b Powell 11 (28)
Khan c Ramdin b Taylor 9 (13)
Yousuf c Ramdin b Smith 37 (72)
Inzamam-ul-Haq lbw b Smith 36 (65)
Malik c Chanderpaul b Collymore 62 (54)
Akmal c Bravo b Smith 0 (1)
Naved-ul-Hasan b Bravo 11 (29)
Anjum c Lara b Bravo 11 (18)
Gul c & b Bravo 0 (1)
Kaneria not out 0 (0)
Extras: (2lb, 2wd) 4
Total: 187 (all out; 47.2 overs)

FoW: 1-6 (Imran Nazir, 0.3 ov), 2-17 (Younis Khan, 3.6 ov), 3-39 (Mohammad Hafeez, 10.3 ov), 4-99 (Mohammad Yousuf, 28.6 ov), 5-116 (Inzamam-ul-Haq, 32.4 ov), 6-116 (Kamran Akmal, 32.5 ov), 7-144 (Naved-ul-Hasan, 40.2 ov), 8-187 (Iftikhar Anjum, 46.5 ov), 9-187 (Umar Gul, 46.6 ov), 10-187 (Shoaib Malik, 47.2 ov)

Bowling
Powell 10 - 1 - 42 - 2
Taylor 10 - 1 - 38 - 1
Collymore 8.2 - 3 - 27 - 1
Devon Smith 10 - 0 - 36 - 3
Bravo 9 - 0 - 42 - 3

West Indies win by 54 runs.

More World Cup warm-up results

Here's a quick run down of the results from Friday's World Cup warm-up matches:

West Indies 85 (25.5 ov) vs. India 1/86 (18.3 ov)
India winners by 9 wickets

England 197 (48.3 ov) vs. Australia 5/200 (40.5 ov)
Australia winners by 5 wickets

South Africa 199 (48.3 ov) vs. Pakistan 3/200 (44.3 ov)
Pakistan winners by 7 wickets

New Zealand 285/8 (50 ov) vs. Sri Lanka 267 (50 ov)
New Zealand winners by 18 runs

Convincing wins for Australia and Pakistan and a very poor showing by the hosts!

World Cup Squads

Here are the squads / teams for the 2007 Cricket World Cup...

Australia:
Ricky Ponting (Captain), Adam Gilchrist, Glenn McGrath, Andrew Symonds, Matt Hayden, Michael Clark, Brad Hogg, Michael Hussey, Shane Watson, Nathan Bracken, Stuart Clark, Brad Haddin, Mitchell Johnson, Brad Hodge, Shaun Tait

Bangladesh
Habibul Bashar (Captain), Shahriar Nafees, Abdur Razzak, Aftab Ahmed, Javed Omar, Mashrafe Mortaza, Mohammad Ashraful, Mohammad Rafique, Mushfiqur Rahim (wicketkeeper), Rajin Saleh, Saqibul Hasan, Shahadat Hossain, Syed Rasel, Tamim Iqbal, Tapash Baisya

Bermuda
Irvine Romaine (Captain), Janeiro Tucker, Saleem Mukuddem, Dwayne Leverock, Dean Minors, David Hemp, Kevin Hurdle, Lionel Cann, Kwame Tucker, Clay Smith, Malachi Jones, Steven Outerbridge, Delyone Borden, Stefan Kelly, Oliver Pitcher

Canada
John Davison (Captain), Anderson Cummins, Ashish Bagai, Desmond Chumney, Sunil Dhaniram, Henry Osinde, Abdool Samad, George Codrington, Umar Bhatti, Kevin Sandher, Ashif Mulla, Qaiser Ali, Ian Billcliff, Austin Codrington, Geoff Barnett

England
Michael Vaughan (Captain), Andrew Flintoff, Paul Collingwood, Andrew Strauss, James Anderson, Kevin Pietersen, Ian Bell, Jamie Dalrymple, Liam Plunkett, Sajid Mahmood, Edmund Joyce, Jonathan Lewis, Paul Nixon, Monty Panesar, Ravinder Bopara

Kenya
Stephen Tikolo (Captain), Thomas Odoyo, Ravindu Shah, Tony Suji, Collins Obuya, Peter Ochieng, David Obuya, Jimmy Kamande, Tanmay Mishra, Maurice Ouma, Nehemiah Odhiambo, Hiren Varaiya, Lameck Onyango, Malhar Patel, Rajesh Bhudia

India
Rahul Dravid (Captain), Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Sourav Ganguly, Robin Uthappa, Yuvraj Singh, Dinesh Kaarthick, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Harbhajan Singh, Anil Kumble, Zaheer Khan, Ajit Agarkar, Munaf Patel, Irfan Pathan and S Sreesanth

