No Indian in ICC’s umpires' panel for 2012-13 season, Llong replaces Doctrove

No Indian features in the International Cricket Council's umpires' panel for the 2012-13 season in which England's Nigel Llong was on Monday named as the replacement for the recently retired Billy Doctrovesays a report in The Times Of India.

Meanwhile, Australian Bruce Oxenford was named in 13-umpire team for the September Twenty20 World Championships Sri Lanka. Long replaces Doctrove who announced his retirement from the elite panel last week, says an Indian Express report adding that Llong has already umpired in 12 Tests, 55 ODIs and 16 T20Is.

“He was appointed to the ICC Emirates Panel of International Umpires in 2002. The 43-year-old made his international umpiring debut in the second-ever T20I, played between England and Australia at Southampton on 13 June 2005. The following summer in a match between England and Sri Lanka at Lord's, Llong stood in his first ODI. His first Test was two years later in Dunedin in the match between New Zealand and Bangladesh, the ICC said in a statement,” says the report.

During his playing days as a left-handed batsman and an off-spinner for Kent from 1990-1998, Llong played in 68 first-class matches in which he scored 3,024 runs and took 35 wickets.

Meanwhile, the 12 Elite Panelists, include Billy Bowden, Aleem Dar, Steve Davis, Kumar Dharmasena, Marais Erasmus, Ian Gould, Tony Hill, Richard Kettleborough, Nigel Llong, Asad Rauf, Simon Taufel and Rod Tucker -- will be joined for the ICC World Twenty20 Sri Lanka by Oxenford.

KP still wants to help Eng defend WC T20 title: Kevin Pietersen said he still wanted to help England defend their World Twenty20 title in Sri Lanka in September, despite announcing his retirement from limited overs internationals. The South Africa-born batsman was man of the tournament when England won the World Twenty20 in the Caribbean two years ago. But he quit all limited overs internationals last week when he was told by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) the terms of his England central contract would not allow him his wish of abandoning 50-over one-day matches while still playing Twenty20 fixtures for his adopted country.

‘F i r e i n B a b y l o n’inspired Best: ‘F i r e i n B a b y l o n’ inspired West Indies tail-ender Tino Best to make the highest score by a number 11 batsman in Test history. He broke Zaheer Khan's record when he passed 75, but missed out on a maiden century when he fell for 95. Best said a documentary film about the great West Indies side of the 1970s and 80s was behind his record knock. “I have been watching a lot of ‘F i r e i n B a - b y l o n’ and it’s really inspired me,” he said.