West Indies spinner, Sunil Narine, believes that cricket’s T10 format could be the best choice for inclusion at the Olympic Games as it is even more exciting than the T20 version.

Cricket has not been played at the Olympic Games since 1900, where Britain and France were the only two teams that participated.  There have, however, been numerous discussions geared towards reviving the sport at the Games in recent years, with T20 cricket identified as the best format.  Narine, however, believes that T10 could also be a consideration.

“The T10 format is more exciting than the T20 format. In T20s, the batters take a few overs before starting their attacking skills, however, in T10 the batters probably look for only one or two balls,” Narine told the Daily Times.

“There’s always a possibility to attract new fans through a shorter format of cricket and more exciting cricket. It will be an exciting thing if cricket is included in the Olympics as well and hopefully, maybe T10 could be a part of the Olympics,” he added.

The 10 over-format of the sport was introduced in the United Arab Emirates in 2017, it is, however, yet to be widely adopted.

Narine will be among a number of West Indies players taking part in this season’s edition.  The spinner will represent the Deccan Gladiators, alongside West Indies T20 captain Kieron Pollard.

Nicholas Pooran believes the West Indies’ low ranking in T20 cricket is due mainly to the fact that it hasn’t been able to put its best players on the field of play often enough.

The West Indies are currently ranked 10^th in the ICC T20 rankings despite having some of the best players in the world in their talent pool. However, Pooran anticipates that the team could show its full potential at the next world cup.

“I just believe that most of the series West Indies play, they don't play with their strongest team. And by strongest I mean Chris Gayle, Pollard, Russell, Narine, Bravo in the team together,” the talented Trinidadian said in a recent interview with ESPNCricinfo.

“In the last couple of years, we haven't witnessed these players together. Either most of them weren't selected, some were unavailable ... but definitely a case around that.

“We couldn't play as a team after the last T20 World Cup. This, I am saying from a player's and a fan's point of view. Not seeing some of my favourite players represent West Indies might be one of the reasons.”

Notwithstanding the disappointment that comes with that reality, Pooran said he is looking forward to the coming T20 World Cup where he expects to be a better player holding his own amongst the best players from the region.

“Personally, I am looking forward to the T20 World Cup. As a team, our strength is T20s. For the last couple of years, we've been doing good in World Cups, but as a team where we are ranked [10th], it doesn't show how good our team actually is,” he said, indicating that believes that situation could change in the near future.

“Most of the senior guys are coming back to the West Indies team ... like Kieron Pollard, Dwayne Bravo, Andre Russell and Sunil Narine are all coming back eventually.

“As a player, I am especially excited because I want to do good for the West Indies people and put a smile on their faces. My record for West Indies in T20s isn't that good and I want to improve that for the next couple of months.”

Chris Gayle said it was nice to be able to win the battle between himself and mystery spinner Sunil Narine in the Kings XI Punjab’s emphatic victory over the Kolkata Knight Riders in Sharjah on Monday.

Man-of-the-Match Gayle, 41, scored a 29-ball 51 in a second-wicket stand of 100 from just 60 balls with Mandeep Singh, who top scored with an unbeaten 66 as KXIP ran out eight-wicket victors.

Gayle took 17 runs off Narine’s bowling ithat included two of his five sixes that were creamed over wide long off the Trinidadian in the 11^th and 13^th over, respectively. The Universe Boss just failed to remain unbeaten getting out from a slower ball from Lockie Ferguson in the 19^th over with KXIP just three runs short of their target.

Narine, meanwhile, went wicketless while conceding 27 from his four overs.

Gayle said it was great to get one up against one of the best T20 bowlers in the world.

“Sunil has got me out so many times. He is the best spinner in the world. So when you get a wicket like this, when it is not turning much, you got to cash in,” Gayle said even as he praised the match-winning knock from Mandeep, who is mourning the loss of his father.

“Mandeep is going through a lot. Last game we said we want to win it for him. So beautiful to watch him in the middle pointing out to his father watching from above. And dad, my dad, I love you. Today, the coach asked the senior players, we need to step up in crucial games, I am glad we were able to put my hand up. And the youngsters in the team are telling me, 'Don't retire.'"

