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Victoria 0 for 2 trail South Australia 292 (Ludeman 62, Cosgrove 53, McKay 3-49) by 290 runs
Scorecard
Clint McKay picked up 3 for 49 for Victoria•Getty Images

South Australia’s debutant wicketkeeper Tim Ludeman has slotted in comfortably to first-class cricket, top scoring with 62 on the opening day against his former state Victoria. However, the Bushrangers had the better of the day and dismissed the Redbacks for 292 before their openers survived two overs prior to stumps.Victoria’s players were making a rapid adjustment from Twenty20 to four-day cricket following their Champions League semi-final appearance and their bowlers quickly made the switch. Dirk Nannes and Clint McKay took the new ball and reduced South Australia to 3 for 28 before the middle order began to recover.Mark Cosgrove posted 53 and had assistance from Aaron O’Brien (47), before Cosgrove was caught on the boundary off the bowling of Andrew McDonald. Ludeman and Daniel Christian (37) continued to rebuild with a 99-run seventh-wicket partnership that ended when Ludeman was trapped lbw by Bryce McGain.It was an impressive debut for Ludeman, who moved from Victoria during the off-season and was called into the side after South Australia’s captain and gloveman Graham Manou made a quick dash to India to join Australia’s one-day squad. Ludeman struck nine fours and one six during his 82-ball innings.McKay and Nannes finished with three wickets each for Victoria. The Bushrangers reached 0 for 2 at stumps with Nick Jewell having scored the full tally and Chris Rogers yet to get off the mark.

Match facts

Saturday, September 26, 2009
Start time 1430 (1230 GMT)No sleepless nights for Tendulkar this time•Associated Press

Big picture

For once, India and Pakistan will not be playing on an island. India-Pakistan matches are usually separate events within the main event, oblivious to the larger picture of the tournament, but this game doesn’t seem to be the usual matter of life and death. For once, this match, though the first big clash of the Champions Trophy in terms of traditional rivals coming face to face, is more about the cricket.What’s helped is the tight draw in the tournament format. Pakistan, who have been more vocal in setting up the match (Shahid Afridi, Umar Gul and Younis Khan have been quoted on how badly they want to beat India), will know only net run-rate can keep them out of semi-finals if they win this match. India, blighted by injuries to Yuvraj Singh, Virender Sehwag and Zaheer Khan, have a year and a half of good work done in ODIs to defend. A loss in their opening match will leave them needing to beat Australia and possibly run-rate calculations to go their way.The build-up for this match, though, has been different from the last time the two teams met at the same venue, in the 2003 World Cup. Sachin Tendulkar then lived the match a year in advance. Everywhere he went, he was reminded of the match. He said he couldn’t sleep properly for 12 nights leading into the game. March 1 was a day people of two countries lived for. If you had asked Tendulkar of this match six months ago, he would have – rightly – not known of any such fixture. Before March 1, 2003, the teams had not played each other for three years. In last three years now, they have played 17 ODIs, six Tests and two Twenty20s.Hype or no hype, once the match begins, Centurion – and the rest of world, wherever the match is telecast – will be engrossed. Albeit slowly, the atmosphere will build. It can’t be such a bad thing if a cricket match is a cricket match and not a war.

Form guide

(last five completed matches, most recent first)India – WLWWL
Coming off a tri-series win in slow-and-low Sri Lanka, they will need to quickly adjust to livelier pitches in South Africa. Centurion, though, has assisted spin and makes for a smooth transition.Pakistan – WWWLL
The bowling unit looks almost perfect, as it showed in the win over West Indies. Batting is the weak link, and they need bigger contributions from senior batsmen.

Team news

Gautam Gambhir and Younis are fit and ready. But for India the good news is offset immediately by the injury to Yuvraj. They should go with the same batting line-up that won in Sri Lanka, except for Gambhir replacing Yuvraj and Rahul Dravid moving down the order. They will be tempted to play two spinners at SuperSport Park, which has brought much joy to Ajantha Mendis and Roelof van der Merwe in the first two matches. The bowling has been cause of worry for India, and those last three slots will be the most discussed.India (probable) 1 Gautam Gambhir, 2 Sachin Tendulkar, 3 Rahul Dravid, 4 Suresh Raina, 5 MS Dhoni (capt/wk), 6 Virat Kohli/Dinesh Karthik, 7 Yusuf Pathan, 8 Harbhajan Singh, 9, 10 and 11 three out of Ishant Sharma, RP Singh, Ashish Nehra and Amit Mishra.Who does Younis replace? Misbah-ul-Haq seems the most likely candidate; Umar Akmal would like to think he has earned another match after his Man-of-the-Match performance against West Indies. There seems no need to tinker with the bowling combination.Pakistan (probable) 1 Imran Nazir, 2 Kamran Akmal (wk), 3 Younis Khan (capt.), 4 Shoaib Malik, 5 Mohammad Yousuf, 6 Umar Akmal, 7 Shahid Afridi, 8 Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, 9 Mohammad Aamer, 10 Umar Gul, 11 Saeed Ajmal