Ireland
Trent Johnston (Captain), Kyle McCallan, Andre Botha, Andrew White, Niall O'Brien, Dave Langford-Smith, Kevin O'Brien, William Porterfield, Jeremy Bray, Eoin Morgan, John Mooney, Peter Gillespie, Paul Mooney, Kenneth Carroll, Boyd Rankin

New Zealand
Stephen Fleming (Captain), Daniel Vettori, Craig McMillan, Scott Styris, Brendon McCullum, Lou Vincent, Jacob Oram, Daryl Tuffey, Shane Bond, James Franklin, Peter Fulton, Ross Taylor, Jeetan Patel, Mark Gillespie, Michael Mason

Pakistan
Inzamam-ul-Haq (Captain), Shahid Afridi, Mohammad Yousuf, Younis Khan, Azhar Mahmood, Shoaib Malik, Muhammad Sami, Imran Nazir, Kamran Akmal, Naved-ul-Hasan, Mohammad Hafeez, Iftikhar Anjum, Umar Gul, Danish Kaneria, Yasir Arafat

Scotland
Craig Wright (Captain), Dougie Brown, Gavin Hamilton, John Blain, Neil McCallum, Ryan Watson, Ross Lyons, Fraser Watts, Paul Hoffmann, Colin Smith, Majid Haq, Navdeep Poonia, Dewald Nel, Douglas Lockhart, Glenn Rogers

South Africa
Graeme Smith (Captain), Shaun Pollock, Jacques Kallis, Mark Boucher, Herschelle Gibbs, Makhaya Ntini, Andrew Hall, Justin Kemp, Andre Nel, Ashwell Prince, Charl Langeveldt, Roger Telemachus, Robin Peterson, AB de Villiers, Loots Bosman

Sri Lanka
Mahela Jayawardene (Captain), Sanath Jayasuriya, Chaminda Vaas, M Muralitharan, Marvan Atapattu, Kumar Sangakkara, Russel Arnold, Tillekeratne Dilshan, Dilhara Fernando, Farveez Maharoof, Upul Tharanga, Lasith Malinga, Malinga Bandara, Nuwan Kulasekara, Chamara Silva

The Netherlands
Luuk Van Troost (Captain), Tim De Leede, Bas Zuiderent, Daan van Bunge, Jeroen Smits, Edgar Schiferli, Ryan ten Doeschate, Peter Borren, Alexei Kervezee, Darron Reekers, Billy Stelling, Adeel Raja, Mohammad Kashif, Mark Jonkman, Eric Szwarczynski

West Indies
Brian Lara (Captain), Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Chris Gayle, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Marlon Samuels, Corey Collymore, Dwayne Bravo, Ian Bradshaw, Dwayne Smith, Jerome Taylor, Denesh Ramdin, Daren Powell, Devon Smith, Lendl Simmons, Kieron Pollard

Zimbabwe
Prosper Utseya (Captain), Stuart Matsikenyeri, Brendan Taylor, Gary Brent, Elton Chigumbura, Vusimuzi Sibanda, Anthony Ireland, Edward Rainsford, Justice Chibhabha, Terrence Duffin, Tawanda Mupariwa, Chris Mpofu, Sean Williams, Keith Dabengwa, Friday Kasteni

Pakistan, Bangladesh players given more incentive to win

The Pakistan Cricket Board is offering its players a reward of up to US$1.2 million if they win the World Cup. Under the plan, each player will receive a bonus of 5 million rupees (US$84,000) if they win the tournament.

Their also offering a cash bonus of US$20,000 if they make the semi-finals.

Bangladesh has also employed a similar scheme to spur on it's players,

"To spur the Bangladesh Cricket Team on in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007, the Board announced incentive bonuses for the players,” the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) said. “Accordingly, each player will receive an additional US$2000 (on top of the usual win bonus) per match for winning a Group Stage game.

“If the team qualify for the Super Eight stage then each player will receive an additional US$3000 (on top of the usual win bonus) for winning a game.”

Akhtar and Asif likely to miss World Cup

Karachi: Pakistan bowlers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif are expected to miss the World Cup due to doping and fitness problems, a Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) official said yesterday.

The two have been named in Pakistan's squad but have yet to take the board's official dope tests and must also be cleared of their knee and elbow injuries.

"The situation for them is not good. They are struggling against time and we are not very hopeful of them playing in the World Cup," said the PCB official without wanting to be named.

The two bowlers tested positive last October for the banned substance nandrolone, but a PCB appeals panel cleared them of a doping offence and set aside their bans in December.

Pakistan media reported on Friday they had gone to London to take private dope tests to confirm the level of nandrolone remaining in their bodies.

The reports said they took the tests to confirm no traces of nandrolone remained before taking the PCB's official tests.

Director of cricket operations Saleem Altaf insisted it was mandatory for Shoaib and Asif to clear dope tests and fitness trials next week to play in the World Cup.

"I don't know why they are delaying taking the tests in Pakistan but if they don't take it they don't go to the World Cup," he said.

Source: Reuters