Gayle’s form has been on the upswing since he made his season debut for KXIP after missing out on playing during the first half of the season, partly due to a case of food poisoning that resulted in him being briefly hospitalized.

"Been training off the field when not playing. Doing my runs. Gym. Feeling good,” said Gayle, who is also optimistic about his team finishing the season well after their fifth win on the trot.

“Have a good feeling about myself and the team. Just capitalizing on it, but still a long way to go."

Varun Chakravarthy claimed the best bowling figures seen in the 2020 Indian Premier League so far as Kolkata Knight Riders beat Delhi Capitals by 59 runs on Saturday. 

The Capitals would have returned to the top of the table with a win at Sheikh Zayed Stadium, but KKR consigned them to back-to-back defeats to give their own play-off hopes a major boost. 

Nitish Rana (81 off 53 balls) and Sunil Narine (64 from 32) put on 115 to get Eoin Morgan's side up to an imposing 194-6. 

South Africa pacemen Anrich Nortje and Kagiso Rabada - the leading wicket-taker in the tournament - took two wickets apiece, but Rana and Narine shifted the momentum after Kolkata had slipped to 42-3. 

The brilliant Pat Cummins (3-17) put the Knight Riders in control when he got rid of openers Ajinkya Rahane and Shikhar Dhawan cheaply. 

Chakravarthy then demolished the middle order with a magnificent exhibition of spin bowling, taking 5-20 from his four overs as the Capitals could only make 135-9 in their reply. 

Captain Shreyas Iyer (47) gave Delhi hope, but they lost seven wickets for 59 runs as Chakravarthy claimed the first five-wicket haul of this year's IPL. 

RANA AND NARINE TO THE RESCUE

Nortje (2-27) removed Shubman Gill in his first over and struck again in his second, giving Rahul Tripathi no chance to keep out a searing yorker. 

Rabada (2-33) got in on the act by dismissing Dinesh Karthik, but a century stand between Rana and Narine got KKR up to a challenging total. 

Narine smashed four sixes as Ravichandran Ashwin went for 45 off his three overs, while Rana struck 13 fours and a six in a 10th IPL half-century he dedicated to his late father-in-law, who passed away earlier this week.

CHAK ATTACK AFTER CUMMINS GETS KKR GOING

Cummins set the tone by getting a sharp first delivery to nip back and hit Rahane bang in front, then followed that up by removing Dhawan's off stump in his second over.

Iyer and Rishabh Pant put on 63 for the third wicket, but they were unable to score at the required rate as the Knight Riders' attack bowled with impressive discipline. 

The craft and composure of Chakravarthy then ended any hope of Delhi rising back to the summit, as he dismissed Shimron Hetmyer and Iyer in the 14th over after Pant had already holed out.

Sunil Narine has been cleared of having a suspect bowling action and has been taken off the warning list, the IPL said Sunday.

The Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB) have vowed to support Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) and West Indies spinner Sunil Narine after he was reported for a suspect bowling action in the IPL last week.

The 32-year-old mystery spinner was reported during the team’s win over Kings XI Punjab last week.  Although the player remains free to bowl, until a second report is made, he was not selected by the KKR for their clash against Royal Challengers Bangalore on Monday.

It was not the first occasion that the spinner action has been placed under the microscope.  He was suspended in 2014 after being called in successive matches during the Champions League Twenty20.  The player missed out on the World Cup the following year, while he worked on his remodeled action.

It is reported that his bowling coach Carl Crowe is with him at the tournament and will help the player work through any issues.  Dr Nigel Camacho, acting president of Narine’s parent club Queen’s Park, believes the issue can be sorted with minimal fuss.

“As his parent club, we’ll continue to support him,” said Camacho. “We have brought in the Australian (Crowe). He has a great relationship with his coach at Queen’s Park, David Furlonge. Whatever Sunil needs at Queen’s Park, we are very willing to give him support.

