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VAUGHAN HAILS SMITH

Michael Vaughan has hailed Steven Smith for scoring a brilliant hundred in Australia’s first innings in the 5th Ashes test match which is being played at Kennington Oval.

Smith played a superb knock of 138 runs and helped Australia get close to a score of 500 in the first innings.

This was Smith’s first test hundred. He had been a bit inconsistent in the series before this test match. He only had a couple of decent scores and this was supposed to be his last chance. Another failure here would have made it hard for him to find a place in the Australian squad for the return Ashes series back home.

But, the 24 years old right hander showed great temperament and became the 4th Australian batsman to score a hundred in this series.

When Vaughan was asked about Smith’s inning, he said, “He played beautifully. He is a gutsy player and has got a good cricketing brain. He seems to have a bright future.”

“This inning will give him plenty of confidence. It will make him believe that he can play big knocks against quality bowling line ups.”

When asked if he thinks Michael Clarke declared at the right time, Vaughan said, “Yes, I think so. It’s a flat deck and the bowlers need time to get 20 wickets. Tomorrow is an important day.”

“Australia will have to get England 5 down for 150 or so. Nathan Lyon will be doing the bulk of the work for them as it’s a very slow pitch.”

“There is not much help for the bowlers in this wicket, but, England will have to deal with the scoreboard pressure. So, you never know.”

At the end of the second day’s play, the score of England was 32 without loss in reply to Australia’s 492.

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UNDER PRESSURE

The captain of Rajasthan Royals, Rahul Dravid, has said that his side will not be under pressure in qualifier 2 of the ongoing IPL because people don’t have massive expectations with them.

Rajasthan Royals made their way into qualifier 2 yesterday night by defeating Sunrisers Hyderabad in the eliminator played at Feroz Shah Kotla, Delhi. The Royals won the match by 4 wickets courtesy a fine knock from Brad Hodge.

On a low, slow wicket, Hodge made batting look very easy and played some great shots to score his first half century of the season. He scored 54 off just 29 balls with 2 fours and 5 sixes.

Now, in qualifier 2, Rajasthan will take on Mumbai Indians on Friday at Eden Gardens, Kolkata.

Talking to the reporters in the post match press conference, Dravid said, “It has been a very hard week for us. We have gone through a lot. But, we kept our spirits high for this game and managed to win it.”

“It’s always good to have experienced players like Brad Hodge in the side. He has been around for many, many years and he has seen it all. He knows how to play in pressure situations.”

When asked about the next match against Mumbai Indians, Dravid said, “Mumbai is one of the strongest sides in the competition and they are the favourites to win that match. They are a team full of superstars. So, the pressure is on those guys. We will just go out there, enjoy ourselves and try to play some good cricket.”

The Sunrisers’ skipper Cameron White was looking absolutely gutted in the press conference. He said, “It was a great game of cricket. Perhaps, we were 15-20 runs short, but, the boys showed great character and fought till the end. Brad Hodge showed today why he is one of the best T20 players in the world.”

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