Woolmer supports Klusener
 
Former South African coach Bob Woolmer is "deeply hurt" by the current state of South African cricket and was critical of new captain Graeme Smith at Dale Benkenstein's benefit dinner at Pietermaritzburg.

Smith publicly criticised axed all-rounder Lance Klusener for his attitude and personality, something Woolmer took him to task for.

"I can't really believe that Lance has not been selected to tour England. It was because of him that we got to the semi-finals of the 1999 World Cup in the first place."

"That man wins games for South Africa and then someone had the temerity to attack him at a breakfast."

"Graeme Smith has not been playing long enough and after five Tests has no right to criticise someone whose track record for South Africa is so good," Woolmer said.

Speaking to The Natal Witness after the dinner, Woolmer revealed he phoned Smith shortly after Shaun Pollock's axing and advised the 22-year-old not to accept the captaincy.

"I pleaded with him not to take the captaincy but to rather wait until he was 26, more experienced and more settled in the side so he could handle all the pressures."

The former England Test batsman also said he considers himself South African, but "I feel more like a masochist at the moment because the state of our sport really hurts me."

No clash of champions

Australia have announced plans to take their World Cup- winning cricket squad out of the country during October/November to avoid a clash with the rugby World Cup.

After months of negotiations, the Board of Control for Cricket in India on Monday released a schedule for an ODI featuring Australia, India and New Zealand to be played in India between October 23 and November 18.

Australia will play each team thrice before the final.

The dates have been finalised for the series though the venues remain unresolved.

Australia was keen to avoid a clash with rugby's global showpiece which runs from October 10 to November 22, featuring matches in all of Australia's mainland capitals.

Also, Australia is keen to foster relations with India which will tour Australia for four Tests later in the summer. Australia is also set to tour India for a Test series next year.

From the start of the first Test of the summer against Zimbabwe on October 9 in Perth, the Australian players will have just nine weeks off in the next 23 months which will include 33 Tests and 73 one-dayers.

Pakistan beaten by Essex

Tour match: Essex 284-6 (50 overs) bt Pakistan 234 all out (46.1 overs) by 50 runs

Former Zimbabwe captain Andy Flower hit his first century of the season to help Essex beat tourists Pakistan by 50 runs in a day-night match at Chelmsford on Monday.

Flower's unbeaten 115 guided a weakened Essex side to 284 for six. In reply, the tourists could only respond with 234 all out in 46.1 overs.

After a narrow one-wicket win over Scotland in their tour open, Pakistan did little to improve their confidence against a team containing only four capped players ahead of three one-day matches against England.

Caribbean stadiums in crisis

Chris Dehring, chief executive of the 2007 World Cup, says the two most famous grounds in the Caribbean, the Kensington Oval in Barbados and Jamaica's Sabina Park, are unfit to stage matches.

Dehring said refurbishment plans are around two years behind schedule and he believes it will cost several millions of dollars to get them ready in time.

"You are talking about two countries which have been so-called traditional venues of international cricket in the Caribbean," he told the Sunday Sun newspaper in Barbados.

"Yet, because of their status as traditional venues, very little, or certainly not enough, has been done to improve the quality of their stadiums over the last 40 years.

Dehring believes that the best venues are now in the Eastern Caribbean - St Lucia, Antigua, St Vincent and Grenada.

"They have new facilities and purpose-built cricket stadiums," he explained.

"That's one area where both Jamaica and Barbados have fallen behind."

Dehring did, however, concede that it should not be too hard to start from scratch to rebuild stadiums.

"The beauty about it is that there is really no country that is absolutely ready, so, this is a green field," he said.

He also dismissed reports suggesting the International Cricket Council (ICC) was looking at alternative venues to host cricket's biggest tournament.

"All of the television rights have been sold all around the world," he said.