Not sure about Singapore though. I have friends and relatives in Singapore and they say that it is not yet 100% legal to deal in cryptocurrency there. The police department is frequently coming up with statements claiming that cryptocurrency is being used by criminals to hide their tracks. Among the politicians, there are people on both the sides of the debate. Only El Salvador has yet made cryptocurrency as the legal tender. I have heard some rumors about Malta, but that is it. No concrete action from their side.

^^^^ LOL.. right now I am 99% assured that the Ashes will end up in a 5-0 whitewash for Australia. England can't just rely on Joe Root and James Anderson all the time. The remaining 9 players in the XI need to contribute. And for India, they are going to sweep the series against South Africa and their next series is going to be against Sri Lanka (which is going to be another cakewalk for them). Still, New Zealand is looking precarious out there. Hopefully they will be in a better position as soon as the series against Bangladesh is over.

From where did you got this list? I am surprised with the inclusion of Vietnam, because until very recently, Bitcoin was explicitly banned there and there were reports of users getting arrested. I have heard about countries like Paraguay, Panama, Malta and Cyprus. But the inclusion of Kenya, South Africa.etc surprises me. Anyway, El Salvador was the first and that country (along with the president Nayib Bukele) will be having a special place with each of us. And the people of El Salvador have benefitted greatly from the Bitcoin adoption.

We have similar laws in our country (India) as well. Even if the income is sourced from an illegal business, the tax law states that it needs to be reported in the returns and due tax needs to be paid. A few years ago, when the legal status of Bitcoin was in limbo, several of the Bitcoin traders received notices from the income tax department. It explicitly stated that Bitcoin trading is not 100% legal, but the traders still need to pay taxes on any profits they receive from these transactions. Fortunately in India, the IT department is not as stringent as the one in the States.

The idea of 24-team T20 world cup is good. But it will be of no use, if the 12 associate nations end up importing mercenary players from India and Pakistan (similar to what Oman did this time). Associate cricket is turning out to be a joke. More than half of the ICC member nations have teams comprised 100% from foreigners. Teams like UAE, Oman, Hong Kong, European nations.etc doesn't even have a single citizen representing them. And cricket is dying in countries which used to rely on native players. I can give dozens of examples - Kenya, Netherlands, Nepal, Iran, Argentina, Israel.etc.

There can be no better example than Kenya. This is a team that managed to reach the semi-finals of the 2003 ODI World Cup. But they received no support from the ICC and cricket died out completely in less than a decade.

No surprise there. Among the Asian nations, only Pakistan is able to offer some sort of challenge to India. Other teams like Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Afghanistan are going down the drain. And as far as I know, Sri Lanka doesn't even have a proper domestic setup for the U-19 players. They are mostly dependent on the schools and colleges to mentor their age group players. Given this, it is a big achievement that they have reached the finals of the U-19 Asia Cup. But at the same time, I don't think that they have any serious chance of a win against India. 

Yeah.. that's why I have a feeling that the pitch at Johannesburg will be even more supportive towards pace bowling. BTW, you don't get pitches at are very helpful for pace bowlers anymore. Two decades ago we used to have grounds like WACA (Perth, Australia) and Kingsmead (Durban, South Africa) that used to be heaven for pace bowlers. But these sort of pitches were opposed by the TV broadcasters. If the match gets completed in two or three days, then the TV channels face huge losses. So even grounds like WACA are now having more neutral pitches.

Kohli's aggression has got converted to bullying. Nowadays he doesn't seems to be using his brain a lot. Tactics are quite poor and on a lot of occasions India has been at the receiving end due to this. As a batsman also, his form has nosedived. It may hurt his ego, but I would say that the best thing for him to do would be to take a short break from international cricket. If he doesn't want to play domestic cricket, then fine. He can spend quality time with his family and make up for the past.

LOL.. this will be the last thing they need right now. If they prepare batting friendly wickets, then you can expect the Indians to build totals of 500 plus or 600 plus and on the other side the South Africans don't have quality batsmen who can get them to such high totals. The current strategy, IMO works better for them. Look at the margin of defeat. It may be in the range of 100-130 runs. If they prepare batting friendly tracks, then in all probability they are going to suffer from innings defeat.

If he is out of form, then the best possible course of action for him and for the team would be to take a break from test cricket and concentrate on domestic cricket for a few months. I have never heard about this excuse, like saying that a player is depressed and therefore he should be allowed to play in the national team. There are a lot of talented youngsters sitting at the bench, only because the oldies like Kohli would select players only based on their loyalty and not based on their skills and merit.

