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Aussie spin legend Shane Warne was given six penalty points Tuesday by the England and Wales Cricket Board after disputing an umpire’s decision in a county cricket game.

Warne was found guilty of two charges of ’showing serious dissent’ and ‘using language or gesture that is obscene or of a serious insulting nature’, the ECB said in a statement.

Any player getting nine or more penalty points in a two-year period faces automatic suspension from county cricket, the board said.

The Australian leg-spinner was batting for Hampshire against Kent on May 24 when he initially refused to walk after being given out leg-before-wicket for 19 runs.

The four-day match ended in a draw.

Warne, 37, retired from international cricket earlier this year with the world record of 708 test wickets. He has been dubbed cricket’s bad boy for sex scandals, a 12-month ban for a doping violation and allegations that he accepted money from an Indian gambler in exchange for pitch and weather details at matches.

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Ramnaresh Sarwan, the West Indies captain, has been ruled out of the rest of the England tour with the shoulder injury sustained last week, a spokesman has confirmed. West Indies were expecting the news, but nevertheless it’s a further blow following their drubbing by England in the second Test at Headingley, when Sarwan picked up the problem.

“Unfortunately Sarwan’s injury will take approximately six weeks to heal and as a result he will not be able to take any further part in this tour,” the manager Mike Findlay said on Tuesday afternoon from the team hotel in Leeds.

It’s not yet been decided who the replacement captain will be, although Daren Ganga will be strongly placed for the nod, after deputising admirably in Leeds. Findlay said: “As soon as a decision is reached we will make an announcement on who the player is.”

Sarwan spoke of his understandable frustration. “I am very disappointed that I would not be able to continue on tour,” he said, “but I have spoken with the players and wished them well for the remainder of the Test series and the Twenty20 games and the One Day Internationals.”

West Indies, who are trailing 1-0 in the Tests, have two further matches in abid to turn their series around. The next Test begins at Old Trafford on June 7. Two Twenty20s at the end of June, and three ODIs in July, follow.

“I have confidence that the boys will be able to rebound after the defeat at Headingley and give a better account of themselves and the team as a whole,” he added.

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The three-match one-day series between India and South Africa due to take place in Belfast at the end of June is in doubt after the broadcast deal between Zee TV and the Indian board reportedly fell through.

“We have decided to scrap the deal,” Ashish Kaul, senior vice-president of Zee Group, told Press Trust of India. Zee and the BCCI signed a five-year deal worth around US$219 million last year, the terms of which obliged India to play up to 25 “home” ODIs outside the country. The deal was believed to have been scrapped after a meeting yesterday – it is not clear at which side’s instigation – and the BCCI are now in discussions with another broadcaster. The Irish board told Cricinfo that a statement will be released soon.

Kaul said “the attitude of the BCCI” was to be blamed for the fall-out. “This is because of the double standards adopted by the BCCI. While Nimbus [who hold the telecast rights for matches played in India till 2008-09] were given a hefty rebate on the renegotiated price, they have not even bothered to discuss the issue with us. Also, apart from the Ireland and Scotland matches, they have not intimated us the whole calendar.”

Nimbus are in talks with BCCI to reduce the rights acquisition amount from US$612 million for the losses incurred by the company due to the encryption row. However, no rebate figure has been agreed upon on yet.

Lalit Modi, the BCCI vice-president, was non-committal, though. He told Cricinfo: “Nothing is finalised yet. We’re working on it. Regarding the cancellation of the Ireland series, we can’t comment at this stage.”

The series in Ireland was arranged by Warren Deutrom, the Irish Cricket Union’s CEO, and would have earned his board around US$600,000. The move had caused friction between the ICU and the ECB as the dates clashed with international matches in England.

India and South Africa were both due to play one-off ODIs against Ireland before the main series, and those matches are also in doubt. South Africa will almost certainly not travel for that game alone, but India might still be persuaded to play games in Ireland as they are due to start their tour of England with a game against Pakistan in Glasgow on July 3.

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Andrew Flintoff will be ruled out of the remainder of England’s Test series against West Indies, and possibly for the rest of the summer, after the ECB confirmed that he would be undergoing a third bout of surgery on the troublesome left ankle that has dogged his career for the past three years.

Flintoff reported soreness while bowling in the nets on the eve of the Lord’s Test earlier this month, and was subsequently ruled out of that game as well as last week’s record innings-and-283-run victory against West Indies.

After missing two more county one-day games over the Bank Holiday weekend, it had been hoped that Flintoff would be able to test his fitness in Lancashire’s four-day championship match against Sussex at Hove. But when he was ruled out on the morning of the match, the ECB announcement followed soon afterwards.