Watch out for…

Pakistan bowlers v Indian batsmen: As has so often been the case, this is the deciding mini contest. Pakistan have three different kinds of fast bowlers, and two different kinds of spinners, who will need a perfect show from opposition batsmen, if they are to be outdone.Gautam Gambhir and Shahid Afridi Last checked they had to be physically separated from a mid-pitch altercation, in Kanpur. Since then Afridi has become a different man, so mature he seems almost possessed. Will he able to keep his calm when he comes to bowl to Gambhir? Will Gambhir survive for that long?Sachin Tendulkar and Mohammad Aamer Tendulkar knows all about pressure, playing Pakistan, and playing Pakistan in pressure games. Will he try to bully and unsettle a 17-year-old opening the bowling against him?MS Dhoni and Younis Khan Two men seemingly above negative emotion and most likely to stay composed in tense circumstances, and rightly the captains. Are they too cool for an India-Pakistan match?

Stats and trivia

• Pakistan have beaten India only once in an ICC tournament, in the 2004 Champions Trophy. India have won in the World Cups in 1992, 1996, 1999 and 2003, and also twice in the 2007 World Twenty20.
• Umar Akmal and Mohammad Aamer have never played India in an international. Neither have Virat Kohli, Amit Mishra and Abhishek Nayar played Pakistan.
• Tendulkar, with 2381 runs to his name, is 22 short of Inzamam-ul-Haq’s record aggregate in India-Pakistan matches. In current teams, Dravid (1823) and Afridi (1404) are the other leading run-getters.
• In 14 ODIs against Pakistan, Harbhajan Singh has taken nine wickets at an average of 71.11 and a strike rate of 90.6 balls per wicket.

Quotes

“I was told four weeks rest but I want to take my chance tomorrow, playing against India. Maybe if it wasn’t India I would’ve skipped this match”

West Indies may be weakened without their big stars but their captain Floyd Reifer has said his side could spring a surprise as most of their opponents haven’t had a chance to analyse his new-look squad.The leading players of the Caribbean – including Chris Gayle, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Dwayne Bravo – are missing because of a long-running contract dispute with the West Indies board.West Indies open their campaign against Pakistan on Wednesday. “We have watched Pakistan a lot on the television,” Reifer said. “We have been able to come up with some tactics but they have never watched us play, so that’s good for us. There is a nervous energy in the camp but we are not scared of anyone.”West Indies’ chances have also improved because Pakistan’s captain Younis Khan was ruled out of the match due to a hairline fracture on the little finger of his right hand. “Losing the leader of the team, the leader of the ship, is never a good thing,” Reifer said. “He is a good captain and a good batsman so that’s a big blow for Pakistan.”The other two sides in West Indies’ group are India and Australia, two of the favourites for the tournament. “Whether it’s a tough group or not, it will be a challenge for us. Thereare no big-name players.”He urged his inexperienced side to seek inspiration from the West Indies’ performances in the two previous Champions Trophies. “This is a major tournament and we want to do well. In 2004, we were the champions. We were underdogs then as well. In 2006, we finished runner-up.”The signs haven’t been encouraging for West Indies in the lead-up to the tournament. They were thrashed by 188 runs by South Africa and lost to Sri Lanka by five wickets on Sunday.

