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Marcus Trescothick has issued a call for tougher penalties for spectators who run onto the pitch.”I would advocate the Australian system whereby any spectator running on the pitch during the game should be hit with a heavy fine and then banged up for a night in the cells,” the England and Somerset opener told the Mail on Sunday.Trescothick was voicing his fears after the Edgbaston pitch invasion of Thursday night, when team-mate Nick Knight was assaulted on the pitch. Trescothick was keen to distinguish between over enthusiasm and deliberate intimidation, and believes that some spectators crossed the line between the two on Thursday night.”I feel it is important to stress the serious risk the players felt under on Thursday,” Trescothick explained. “No one minds enthusiasm or exuberance and I totally accept that there was no malice in the premature celebrations which forced the interruption. But some of the behaviour of the crowd prior to that flashpoint made the atmosphere the ugliest and most hostile I have ever experienced.”We all accept that people are entitled to voice their opinions and you expect a bit of good-natured banter. But this was different. This was full-on, foul-mouthed personal abuse and there was nothing remotely amusing about it.”Meanwhile David Graveney, Chairman of the Selectors and Chief Executive of the Professional Cricketers’ Association, has echoed calls for harsher penalties for miscreants and warned that action should be taken before a serious incident occurs.”We agree with Alec Stewart that in terms of security, it wasn’t adequate,” Graveney said, referring to Edgbaston. “Everything must be done to give that an uplift. The England Cricket Board have issued a series of measures and let’s see how they work.”Areas have got to be looked at because sooner or later, a player or an umpire, is going to have a serious injury. We’re obviously trying to avoid that scenario happening.Graveney also lent his support to Australian captain, Steve Waugh, who has publicly voiced his concern over the levels of security at English grounds.”Australia have voiced their concern with some justification. You look at the way Australia have treated security; there are considerable penalties for even putting one foot on the pitch. I think the ECB have to speak to the Australians to see how it’s worked. They have life bans from grounds; it’s pretty Draconian, but it does work.”

Ange Postecoglou has dropped a promising injury update regarding Celtic winger Mikey Johnston.

What’s the latest?

In recent comments on the club’s YouTube channel (cited by 67hailhail), the 56-year-old confirmed that, after featuring in Celtic B’s 5-0 win over Partick Thistle in the Glasgow Cup earlier this week, the forward will be available for the Scottish Cup quarter-final clash with Dundee United on Monday, having been out of action since limping off against Raith Rovers in mid-February,

Speaking about the current condition of the former Scotland under-21 international, Postecoglou said: “Mikey missed a couple of weeks. Mikey, Karamoko [Dembele], Johnny [Kenny] got some game-time and they’re available. That means they got through the game okay.

“They obviously had [Thursday] off because they played but they’ll be back training with us on Saturday and they’re available. Mikey is in the same boat as everyone else. To be fair, it’s not easy because if you come to our training at the moment, I’ve got an easy job. I could probably pick two or three different XIs and still come out looking like a genius.”

Huge boost

While Johnston is not exactly a guaranteed starter for Postecoglou, the reports that he now appears to have recovered from his injury will nevertheless come as a huge boost to the Celtic manager and the Parkhead fan base.

Indeed, with the Bhoys still battling in both the Scottish Cup and the Premiership title race, rotation will be necessary for the 56-year-old over the season’s run-in over the coming months, should Postecoglou wish to give his side the best possible chance of sealing a domestic treble this term.

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As such, with Kyogo Furuhashi still appearing to be some way off making a recovery of his own – which means that Daizen Maeda is required to fill in for his Japanese team-mate up front, instead of being utilised on the left wing – the fresh addition of Johnston to the manager’s options on the left of his front three is undoubtedly a huge bonus.

