Fifa Ballon d’Or: Ronaldo set to top Lionel Messi as world’s best player

January 13, 2014
Ronaldo_WinMadrid, Jan 13: Cristiano Ronaldo is heavily favoured to end Lionel Messi’s four-year reign as the world’s best player at the Fifa Ballon d’Or gala on Monday.
Ronaldo’s prolific tally of 69 goals for Real Madrid and Portugal seems likely to earn his second Fifa award after finishing runner-up three times in Messi’s dominating era.
Franck Ribery is the third candidate, but the Bayern Munich and France winger needs to score a major upset to add the Fifa accolade to Uefa’s Best Player in Europe award, which he collected in August.
A Ronaldo victory is expected because of Fifa’s announcement after the World Cup playoffs in November to extend the voting deadline by two weeks.
That brought his inspiring performance and hat-trick for Portugal in Stockholm, completing a 4-2 aggregate win to eliminate Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Sweden, into the calculations.
“I did my job as I have been doing all season,” Ronaldo said following the match. “Every year I show what I’m about. I’ve scored 40 or 50 goals a season and that’s not enough for everyone.”
Messi, who got 45 goals for Barcelona and Argentina, was unable to further his case after already being ruled out of action for by a third injury in 2013.
Fifa also allowed the voting college — national team captains and coaches, plus one journalist, from each of world football’s 209 member countries — to change preferences and submit new ballot papers. Voters were invited to select their top three choices from a 23-man shortlist provided by Fifa and France Football magazine.

The adjustment prompted speculation Fifa was seeking to counter speculation in Spain and Portugal that the governing body and its president Sepp Blatter was biased toward Messi and Barcelona.
That long-held conspiracy theory was further fuelled in October when Blatter was filmed telling a student audience in Oxford, England, that he did indeed prefer Messi’s more modest personality and that Ronaldo was too concerned about his hairstyle.
Blatter’s subsequent mimicry of Ronaldo having a “commander on the field” stature only seemed to stoke the player’s anger and raise the level of his game even higher in the following weeks.
Last week, Ronaldo confirmed he would attend the ceremony in Zurich, ending speculation he would snub Fifa and Blatter in retaliation.
Ronaldo’s all-round excellence, variety and quality of goals have made him a worthy front-runner to add to his 2008 award, which was a reward for helping Manchester United win the Champions League.
His former boss at Old Trafford, Alex Ferguson, is also nominated for the coaching award after going into retirement with another Premier League title.
Jupp Heynckes, who also retired last May, is favoured to win after leading Bayern to a treble of Champions League, Bundesliga and German cup titles. Jurgen Klopp, whose Borussia Dortmund side was beaten by Bayern in the Champions League final, completes the shortlist.
The finalists for the women’s world player award are last year’s winner Abby Wambach of the United States, five-time winner Marta of Brazil and Germany goalkeeper Nadine Angerer, the current European player of the year.
Two more Germans who won European titles are competing to be named best coach in women’s football: Silvia Neid is the national team coach and Ralf Kellermann guided Wolfsburg to the Champions League title. Sweden coach Pia Sundhage, who won last year for her Olympic success with the United States, is the third candidate.
Ibrahimovic could get some compensation with the Puskas Award for most beautiful goal in the 12-month qualifying period, for his long-range bicycle kick for Sweden against England in a friendly in November 2012.
Neymar’s goal for Brazil against Japan in the Confederations Cup and Nemanja Matic’s strike for Benfica vs Porto in the Portuguese league complete the shortlist. Fans can vote online until Monday evening.
A World XI team has been selected by players in a poll organized by the FIFPro group of unions worldwide.
Fifa will also make a presidential award decided by Blatter and a prize rewarding fair play.

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News Network
June 24,2020

New Delhi, Jun 24: Star Bangladesh all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan deeply regrets his "silly mistake" of not reporting a corrupt approach by an Indian bookie to the ICC, leading to his one year suspension from the game.

Shakib was banned for two years, one year of it suspended, for failing to report corrupt approaches during an IPL edition by an alleged Indian bookie named Deepak Aggarwal.

"I took the approaches too casually When I met the anti-corruption guy and told them and they knew everything. Gave them all the evidence and they knew everything that happened," Shakib told Harsha Bhogle on 'Cricbuzz in Conversation'.

"To be honest, that's the only reason I was banned for a year, otherwise I'd have been banned for five or 10 years," he added on the ICC's investigation.

The 33-year-old, who was in brilliant form before the ban, amassing 606 runs in the 2019 World Cup in the UK, said he regrets how he went about the situation.

"But I think that was a silly mistake I made. Because with my experience and the amount of international matches I've played and the amount of ICC's anti-corruption code of conduct classes I took, I shouldn't have made that decision, to be honest."

Lesson learnt, Shakib's advice to all young criceters is to never take any such message lightly.

"I regret that. No one should take such messages or calls (from bookies) lightly or leave it away. We must inform the ICC ACSU guy to be on the safe side and that's the lesson I learnt, and I think I learnt a big lesson," he added.

The all-rounder, whose ban ends on October 29, said he became a bit arrogant and never felt he was doing anything wrong by not reporting the bookie's approach immediately.

"Because you do most things right in your life, you tend to get arrogant with some decisions. You may not realise but you're doing wrong by the books. It never came to my mind that I am doing something wrong

"It was just a feeling of 'okay, what's going to happen, leave it' and I continued with my life. But that's the mistake I made. And that happens," Shakib said.

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Agencies
July 30,2020

New Delhi Jul 30: After Pakistan cricketer Umar Akmal's ban was reduced to 18 months, Danish Kaneria criticised Pakistan Cricket Board's (PCB) policies and said that the 'zero tolerance policy' applies only to him.

"Zero Tolerance policy only apply on Danish Kaneria not on others, can anybody answer the reason why I get life ban not others, Are policy applies only on cast, colour, and powerful background. I am Hindu and proud of it that's my background and my dharma," Kaneria tweeted.

Earlier on Wednesday, Akmal's three-year suspension was reduced to 18 months by an independent adjudicator, former Pakistan Supreme Court judge, Faqir Mohammad Khokhar.

On April 27, the Chairman of the Disciplinary Panel, Justice (retd) Fazal-e-Miran Chauhan, had banned the wicketkeeper-batsman for three years after finding him guilty of breaching the PCB's Anti-Corruption Code in two separate incidents.

Akmal, on May 19, filed an appeal against the three-year ban imposed on him, seeking a reduction in the duration of the sanction. He will remain suspended effectively from February 2020 till August 2021.

The batsman said he might appeal again to get the ban "reduced further".

"I am thankful to the judge for listening to my lawyers properly. I will decide about the remaining sentence and try to get it reduced further. For now I am not satisfied and will consult my lawyers and family how to take this ahead," ESPNcricinfo had quoted Akmal as saying.

"There are many players before me who made mistakes and just look at what they got and what I got. So all I say right now is thank you very much," he had added.

On the other hand, Kaneria was found guilty of spot-fixing while playing for English club Essex and was banned from the sport.

Earlier this month, Pakistan's cricket governing body 'advised' Kaneria to approach England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) if he wants to play domestic cricket after the cricketer had appealed to the PCB, seeking permission to play domestic cricket. 

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News Network
February 17,2020

Hamilton, Feb 17: Mayank Agarwal found form on his birthday and Rishabh Pant mixed caution with his customary aggression as India’s warm-up fixture against New Zealand XI ended in a draw here on Sunday.

The match was called off an hour after lunch with India reaching 252 for four just 48 overs into their second innings.

Agarwal, who had gone through a wretched period since the second Test against Bangladesh, retired on 81 off 99 balls with 10 fours and three sixes to his name.

To the relief of the Indian team management, Pant played in his customary manner to reach 70 off 65 balls, but also showed discretion when the opposition bowlers were in the midst of a good spell. There were four sixes -- two each off leg-spinner Ish Sodhi and off-spinner Henry Cooper.

While Sodhi was hit down the ground, Cooper was dispatched over extra cover on a couple of occasions. He didn’t curb his aggression, though, there were times when he was ready defend the spinners and also leave some of the deliveries.

Even though Pant is considered a better batsman than Wriddhiman Saha, the innings might have come too late in the day considering that the latter is a better keeper and possibly a more responsible batsman in pressure situations.

The biggest positive to have emerged from the New Zealand second innings is Agarwal’s poor run coming to an end. The Seddon Park track easing out was definitely a factor but Agarwal’s footwork was more assured as he played some glorious on-drives and pull-shots off fast bowlers.

Before this game, Agarwal had played 10 competitive games including first-class, ODIs and List A matches and couldn’t cross the 40-run mark in 11 completed innings. He even bagged a pair against New Zealand A in an unofficial Test match.

Once he had got his form back, he didn’t come out to bat after lunch giving Saha an opportunity to score an unbeaten 30, his runs coming mostly against non-regular bowlers.

The Agarwal-Pant pair added 100 runs in 14.3 overs and it also helped that part-timers like Cooper was introduced into the action.

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