“If they suspect that there is something amiss with his action, we’ll support Sunil 100 percent and we’ll make sure he can perform to the best of his ability,” he added.

“He had this before and he came back almost as strong or stronger than before. Narine is just a fantastic bowler. Even if he is to make a change to his action, I am confident he will be back stronger than before.”

Former England captain Kevin Pietersen believes the Kolkata Knight Riders could well afford to do without Sunil Narine, should he be suspended, as the spinner does not have the same impact as in years gone by.

The 32-years-old West Indies bowler does indeed face the threat of suspension after being reported for a suspect action during KKR’s victory over Kings XI Punjab last week.  The spinner is allowed to continue bowling, for now, but another report to the Indian Premier League (IPL) would see Narine suspended until cleared by the BCCI Suspect Bowling Action Committee.

Narine had performed heroics for KKR after defending 14 runs off the final over, to help his team register a stunning 2 runs victory over KXIP.  Despite that, however, Pietersen insists the bowler has not quite been at the same level since his last suspension.  Narine was previously suspended in 2015 when he was ranked No. 2 on the ODI and T20 rankings.  His action was reported as suspect in successive matches during the Champions League Twenty20.  It resulted in his missing out on playing in the final for Kolkata Knight Riders, who lost to Chennai Super Kings.

“If I am honest, I am not so sure it (Sunil Narine absence) is a massive loss. Andre Russell is the guy you spend time talking about in team meetings. When he bowls, you are thinking about it. When he bats, you are thinking about it. It is the same when he is fielding,” Pietersen said on Star Sports.

“Sunil Narine has not been the same bowler for a few years now. He hasn’t had his best; he hasn’t had his real big spin. Coming to Sharjah, it is not something you are really worried about Sunil Narine. And then the bowlers have found him out in his batting. You bowl him short, he doesn’t like it,” Pietersen added.

All-rounders Sunil Narine and Andre Russell bounced back with the ball to spearhead Kolkata Knight Riders' 10-run win over Chennai Super Kings in a low-scoring Indian Premier League encounter.

Narine, who has struggled with the bat throughout this IPL, and fellow West Indian Russell were two of those who failed to deliver as Kolkata were bowled out in 20 overs for 167, a total that owed much to Rahul Tripathi's 81 as he repaid the decision to promote him to open.

Chennai were confident of chasing their modest target when Shane Watson (50) and Ambati Rayudu (30) made 69 for the second wicket.

However, some brilliant death bowling from Narine (1-31) and Russell (1-18) meant the Super Kings came up short with 157-5.

Kolkata were indebted to Tripathi's 51-ball knock, which included eight fours and three sixes, as their star-studded middle order for once failed to show up.

Narine, who had been opening, was dropped down to four but could only make 17, while Eoin Morgan (7) and Russell (2) had rare off-days as Dwayne Bravo (3-37) led the Super Kings' fine bowling display.

There was then a boundary in each of Chennai's first 10 overs and they were coasting when requiring 69 off the final 48 balls with nine wickets in hand.

Yet Narine - who bowled overs 12, 14, 16 and 19 - applied the handbrake, along with Russell, whose two-over figures would have look much better had Ravindra Jadeja not struck the final three balls of the innings for an ultimately frivolous 14.

BATTING SHAKE-UP PAYS OFF FOR KNIGHT RIDERS

Kolkata's problems in the early stages of the tournament were due to a lack of big scores, with top scorer Shubman Gill down in 13th in the IPL for runs.

However, Tripathi hit their highest individual score in their five games so far, and boy was it needed given the rest of the order's struggles.

BOUNDARY DROUGHT COSTS SUPER KINGS

At 90-1 at the halfway point, Chennai were cruising and required only 78 from 60.

However, they failed to find or clear the ropes across the next 33 deliveries and were then left needing 55 off 27. It was that barren patch in the middle of their reply that ultimately proved their undoing.

Prithvi Shaw and Shreyas Iyer led the way as Delhi Capitals moved to the top of the Indian Premier League table with an 18-run victory over Kolkata Knight Riders. 