AND in other news: Sold for peanuts, now worth £8.1m: “Staggering” £23k-p/w dud has left Celtic red-faced

	Johmari Logtenberg won’t be playing in the qualifiers for the Women’s World Cup © Getty Images

Johmari Logtenberg is the only prominent name missing from South Africa women’s squad announced to participate in the World Cup qualifiers in Stellenbosch during February after quitting cricket.The 18-year Logtenberg was vice-captain for the team that was to tour Pakistan for the qualifiers in November. However, unrest in Pakistan saw the tournament being postponed; subsequently, the ICC decided to shift the matches to South Africa.Now Cricket South Africa (CSA) has confirmed to Cricinfo that Logtenberg, one of two players nominated by CSA for the ICC Women’s Cricketer of the Year award in 2007, has opted to stop playing cricket in order to pursue other sports. Allrounder Alicia Smith replaces Logtenberg in the 14-member squad, while Claire Terblanche will be the deputy to captain Cri-zelda Brits.Logtenberg burst on the scene with an impressive 74 on her Test debut in 2003, when she was just 14. She was named Women’s Cricketer of the Year at the South African Cricket Awards in 2006.South Africa are one of the favourites to qualify from the tournament, where the top two sides go through to join the major nations who will contest the World Cup in Australia in 2009. South Africa are in the same group as Bermuda, Netherlands and Papua New Guinea.The qualifiers will be held from February 18 to 24.South Africa squadCri-zelda Brits (capt), Claire Terblanche, Olivia Anderson, Susan Benade, Trisha Chetty (wk), Dinesha Devnarain, Mignon du Preez, Shandre Fritz, Ashlyn Kilowan, Marcia Letsoalo, Sunette Loubser, Annelie Minnie, Alicia Smith, Daleen Terblanche.

Matthew Hayden: ‘We could be playing kick a cockroach from here to the wall and we’d want to be competitive’ © Getty Images

Matthew Hayden is proud of the way his team sticks together after Lou Vincent’s claims that Australian players are arrogant sledgers who “hunt like a pack of dogs”. “If he considers that to be the case, I’m not unhappy about it, to be honest,” Hayden said in Brisbane.”Regardless of what Lou says, it’s water off a duck’s back as far as Australia is concerned.” Hayden, who scored 117 against New Zealand on Sunday, said the comments reflected the competitive nature of Australian athletes.”It’s doesn’t matter what sport … we could be playing kick a cockroach from here to the wall and we’d want to be competitive,” he said. “In the heat of the battle New Zealand and Australia is one of the finest competitions you can play. They’re in our country and we’re very excited about the way we’re playing and we’re working exceptionally hard to what is ahead of us.”Hayden said one of the strengths of the Australian team was that they stuck together on the field. “We’ve had that mentality for as long as I can ever remember and it’s served us well,” he said. “We’ve been motivated by the fact we were under pressure, motivated by the fact that we needed to perform … we’re very proud of the fact that we stick by each other.”

Bracewell to focus on player development © Getty Images

With the 2007 World Cup a little more than a year away, both New Zealand and Sri Lanka have an eye on future targets going into the third one-day international at Wellington on Friday. For John Bracewell, the New Zealand coach, the objective is to develop depth ahead of next year’s World Cup while the desperately out-of-form Sri Lankans would look to team up with a sports psychologist for much-needed mental analysis.The Sri Lankans are still struggling for self-belief after coming to New Zealand off a 1-6 hiding in India, and they have turned to Sandy Gordon, the South African sports psychologist, for help. Gordon will spend time with the team when they arrive in Australia next week to prepare for the tri-nations series there.”We’ve let ourselves down with some bad basics,” Marvan Atapattu, the Sri Lankan captain, said. “It’s a matter of winning one game. We are better than this and if we can win the whole thing changes.”From the New Zealand squad which won the second match at Christchurch, Nathan Astle has been dropped to make way for returning captain Stephen Fleming, while Jeetan Patel, the offspinner, has been brought in for James Franklin, the fast bowler.The surprising decision to drop Astle, New Zealand’s most successful one-day batsman who ground his way out of a batting slump with an unbeaten 90 on Tuesday, was part of the “squad mentality”, according to Bracewell. Heading towards the 2007 World Cup, player development across all positions took precedence over the individual.”They’re always tough decisions, but we need a squad mentality and I want to continue with the long-term planning towards the World Cup, which is developing a strong competitive squad in all positions,” Bracewell said.Meanwhile, New Zealand Cricket has announced their team for the third National Bank series match against Sri Lanka at Wellington.New Zealand squad Stephen Fleming (capt), Daniel Vettori, Shane Bond, Chris Cairns, James Franklin, Peter Fulton, Jamie How, Hamish Marshall, Brendon McCullum (wk), Jeetan Patel, Scott Styris, Lou Vincent .