“Andrew Flintoff has undergone rigorous fitness testing over the past two days, most recently 30 minutes of net bowling on Tuesday, but has reacted to the testing with further discomfort in his left ankle,” said the ECB’s chief medical officer, Dr Nick Peirce.

“Despite intense conservative treatment and rehabilitation with England and Lancashire’s medical teams, Andrew’s ankle has continued to cause him discomfort when bowling at full capacity. As a consequence he will undergo an exploratory arthroscopy on his left ankle over the weekend.”

Peirce added that the injury was not a recurrence of the bone spur that has twice been removed in surgery – firstly in February 2005, after England’s tour of South Africa, and then again in July 2006, ahead of last winter’s hectic Ashes and World Cup campaigns.

On the one hand, Peirce believed this was good news, as he felt that the recovery period would be less than the three months out of the game that Flintoff required after his previous surgeries. But on the other, the mystery surrounding the problem merely adds to the sense of unease surrounding Flintoff’s future at the highest level of the game. “A comprehensive timescale of rehabilitation will be clearer following the operation,” added Peirce.

Flintoff himself was downcast at the news. “Obviously I’m bitterly disappointed to face another operation on my ankle as I really thought I was making progress with the injury over the past few weeks. I’ve been working really hard on my game and the rest and rehabilitation appeared to be helping the ankle, but after giving it a strong workout this week, it now seems that an operation is the only option.

“Having bounced back from ankle surgery before I know how much work is ahead of me but I’m desperate to get back playing for England and determined to overcome this setback as soon as possible.” The first Test against India, which starts at Lord’s on July 19, is the most realistic target for his next comeback.

The news will be a blow to the morale of a squad who won handsomely at Headingley, and to the new coach Peter Moores, who cannot mould his new-look England team until he knows just where such a talismanic character fits into it. “I will push the medical team to do the best they possibly can to get him fit enough,” he told reporters after the conclusion of the Headingley Test. “Everyone wants a fit Andrew Flintoff.”

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Steve Rixon, the former Australia wicketkeeper, has been sounded out as a potential coach of Pakistan. However, Rixon said the unexplained death of Bob Woolmer had left him in doubt whether he wanted the job and he has not officially applied.

Pakistan’s board was reportedly impressed by Rixon’s successful stretch as New Zealand’s coach from 1996 to 1999, and specifically his work with the captain Stephen Fleming. Rixon said whether he put in for the Pakistan position might depend on what police uncovered about Woolmer’s death in Jamaica at the World Cup.

“They [Pakistan] have made contact with me, I have spoken to them,” Rixon told Cricinfo. “I haven’t indicated whether I’m interested yet. I’m finding it extremely hard to get over the fact Bob Woolmer is no longer with us, to be honest. I’d never say never, but I’ll be interested in the results of the inquiry.”

As well as Pakistan, there are still senior coaching vacancies in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. Without naming specific nations, Rixon confirmed he had “spoken to a few different countries” but had not committed to applying for any of the roles.

Rixon, who is based in Sydney, said coaching on the subcontinent would be a very different challenge, if he chose to pursue it. “It’s something that’s not grabbing me and saying ‘you’ve got to come and do it’,” Rixon said of a potential move to Asia. “But who knows? This interest might be the spark that gets me there.”

Rixon spent two years at the helm of Surrey from 2004-05 and has also had two separate stints as the coach of New South Wales. He hoped to return to the international ranks as John Buchanan’s replacement this year, although Australia instead chose Tim Nielsen.

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Stumps Bangladesh 58 for 5 trail India 610 for 3d (Karthik 130, Dravid 129, Tendulkar 122*, Dhoni 51*) by 552 runs

A torrent of runs took India to a mammoth 610 for 3 declared before Zaheer Khan found proof of life out in a comatose surface to reduce Bangladesh to 58 for 5 at the close of a bat-dominated day two in Dhaka. Rahul Dravid, Dinesh Karthik and Sachin Tendulkar all made centuries, the first instance of Nos 1 to 4 crossing three figures, and accounted for 381 runs between them. In sharp contrast, Bangladesh’s top three were back in the hut inside three overs to round off a great day for India.

Zaheer gave India the perfect start with the ball. Javed Omar poked at the very first delivery and edged to Karthik at third slip. Two gullys and point came in and RP Singh needed just four deliveries to remove a clueless Habibul Bashar, edging a lifter to the ‘keeper. Zaheer made it 7 for 3 when he bowled a leaden-footed Shahriar Nafees for 2 and the very next delivery jagged back to strike Mohammad Ashraful flush on the pads, leaving umpire Billy Doctrove with the easiest of decisions.