The Capitals posted 228-4 - the highest total of this year's IPL - as Shaw (66) and Ayer (88 not out) shone at the top of the order before Rishabh Pant chipped in with a 17-ball 38. 

Kolkata would surpass 200 too as both teams reached that landmark total for a third successive game in Sharjah, Eoin Morgan (44) and Rahul Tripathi (36) smashing 47 runs from the 17th and 18th overs. 

However, the Knight Riders would come up short in making 210-8 as Anrich Nortje (3-33) helped the Capitals make it three wins from four.

Delhi had three half-century partnerships at the start of their innings and Iyer, who crashed six maximums and seven fours, and Pant did most of the damage as the Capitals accumulated 77 runs in the final five overs. 

The Knight Riders were well short at the halfway point of their reply at 94-3 and they lost Nitish Rana (58) and captain Dinesh Karthik in back-to-back balls to Harshal Patel in the 13th over. 

A rapid 44 off 18 deliveries from England's limited-overs captain Eoin Morgan raised their hopes, but he fell in the penultimate over to Nortje, who gave up just five runs across those six balls, leaving Kolkata with too much to do.

LEAN RETURNS FOR NARINE 

Kolkata have won two of their opening four games, but no one has struggled for them more than opener Sunil Narine. Bowled by Nortje for three here, meaning he has made just a combined 27 runs in four innings at the tournament. 

"We will discuss Narine's role with the coaches, but I have got full confidence in Narine," Karthik said afterwards. 

NORTJE COMES TO RABADA'S RESCUE 

Kagiso Rabada is the joint-leading wicket-taker in this edition of the IPL with eight victims, but he had a hard time against Morgan, who smashed the South African paceman for three successive sixes at the start of the 18th over, a pair of short balls and an attempted yorker getting the treatment. 

Fortunately for Rabada, compatriot Nortje removed Morgan in the next over to kill off the Knight Riders' hopes. 

A fine all-round bowling display saw Trinbago Knight Riders win the battle of the unbeaten teams and go to the top of the Hero Caribbean Premier League (CPL) table. Glenn Phillips was the only standout for the Jamaica Tallawahs as the power-hitters struggled for fluency, and Sunil Narine’s second consecutive 50 did the bulk of the work even as the Knight Riders took their time about the chase.

Sunil Narine’s whirlwind 50 and miserly 2 for 19 saw Trinbago Knight Riders kick off the Hero Caribbean Premier League (CPL) 2020 in style, easing past Guyana Amazon Warriors in the tournament opener, at Tarouba, despite Shimron Hetmyer’s unbeaten 63 off just 44 balls.

West Indies players account for the lions share of those considered the best to ever play the game as SportsMax completed its Ultimate XI T20 team ahead of the start of the Hero Caribbean Premier League on Tuesday.

A combination of a panel of experts, the SportsMax Zone, and fans who voted online called fanalysts completed voting on the SportsMax Ultimate XI team with a final discussion on three impact players.

The final six players from which the three were chosen were West Indians

Dwayne Bravo, Kieron Pollard, and Andre Russell, Australian Shane Watson, Pakistani Shahid Afridi, and Indian Yuvraj Singh.

The panel, made up of cricket commentator and broadcast journalist, Fazeer Mohammed, cricket umpire Chris Taylor, and statistician, Zaheer Clarke, picked an all-West Indian cast as their impact players, in complete agreement with the SportsMax Zone and Fanalysts.

There was one dissenting voice among the panellists with Fazeer deciding on Shane Watson over Kieron Pollard, however, Clarke and Taylor’s votes were enough to overrule him.

With all parties, the Zone, the panel, and fanalysts in agreement, the final list of the greatest T20 team of all time is complete.

The openers are Chris Gayle and David warner, the middle-order, batsmen 3-5 are Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the bowlers are Sunil Narine, Rashid Khan and Lasith Malinga, while the impact players are Dwayne Bravo, Kieron Powell and Andre Russell.

The Ultimate XI T20 team is made up of five West Indians in Gayle, Narine, Bravo, Pollard, and Russell, while Kohli and Dhoni make up the Indian contingent. Then there is the South African representation in de Villiers, one Australian in Warner, a Sri Lankan in Malinga, and the Afghan Rashid.

Cricket West Indies Director of Cricket Jimmy Adams has insisted on the development of a world-class Test cricket spinner would be a multi-tiered and complicated process.

While the Windies have produced top-quality spinners in the shortest format of the game, with the likes of Devendra Bishoo and Sunil Narine.  The fact that neither has really made the transition to the red-ball format, means it is another area that continues to be lacking for the team.

 In fact, it could be argued that the last West Indies world-class spinner to dominate Test cricket was Lance Gibbs who represented the team in the 60s and 70s.  Gibbs claimed 309 Test wickets.  Creating another player of Gibbs caliber, for Test cricket, is not a simple process.

“It’s a combination of quite a few things.  The first thing is to keep making sure that we encourage spin bowling throughout the region, but also to ensure that the environment in which they are developing their skill is one that can develop world-class slow bowling,” Adams told the Mason and Guest radio program.

In the West Indies regional tournaments, it is spinners that have dominated the bowling in recent years.  For at least the last five years a spinner has taken the most wickets in the WICB Regional 4-day tournament. The honour has been achieved by Rahkeem Cornwall, with Veerasammy Permaul and Nikita Miller achieving it twice.

“Good cricket wickets play a big role in player development, not just spinners but obviously it does for spinners as well.  The Indian spinners in the 90s proved that if you didn’t have wickets that got outside your region, you would struggle whenever you went outside the region,” he added.

“Also, though, we have to improve the quality of batting against spin bowling because spin bowlers also develop their craft by bowling to good batsmen.  You don’t want a spinner to see high-quality batting for the first time when they leave the region.”

Fans and the SportsMax Zone were not in agreement with a panel of experts, who made a decision on its picks for SportsMax’s Ultimate XI T20 bowlers today.

The panel on the set of the Zone, made up of former West Indies fast bowler and cricket commentator Ian Bishop, cricket umpire Chris Taylor, and statistician Zaheer Clarke, along with Tom Moody and Vernon Singer (offset), have picked Sunil Narine, Rashid Khan and Lasith Malinga as their three bowlers.

The Afghan Rashid, the Sri Lankan Malinga and the West Indian Narine, were picked from a group of six that included India’s Jasprit Bumrah, South Africa’s Dale Steyn, and Australia’s Mitchell Starc.

Jasprit’s exclusion is where the bone of contention lies.

According to the SportsMax Zone, while Malinga and Narine are shoo-ins, Rashid was not.

In Rashid’s stead, the Zone has picked Jasprit.

In coming up with SportsMax’s Ultimate XI T20, there is a three-way split in the decision-making process with the panel’s picks accounting for 40% of votes, while the Zone has 25, and fans who vote online have a 35% stake in who makes the team.

Fans, so far, have agreed with the SprotsMax Zone’s take on the three best bowlers the T20 game has ever seen, also picking Jasprit to go alongside Narine and Malinga.

There is still an opportunity for the fans to change their minds, but at the moment, they are joining the zone in beating back the opinions of the expert panel.

So far, the panel has picked Chris Gayle and David Warner as its openers, Virat Kohli, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, and AB de Villiers as its middle order to go along with Rashid, Narine and Malinga as its bowlers.

Tomorrow the panel will go about whittling down what are termed impact players in a bid to come up with its version of an Ultimate XI.

The Zone has differed in small ways to date, picking Rohit Sharma to go along with Gayle as well as picking Jasprit over Rashid.

Fans have stuck even closer to the panel to date. As far as openers and the middle order are concerned they are in complete agreement but have veered away with the bowling choices, choosing the same way as the Zone.

But the voting isn’t finished and fans, called fanalysts, can vote by clicking here or going to SportsMax.tv and just clicking on the Ultimate XI tab at the top of the screen.

SportsMax.tv has also built a list of profiles where Fanalysts can go to have a look at the careers of the players who have made the SportsMax Ultimate XI shortlist just in case you want to learn a little more about them before making your choice. To take a look at those players click here.