Ramanathan Krishnan honoured with Asian Lifetime Achievement Award

Indian tennis legend Ramanathan Krishnan was honoured with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Asian Sports Press Union.

Krishnan, who twice reached the semi-finals at Wimbledon, is considered the greatest tennis player India and Asia ever produced.

Former Pakistan cricket captain Imran Khan was given the Humanitarian Award for his efforts in setting up a cancer hospital in his country.

China’s Liu Xiang, the men’s 110m hurdler, was named the Asian Sportsman of the Year, while Malaysian squash player Nicol David, the world No.1, bagged the Asian Sportswoman of the Year award.

Nicol beat Thai weightlifter Paweena Thongsuk and South Korea’s Jin Sun-yu (winter sports) to take the inaugural award.

Other winners of the Asian Sports Awards (ASA) were South Korea’s short track speed skating team (Asian Team of the Year – men), Chinese badminton doubles pair Gao Ling-Huang Sui (Asian Team of the Year – women) and former Pakistani cricketer Imran Khan (Humanitarian Award).

Krishnan, born April 11, 1937, was world No. 3 at a point and it is the highest world ranking attained by an Asian tennis player. He won the junior Wimbledon in 1954 and then twice reached the Wimbledon semi-finals and lost to the eventual champions – to Neale Fraser in 1960 and Rod Laver in 1961. He also had the best Davis Cup record till Leander Paes overtook him.

His son Ramesh Krishnan also became a well-known tennis player, who won the Wimbledon junior title exactly 25 years later in 1979.

Nicol, 23, became world No.1 in January last year. She won titles at the British Open, World Open, Qatar Airways Challenge Open, Malaysian Open, Hong Kong Open and a gold medal at the Doha Asian Games.

The 23-year-old Liu Xiang, won the gold medal at the 2004 Athens Olympics and is the current world record holder of the 110m hurdles, at 12.88 seconds. He set the record in Switzerland in July last year. He also won the gold medal at the Doha Asian Games, the Osaka Grand Prix, the Golden League Athletics in Paris, the IAAF World Cup in Athens and the IAAF Super Grand Prix in Lausanne.

Pakistan to show more faith in youngsters after disappointing India tour

KARACHI: More than half of the Pakistan team that will take on Zimbabwe in a five-match one-day series at home next month will consist of rookie players.

‘The News’ has learnt that the decision to induct fresh legs in the Pakistan squad on an ‘experimental basis’ is a part of a planned drive by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) which wants the team to recover quickly from a disappointing tour of India.

And they believe the best way to go about it is by getting rid of some of the relatively experienced players, who have been giving a below-par performance in recent outings. According to a top PCB official, the Board chairman Nasim Ashraf has given clear instructions to the national selection committee to start looking for junior players good enough to graduate into the big league.

The official, who requested anonymity, also revealed that the PCB top brass has made up its mind to carry out a thorough post-mortem of the team’s performance in India where it lost the one-day series 2-3 and also failed to give the hosts any worthwhile fight in the three-match Test series, which it currently trails 0-1.

“The PCB chief will soon be calling an emergency meeting to discuss the reasons why Pakistan were unable to live up the expectations in India,” said the official. “The meeting will be attended by some of the Board’s top officials, the national team management and the coaches working for the National Cricket Academy (NCA),” the official added.

He said that the meeting is also aimed at finding a solution for the current shortage of reliable bench players. “Everybody saw Pakistan’s performance in India and it was hardly impressive, apart from a few success stories,” said the official.

The PCB, which was expecting Pakistan to show more improvement after a forceful showing at the inaugural World Twenty20 championship in South Africa this September, is quite concerned over the fact that their team flopped against South Africa at home, where it lost both the one-day and Test series, and then against India in the away tour.

Top Board officials are particularly unhappy with the performance of some of the experienced players and now want youngsters to be given a bigger role. They want the national selectors and the team officials to work together and find more reliable openers and are also calling for a substitute wicket-keeper as regular stumper Kamran Akmal continues to spill catches.

“We are all convinced that there is a need to bring in more youngsters in the side. And we also believe that the series against Zimbabwe will be the perfect event to give ample opportunity to newcomers,” the official explained.

PCB officials are pleased with the impressive performances from players like middle-order batsman Misbah-ul-Haq, medium pacer Sohail Tanvir and all-rounder Fawad Alam in India and are of the view that the team needs more new blood in its preparations for next year’s Champions Trophy in Pakistan and more importantly the 2011 World Cup to be held in the sub-continent.