Hundreds of thousands of legal immigrants and close to a million illegals. This is what the United States took in last year. And you are complaining that the immigration levels are low? Low tax rates are needed to boost the birth rate. The current Democrat logic of replacing the native population with illegals from south of the border is not going to be viable in the long run. Japan is an example of a country which has sustained itself with near zero immigration. Results are there for everyone to see. Low crime rate, surging economy and low taxes.

Same here. Logged in to Sony LIV at around 7:15am Indian time and came to know that the match has been finished already. Big loss for the broadcasters, because the match lasted for just two days and one session. BTW, I need to congratulate the Australian selectors for their bold choice in getting Scott Boland in the playing XI for the third test. He has an excellent record at the MCG, and he singlehandedly destroyed the England batting lineup in the third test. And still, he may be dropped from the playing XI for the fourth test.

Unbelievable scenes unfolding at the MCG. England blown away by Scott Boland and Mitchell Starc for 68, as they slip to an innings defeat. Australia is up by 3-0 in Ashes, and with every passing day a 5-0 whitewash looks likely. Had anyone even considered this possibility before the start of the series? I have followed most of the posts in this thread, and a lot of users actually predicted 5-0 in England's favor. And today morning they got bowled out for a two digit total, and that too without key bowlers in the Australian playing XI (Hazlewood, Richardson.etc).

The Biden administration may end up importing more third world migrants from Latin America and Africa, and now they have got the perfect excuse. Excess mortality from COVID has played a major role, and another important factor was played by worsening economy. A lot of families have delayed their plans for child bearing due to difficult economic conditions, and the situation is not going to improve in the next few years. Anyway, the situation in US is far better when being compared to other countries. For example in Russia, the population is sinking by around one million per year.

LOL... you guys got it completely wrong about Rahul Dravid. He didn't represented the Scottish national side in any of the international matches. Back then, Scotland was given an opportunity to play in the county championship by the ECB, for a period of 3 years. They requested international players for help, as they couldn't afford the mandatory overseas player requirement for county championship. Dravid, being a big supporter of small teams like Scotland immediately agreed to play for them and the Scottish guys were surprised as well as overjoyed at the same time. As far as I know, Dravid refused to accept any payment in return, and was the "player-plus-coach" for the Scottish team for many months.

Whatever you have posted is factually correct and no one is going to argue against those points. All I am asking is that the ICC should follow the same approach being taken by the other sports federations such as FIH, FIFA and FIBA. None of the other federations distribute money as per the population of a particular country (even if that is the case, then China should be receiving more funds from the ICC, since they are also an associate member). Anyway, for me the best solution would be something that is mutually beneficial - the pig-3 agree for more ICC tournaments. If so, the ICC revenues would increase and they can continue with the higher share for BCCI.

One thing I know about Ganguly is that he is very aggressive, at the same time he never crosses the line. This is not true with Kohli. Rather than showing aggression, he always try to bully his opponents. Sometimes it work out, and sometimes it doesn't. Also, blaming everything on Ganguly is not going to make things easy for Kohli. For the last several weeks I am witnessing uncouth social media posts from supporters of Kohli. He should stay away from such behavior, or his career will get negatively impacted.

After IPL came into picture, the age-group cricket in India also changed. Now many of the U-19 cricketers believe that they are at a level equal to that of god. Hopefully with this defeat, they will come back to their senses and introspect about what went wrong. The same malice that is affecting the national squad seems to have crept in to the age group squads as well. There are reports of players not following the quarantine rules and disobeying the match officials. Not a good sign for cricket in India.

Time has come to drop him perhaps? Kohli has been the backbone of Indian batting since time immemorial. But recently, his form has been less than satisfactory. Combined with his involvement in the team politics, I would say that his overall contribution has been negative. I personally believe that he should be rested for the next series and asked to play a few of the domestic matches, so that he could regain his form. Shreyas Iyer or Venkatesh Iyer can be included in his place for the next series.

BTW, anyone watching the third test from Ashes? Things have got interesting, with England fighting back and picking up 4 of the Australian wickets (including those of Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne). 

Until 2010 or so, foreigners were not allowed to represent national teams. That situation changed only 10-12 years ago, when the Emirates Cricket Board pressured the ICC to change the rules, with open support from the pig-3. And the gulf model has been adopted by the other countries as well. Out of the 105 ICC members, more than half (especially those in the gulf and the Europe) doesn't have a single citizen playing for them. And because of these nations, those teams playing with native players are losing out. 

An example is here, from the Czech Republic: