West Indies blasted out for 181 by Scotland.

Too early to reach any conclusions, because yesterday we saw Netherlands failing to chase a target of 213. So I would be rather cautious about Scotland's chances. West Indies made some sort of a recovery BTW. They were struggling at 81/6 when Nicholas Pooran got out. But then the partnership between Jason Holder and Romario Shepherd added 77 runs. But in the end, Scotland wrapped up the proceedings by taking the last 4 wickets for 23 runs.

Crazy shit going on in the super over!!!

Logan van Beek goes mental. Hits 30 runs in 6 runs against Jason Holder!!!!

West Indies need 31 runs from 6 balls now, to win the match now. I am not sure who will be bowling from Netherlands, but it is going to be a very tough job. The pitch looks dead and offers no support for the bowlers.

Latest stats from 21st June 2023. We are very close to 50% Bitcoin market dominance.

Total market cap: $1,151,631,834,178 (-0.91%)

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What a match! Scotland looked to be down when Chris Greaves got out (they were 152/7). But then the amazing partnership between Michael Leask and Mark Watt added 82 runs for the 8th wicket. And then Leask and Safyaan Sharif added another 50 runs for the 9th wicket. The no.11 batsman Chris Sole did his best by managing to give strike to Leask for the final ball. One of the most exciting ODI matches I have ever seen and in the end Scotland managed to scrape through with a last ball boundary. Ireland's chances are almost zero now, to qualify for the Super-6.

Pakistan doesn't contribute much to the ICC revenues, yet they are given a much higher share when compared to the other boards such as SLCB and CNZ (around $27-28 million each per year). If population is the criteria, then Bangladesh is also having a similar population and they are only being allotted $26 million per year. I would say that the PCB received a good deal for revenue distribution for the 2024-27 cycle. If they want to pull out of the world cup and lose that money, then it is their decision. ICC can re-distribute that amount to the associate nations.

If the ICC act the way they should, then there would be no requirement for any help from anyone else to popularize cricket in countries such as the Netherlands. I agree that Netherlands is a rich country. But cricket is not eligible for fund allocation from the Dutch government. There are two reasons - first of all, cricket is not an Olympic sport. And secondly "national" cricket teams in many instances are comprised entirely of foreigners. None of the governments would allocate funds to a sport that is exclusively played by foreigners.

Cricket in Netherlands is increasingly becoming a sport dominated by expats. Back in 1990s, club players were 70-80% native. Now almost 80% of the club players are non-citizens. The Royal Dutch Cricket Association (KNCB) has a policy of including only citizens in their national team. That is the reason why players like Roelof van der Merwe and Timm van der Gugten were first asked to get a Dutch passport before representing the national team. Some other teams like Namibia also follow the same approach. But that doesn't take away the fact that grass-roots cricket in Netherlands is being entirely dominated by expats now.

If cricket was an Olympic sport, then boards such as KNCB would be receiving significant amounts of funds from the national government. But the ICC has no interest in doing so. All they are doing is a hogwash. The ICC sent a proposal to IOC, for a 6-team event. They also demanded that there should be no qualifier tournament, and teams should be selected as per the ICC rankings. And this happened then:

https://www.sportskeeda.com/cricket/news-ioc-reject-icc-s-bid-included-2028-los-angeles-olympics-fresh-pitch-set-made-cricket-s-inclusion-2032-edition

Hi guys.. it have been a while since I updated this thread!

Latest stats from 30th May 2023.

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So apart from Iceland and Faroe Islands, all the countries are represented. BTW, it is good to see Denmark having 4 native players in their squad. Two decades back, Denmark was one of the strongest associate nations, and they had a 100% native squad. I checked the squads of the other three teams, and they are entirely made of foreigners. In the first match, Denmark won by 9 wickets with native player Nicolaj Laegsgaard top scoring with 63 from 36 balls (he also picked up one wicket).

From what I can see, the allocation to associate nations have gone down, and now it is the lowest ever in terms of percentage. During 2007-14 cycle, the associate nations used to receive 35% of all the funds. Now they receive just 11%. And the number of associate nations have gone up, mainly due to fake teams made of foreigners. And this ensures that deserving teams receive hardly any funds from the ICC.

^^^ From what I can see, almost every one got more than what they are receiving right now and should be happy. And for the Associate nations, the lion's share will be pocketed by teams such as UAE and USA who doesn't have a single native in thier squad, which will make sure that cricket in countries such as Kenya and Nepal will die down over the next few years. The following is the criteria used by the ICC to distribute revenue:


For all the test nations (including Ireland and Afghanistan), this is something that they would welcome. For the Associates, there is not going to be much excitement. Overall amount allocated is higher, but most of it will end up in undeserving destinations.

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Tens of thousands of Nepal cricket fans at the Tribhuvan University International Cricket Ground, Kirtipur staying on behind heavy rain. The final match of the ACC Men's Premier Cup is currently ongoing between Nepal and the United Arab Emirates. You will never find any fans for United Arab Emirates, because they don't have any nationals in their team.


It will be a great injustice to the Nepal fans in case this match gets washed out. Because right now, UAE is at 106/9 after 27.3 overs. Without the rains, Nepal would have won already.

Video: https://twitter.com/Xhiuzan_/status/1652931879736320001

The Statista Research Department recently published the difference between Urals and and Brent oil price a few days back, and the data can be accessed here:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1298092/urals-brent-price-difference-daily/

As you can see, the spread has decreased from a peak of $37 per barrel to around $20 per barrel as of now. Increased demand from China has resulted in lower discounts for India. The latter still accounts for more than 50% of the Urals imports, but after factoring in the insurance and freight, the overall discount has narrowed down to single digits.

Indian refineries have published details on the landing cost of crude oil from Russia. In January 2023, average cost per barrel was $80, and this may include $20 to $30 per barrel for freight and insurance. The landing cost was not much different from the Indian basket ($81 per barrel), since under pressure Iraq was forced to reduce the price of crude oil it sells to India. So India is benefitting in both ways. In one hand, it gets cheap oil from Russia and on the other, it can demand other exporters to reduce their rates.

Thanks!

Can someone please lock this topic now?

I was just checking some of the tokens in my wallet, and incidentally found that I have close to a million "old" KICK tokens, that were credited almost 5 years back. Token contract is: 0xC12D1c73eE7DC3615BA4e37E4ABFdbDDFA38907E

I just searched and found that the old tokens were swapped with new ones sometime back, but I didn't got any of them credited to my account.

My question here  is whether all these tokens in my wallet are worthless, or is it possible to convert them to ETH or BTC?

LOL.. after the disappointment with the first test, we have a very competitive match this time. Everything is even stevens, and none of the two teams are at an advantage after the second day of play. Australia had an excellent opportunity to restrict India to somewhere around 150, but then the partnership between Axar and Ashwin pulled things back for India. That said, Australia so far has a nice start to their second innings.

Check this:

https://hurseda.net/gundem/246987-iddia-mossad-a-gore-ukrayna-ve-rusya-kayiplari.html

This is a link from a Turkish Newspaper, which claims that they have leaked the Mossad estimate for losses during the Russo-Ukrainian war. According to this source, the losses are as follows:

Russia:
Current strength at frontline: 418,000 (excluding PMC Wagner and LNR/DNR)
Killed: 18,480 (only armed forces and reservists probably, doesn't include PMC Wagner or LNR/DNR)
Injured: 44,500
Prisoner: 323
Aircraft lost: 23
Helicopter lost: 56
Tanks/APC lost: 889
Lost Artillery systems: 427

Ukraine:
Current Strength at frontline: 734,000 (only armed forces and reservists)
Killed: 157,000 (only armed forces and reservists probably)
Injured: 234,000
Prisoner: 17,230
Aircraft lost: 302
Helicopter lost: 212
Tanks/APC lost: 6,320
Lost Artillery systems: 7,360

IMO, Russian casualties if we include Wagner and other allied forces would be ~60,000 KIA. Ukrainians probably lost around 165,000 including foreign mercenaries. Both the countries can sustain up to 1 million KIA (each), and therefore I would say that there is a good probability that this war can continue for another 4-5 years.

Guys.. the BCCI has reaped yet another windfall from the WIPL auctions. 5 franchises are as follows:

Adani Group - Ahmedabad: ₹1,289 crore
Mumbai Indians: ₹913 crore
Delhi Capitals: ₹810 crore
Royal Challengers Bangalore: ₹902 crore
Capri Global - Lucknow: ₹757 crore

The auctions fetched a record sum of ₹4,670 crore ($573 million) for the BCCI, which is around 7 times higher than the estimates made by various media analysts.

LOL.. I guess they don't want cricket in Olympics, but their fans are pressurizing them for the inclusion. So they at least need to show that they tried. A minimum of three medals will be there (gold, silver and bronze) and for three medals we can't have a competition with just 6 teams. And that too the ICC is proposing that there will be no qualifying tournament. So 6 teams (chosen by the ICC) will take part in the competition and 50% of them will win medals. Anyway, this is excellent news for other sports such as baseball and motorsport. IOC had shortlisted 9 sports including cricket. With the ICC submitting such a laughable format, I guess now it got reduced to 8 sports.

Also, 6-team tournament would mean that hosts (USA) gain an automatic entry. So it will be 5 full members + USA?