Shakib Al Hasan drove the hat-trick ball to the point boundary and was then dropped by Karthik at third slip. It wasn’t his only gaffe. Five balls later, he let off Rajin Saleh at the same position. Ramesh Powar too showed his generosity, giving Shakib another life at point.

Anil Kumble got his first bowl of the series and joined the fun with his fourth ball, as Saleh prodded a topspinner to forward short leg. The first three bowlers had all taken a wicket in their first over, and where Bangladesh had taken three in close to two days, India needed a mere 16 overs to get five.

The day began as it ended for India. Dravid set the ball rolling with his 24th hundred, Karthik notched up his maiden one and Tendulkar ground out his 37th. Dravid looked the best of the lot, picking up ones and twos at will and hitting out when he felt the need. He got as far as 129 before spooning one to point, when just five adrift of the record stand for the first wicket (413), set by Pankaj Roy and Vinoo Mankad against New Zealand in 1955-56.

Karthik resumed on 82 and quickly raised three figures from the ball before lunch. On Friday, he had put in the hard yards and after he reached the landmark he played some aggressive shots, an indication that he knew the plot from there. He slammed Mortaza over mid-off for four and lofted Rafique over the on-side, but on 130, he top-edged a pull off a rank long-hop from Mortaza.

Where Dravid was fluent and Karthik almost urgent, Tendulkar, the fourth centurion, lost much of what little momentum he had in the first session. On the stroke of tea, however, he tapped one to leg and sprinted down to the other end and three figures. In the company of Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who injected some urgency with an unbeaten 51 from 50 balls, Tendulkar trooped on to 122 before Dravid called time on the innings.

No bowler could stop the one-way traffic that started the moment India were put in to bat, and the procession only continued when the Bangladeshis came out to bat

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Regardless of what happens in the future, it was refreshing to see India not panic after Wasim Jaffer’s twin failures in the first Test. They were clear that the opening combination would not be changed irrespective of what happened in that match, even if Dinesh Karthik, his opening partner, bagged a pair too.

No one knows the importance of a second – sometimes third – chance more than Jaffer. In South Africa, he had had a torrid time before his century in the third Test. By then, he had scored ten runs in two ODIs, got out shouldering arms once, and horribly pulling once in the Tests, much like the dismissals in the Chittagong Test. The two dismissals, then and now, have been followed by sublime centuries under intense pressure. And, because he was not dropped after shots that sometimes end careers, Jaffer has got those second chances and capitalised.

Jaffer stands retired-hurt at 138, a second double-century, and more, on offer. Karthik has made half-centuries in every Test he has opened and past openers must be thinking they could have done equally well had they been persisted with . It’s never too late for persistence, though, as Jaffer acknowledged. “I am delighted that the team management was behind me,” he said. “Without their backing I would not have played this game and got this result.”

What, though, does the unbeaten 175-run partnership with Karthik do to India’s opening combination in the long run? Are we on to something? Will this experiment come off? With scores of 153, 0, 0, and 175 not out, the combination seems to have taken on Jaffer’s characteristics, at least his tendency to either get out very early or go on to get big runs. Today was only the 15th time in 35 innings that he has crossed 25. But on ten of those occasions, he has crossed 50; four times he has gone over 100 and once 200.

It is difficult to argue against 175 for 0 but one can always play devil’s advocate. Just as two failures did not make them an unwanted combination, two successes do not necessarily make them the best option yet. Their styles don’t really complement each other. Jaffer is a slow starter, not only in terms of runs, but also body movement. He has shown a tendency to premeditate the leave and he is also an ordinary runner between the wickets.

Wasim Jaffer and Dinesh Karthik pinch a single. The running wasn’t all smooth today. © AFP

Karthik is nippier, more restless, and needs to keep taking singles and doubles to keep his score moving. He is an excellent runner and has quick body movement. The lack of smooth communication between the two was evident today. Many a three became two, many run-outs were barely avoided. Between overs, Karthik was usually seen bent over, spent by the running which didn’t always translate into runs; Jaffer, on the other hand, stood upright, preserving energy, knowing an easy boundary could be around the corner.

There was a period just before lunch when Karthik was struggling against Mashrafe Mortaza, especially the incoming delivery, and took a painful blow too, just under the thigh pad. But he was allowed to play 19 Mortaza deliveries straight, without scoring a run, without having a conversation to just concentrate on the single and let Jaffer face Mortaza.

But it has only been four innings together. And there is scope for the two to grow together: Jaffer asked Karthik to take first strike today, a sign of growing comfort levels. “I wasn’t in any mood to show I am a brave man,” Jaffer said. As Rahul Dravid said before the match, it didn’t matter whether one was a regular or a specialist; what mattered was runs. That they have got runs together, that they have come for Jaffer in desperate times, that they have spent time with each other out in the heat of the battle should help them forge a partnership. Two century partnerships later, Jaffer is looking forward to more with Karthik. “We are good friends and it helps when you bat together.”

Not all good openers have been naturals, not all good opening partnerships natural. Karthik is a fighter, an adaptor, as he has amply displayed before. The two, put together, have just cleared their first test – thanks to the team’s backing. England, if they stay together, will be a much tougher challenge for them.

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Kevin Pietersen reached a career-best 189 on the second morning at Headingley as England piled on the misery for the West Indian bowlers. With Matt Prior alongside him, Pietersen helped add 160 for the sixth wicket as England pressed the accelerator with one eye on the poor forecast later in the weekend. They were not, however, made to work especially hard with the bowlers feeding them a diet of short, wide and full deliveries.

On three previous occasions Pietersen has fallen for 158 – twice against Australia and once against Sri Lanka – but this time he had few problems finally breaking the barrier against an insipid attack. Encouraged by the swing they achieved with the old ball yesterday evening, West Indies opted not to take the new ball first thing. But Daren Ganga, leading the side with Ramnaresh Sarwan remaining off the field with his shoulder injury, was slow to react when there was little early movement.

Pietersen and Prior showed urgency from the start, playing tip-and-run cricket against fielders who were often caught napping. Within the first half-an-hour Denesh Ramdin was stood up to the stumps against Corey Collymore, a sad indictment of the state of the bowling. It wasn’t until the 11th over of the day, after 42 runs had already been added, that the ball was changed. Both batsmen had their eye in and Pietersen went to 150 with an edge through the sparsely populated slip cordon.

But anything Pietersen did, Prior could match. His power and placement was as impressive as it had been at Lord’s, the cover-drives equal of those produced by Pietersen, and earlier Michael Vaughan. Even with a fielder on the cover fence boundaries flowed and Prior’s fifty came off 72 deliveries. The sixth-wicket partnership grew quickly as the bowling became increasingly ragged then, out of nowhere, Daren Powell produced a beauty which pitched off and hit off.

Pietersen, who brought out his one-legged flick through midwicket, will have the chance to reach his first Test double-century after lunch, and then it’s a question of how long England want to carry on. With the clouds hovering over the ground, a need to utilise every available minute of playing time, and an opposition missing two senior batsmen, Vaughan could well decide to pull out sooner than usual and give his pace attack a chance to make amends for their wayward showing at Lord’s.

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Once upon a time, Michael Vaughan built a cricket team in his own image. It was a unit so driven, so determined, so tightly knit, it was able to topple the greatest opponents ever assembled, in a contest that few who witnessed it believe will be matched for intensity in this lifetime. But then, before he could build on his glory and propel England into a new era, he was gone, let down by a body that had no way of matching the iron will that dwelled within it. Today, 18 agonising months later, he returned in triumph with a century that he will savour like few others.

“That’s as fine a feeling as I’ve ever felt in the game,” said Vaughan at the close of play, after a performance in which he took on not only a substandard West Indian attack, but more significantly an army of detractors in the media, who had questioned his right to waltz back into the side after such a protracted break, and were hovering with pens and microphones at the ready should he fail to live up to his own expectations.

“In terms of innings I’ve played, I put that right up there just for the pressure,” said Vaughan. “It stands with the innings I played against Australia at Old Trafford [166, in 2005]. To go out there and produce it when it seemed the whole country was looking to see how Michael Vaughan was going to react this week; to play some nice shots under that amount of pressure and get the team in a good position was just really pleasing.”

Vaughan was not, of course, alone in today’s run-glut. Kevin Pietersen added his second hundred in successive innings, to take England’s centuries tally for the series to seven – as compiled by six different cricketers. But within that stat lurked the extra layer of determination that has been missing from so much of England’s cricket in the wilderness months of Vaughan’s reign. The desire to dig ever deeper and stretch yourself in spite of the opponents at your disposal. It’s precisely the trait that has just driven Australia to their third consecutive World Cup title.

All throughout the Ashes whitewash, Andrew Flintoff’s stock insistence was that he “could not ask any more of his players”. One day into his second coming as Test captain, Vaughan instantly dispelled such notions. No-one has dug deeper than Vaughan in the past 18 months, from the moment he fought back from his original knee dislocation in Lahore to play in the decisive Test of that 2005-06 tour; through the moment he was told by his surgeon he might never play again, and onwards into the new season – via a chastening World Cup campaign and a broken finger in his first first-class outing for 12 months.