ScorecardJonathan Trott began the day in England kit, but was soon back performing for Warwickshire•Getty Images

He may have been surplus to demand in Leeds, but Jonathan Trott’s worth to Warwickshire remains immense. Striding to the crease with his side in some trouble, Trott immediately steadied the ship and then steered it to the brink of safety.It was a performance that spoke volumes for Trott’s temperament. Despite starting the day in sight of a Test debut, he coped with his disappointment and a long journey back down the M1, and simply got on with the job.He looked in imperious form. From the moment he got off the mark, easing a boundary through cover off Alfonso Thomas, Trott timed the ball beautifully. His shots down the ground, in particular, bore the hallmark of real class and he finished the day having taken his championship batting average for the season above 100. That’s form the England selectors won’t be able to resist.Warwickshire had been in some trouble before Trott’s intervention. At 61 for three and conditions offering substantial assistance to the seamers, the follow-on target of 174 looked distant.Ian Westwood, who has now been dismissed for a single-figure score seven times in his last 12 championship innings, fell in the first over after his footlessness left him stuck in the crease. Jim Troughton, who has not passed 18 in his last nine innings, was lured into flashing at one that left him, before Neil Carter’s slashed an edge to slip.In partnership with Tony Frost’s unbeaten 71, however, Trott added 95 for the fourth-wicket in just 18 overs. Frost, who has endured a wretched season, also impressed. This was comfortably his highest score of the campaign, but was studded with the elegant cover drives that were such a feature of his batting when he topped the national averages last year. He is tempted to drift back on to the ground staff at the end of the season but, in such form, he clearly still has much to offer as a batsman.Somerset’s seamers will reflect that they squandered a good opportunity, however. Play did not start until 2.30pm due to overnight rain and the drying conditions resulted in copious swing and seam movement.Though Charl Willoughby was dangerous, his colleagues were unable to maintain a tight enough line or length and Trott and Frost’s boundary tally – they have scored 88 in fours – tells its own tale.Trott’s return was bad news for Nathan Newport, however. The 20-year-old debutant, who had spent the entire Somerset innings in the field, was the man substituted to make way for Trott. It’s just possible Newport won’t play another first-class game.Earlier in the day, James Hildreth held Somerset together. Belying his reputation as a flat track bully, Hildreth batted beautifully in making 64 of the 97 runs Somerset added. Cutting and pulling with rare power, Hildreth (88 balls, 13 fours) dealt comfortably with the moving ball and recorded his highest innings away from Taunton this season.He will need to continue that improvement, however. Before this innings, Hildreth averaged 119 on the flat tracks of Taunton this year, but only 19 away from home. International recognition is unlikely to come while that discrepancy remains.Chris Woakes and Boyd Rankin combined to good effect to deny Somerset more than three batting bonus points. Marcus Trescothick failed to add to his overnight score, beaten by one that nipped back in the day’s first over, before Zander de Bruyn was beaten by a beauty that bounced and left him. Kieswetter, Trego and Phillips all fished at out swingers from the excellent Woakes, before Thomas’ dismissal, edging another that left him, hastened Langer’s declaration.While Somerset might be prepared to gamble on the final day, Warwickshire’s safety-first method is all about the accumulation of bonus points. A draw beckons.

Kumar Sangakkara, Sri Lanka’s captain, has played down his theatrical act during the Pakistan innings saying that the umpires were the most competent judges to decide what takes place on the field.Sangakkara was involved in a heated argument with Younis Khan after the Pakistan captain was ruled not out on 70 by umpire Gamini Silva when replays showed he had nicked Dammika Prasad. For some moments Sangakkara had a long chat withYounis who initially laughed it off but when it persisted complained to the umpire, only to leave Sangakkara fuming.”I am a great believer if he had hit it he probably should go; if he didn’t go maybe he didn’t hit it. I appealed because I thought he did hit it but the umpire thought otherwise,” said Sangakarra. “I wasn’t upset the caught behind was not given that’s the way the game goes. There are some instances where people react, the batsman or the fielders make a bigger issue of it than it was.”It’s one of the reasons why I spoke to Younis but as long as the umpires are there and they are allowed to make the decision I don’t think as players we need to make a big show about whether the ball was hit or missed. In every single game you have decisions going for you and against you but at the end of the day the officials on the field are the most competent, you’ve got to trust them and allow them to do the job.”According to Sangakkara the advent of television and replays made it tougher for the umpires because “everyone becomes a critic”. “I think the umpires are doing the best job they could that’s why the ICC has an elite panel,” he said. “I am sure when the captains and managers reports go in the ICC will take into stock what has happened probably review all the decisions and come to a conclusion as to who belongs to the elite panel and who does not.”Intikhab Alam, the Pakistani coach, did not think the incident was a serious one. “The Younis and Sanga incident was taken in good sense. Nothing serious happened really,” he said. “Throughout the series both teams have got along well with each other and kept a very good spirit. We’ve always had very good relations with Sri Lankan cricketers and with Sri Lanka Cricket.”