That’s as fine a feeling as I’ve ever felt in the game. In terms of innings I’ve played, I put that right up there just for the pressure Michael Vaughan on his comeback performance

“I think the whole team knows what I’ve gone through,” said Vaughan. “It’s been a long road, with lonely hours in the gym with Wayne Morton and the ECB medical team. But this is hopefully the start of a long period. I feel I’m due a bit of luck with my injuries and hopefully this is the start of many games I can play on the trot. I always had to fight to get back, so perhaps it was meant to be, missing Lord’s and then scoring a hundred at my home ground.”

In doing so, in fact, Vaughan became the first Yorkshire batsman to score a century on the ground for England since Geoffrey Boycott in 1977 – a similarly memorable return from exile as he notched up his 100th first-class hundred. On that occasion, Headingley was swamped by thousands of ecstatic fans; today, their passion was matched by an extraordinarily exuberant Pietersen, who lauded Vaughan’s achievement as if it was his own. Or maybe he just wanted to muscle in on the moment.

“It was a funny celebration,” said Vaughan, who at one stage had to fear for his ribs as his team-mate gripped him in an emotional bearhug. “But Kevin breeds confidence in the team and the others waiting to bat. He has an effect on the opposition when he’s out there because he hits the ball in strange areas and he’s very forceful the way he bats. For me, it was a mixture of lots of emotions. It was a feeling I haven’t had for a long time – the crowd cheering, and obviously that’s what you play the game for.”

Unsurprisingly, after everything he has been through, Vaughan felt that he had been touched by destiny in his innings. “I felt all week I was going to get some runs,” he said. “Driving in I could envisage myself scoring a hundred. I just had this sense it was going to happen. I got to 20 and thought, there’s a hundred in me today.” There might even have been a double-hundred in him, as he himself admitted after picking out deep midwicket with a sweetly timed pull. “But if I’d been offered 103 in the morning, I would have taken it.”

Among the many fans to stood to applaud Vaughan’s achievement was one man who was singled out for a special mention – Nick London, the surgeon who reconstructed Vaughan’s knee and made the emotions of the day possible. “It’s quite ironic that he was here today,” Vaughan added. “It’s the first time he’s seen me play.”

Vaughan’s last international appearance on English soil culminated in the most triumphant day of his life – the glory of the draw at The Oval that secured the return of the Ashes. But this time, despite his protestations to the contrary, it was all about No. 1. But is he the special No. 1 – cricket’s equivalent to Jose Mourinho? Vaughan laughed, which is something he hasn’t had a lot of opportunity to do of late. “I’ll leave that for you guys to decide.”

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For one captain, Michael Vaughan, it was a day of personal glory, but for his opposite number, Ramnaresh Sarwan, the emotions could not have been much further removed. On a day in which his bowlers toiled manfully to stay in touch with a rampant England batting line-up, Sarwan was forced to leave the ground in the back of an ambulance, with his shoulder in a sling, after damaging his collarbone during a nasty fielding mishap.

The moment came in the 78th over, as Sarwan dived in vain to intercept a straight drive from Paul Collingwood. He landed heavily on his shoulder and was immediately taken from the field, with the captaincy duties passing to his deputy, Daren Ganga. A team spokesman later confirmed that no dislocation had been suffered, but that Sarwan’s right acromioclavicular joint had been damaged.

Following a scan it was announced by the West Indies team physiotherapist, Stephen Partridge, that Sarwan would not take the field for the rest of the England first innings and would not bat in the West Indies first innings. Further results from the scan would be examined to decide whether he would play any further part in the match.

“We still don’t know what the scans will reveal but we are very optimistic he will be able to join us in this game,” said Ganga. “We are going to remain optimistic until we hear what’s happening.”

Should Sarwan be unable to take any further part in the match, West Indies could face a struggle to stay afloat, seeing as they are already without the services of their most experienced batsman, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, who pulled out shortly before the toss with an inflamed tendon in his right knee. The Antiguan batsman, Sylvester Joseph, was drafted into the starting line-up in his place.

But for all their misfortune, West Indies were not down and out at the close, thanks to some spirited bowling from Corey Collymore, who grabbed two key wickets in the final session, to leave England on 366 for 5 overnight. “England are definitely in front but we are still in the game,” said Ganga. “Getting five wickets today still puts us in the reckoning in terms of getting them out for a total we can overhaul.”

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