Richie Richardson: ‘The biggest downfall in West Indies cricket is the administration’© Getty Images

Richie Richardson, the former West Indian captain, has slammed the West Indies Cricket Board for failing to resolve the ongoing sponsorship dispute, and said it was time for business-minded individuals to take over the administration of West Indies cricket.Referring to the board’s decision to sack seven senior players, including Brian Lara, Richardson told , “I am not totally surprised, but I am really disappointed. It’s really sad. For some of our best players to be fit and not be represented on the West Indies team, is very disappointing and very disturbing.”Teddy Griffith, the board’s president, announced last week that sevenplayers, including Lara, Ramnaresh Sarwan and Chris Gayle, would not be considered for selection for the forthcoming series against South Africa and Pakistan, owing to their individual sponsorship deals with Cable & Wireless, a rival of the board’s current sponsor Digicel.Richardson said that the board should have settled the issues a long time ago.”For these things to happen, I think it is really poor. We should be focussing on trying to make sure that West Indies cricket is returned to what it was some time ago and not to be making silly mistakes and having fights between the board and players. It’s just going to make things even worse.”This issue first cropped up in December last year, and has not been properly resolved since. “We’ve had a number of problems over the years, and the game has advanced and we have remained stagnant, if not retrogressed,” Richardson continued. “I believe the best thing for West Indies cricket right now is to give somebody who has serious money and who is a serious businessman and who is willing to invest in West Indies cricket and restore it. The biggest downfall in West Indies cricket is the administration.”I was frustrated with a lot of things as West Indies captain,” added Richardson, who led them in 24 Tests. “I just thought when are we going to start realising that everybody is changing and we have got to move with the times?” He also said that the board never respected the players, even dating back to the era of Clive Lloyd, and that “We got the impression then that all that we could do was to play cricket.”Richardson stressed that the game was bigger than everybody, and all that were involved in the current dispute needed to “come together and resolve this”.

Sri Lanka A 192 for 4 (Jayawardene 76, Nawaz 72*) and 244 (Herath 51, Bhandari 6-55) lead India A 369 (Gavaskar 60, Kaif 53, Badani 50, Herath 6-89) by 67 runs
Prasanna Jayawardene and Naveed Nawaz made vital contributions as Sri Lanka A clawed back into the game against India A on the third day. India A added 65 more runs in the morning session, largely due to a plucky 42 by Ramesh Powar, before they were bowled out for 369. Rangana Herath, the left-arm spinner, was the chief destroyer with 6 for 89.Both Jayawardene and Nawaz had fallen cheaply in the first innings, but they rescued their team from a precarious situation (49 for 2) by putting on 94 runs for the third wicket. Jayawardene hit nine boundaries, while Nawaz’s innings included four boundaries and a six. However, Jayawardene fell 24 runs short of a century when he was bowled by Ramesh Powar. Nawaz remained unbeaten at the end of the day and received good support from Thilina Kandamby, who hung on for more than an hour.Rohan Gavaskar(60) was the top scorer for India A, and Mohammad Kaif and Hemang Badani chipped in with useful fifties. Ramesh Powar ensured some late-innings impetus with a 61-ball 42, which included six boundaries. But Herath took the last three wickets and finished with six overall. He had also hit a fifty in the first innings, a useful contribution when his team was struggling.

New Zealand has been designated Middle Earth as a result of the release of the first film of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but it is the middle ground the CLEAR Black Caps are seeking in the National Bank Series decider against England in Dunedin tomorrow.New Zealand have proven great starters in one-day series, both in Australia and at home this summer.England have been great finishers in India and in New Zealand.

NathanAstle Photo Photosport

But the home team are looking for the recovery that will see them repeat a series victory in Dunedin, just as they did in a high-scoring contest against Pakistan last summer.However, looking to the local conditions is not likely to be sufficient on its own.New Zealand has had serious batting problems exposed, especially with Nathan Astle being taken out of the batting equation by his own fault or through decisions against him. However, all the batsmen go under the microscope tomorrow after a run of poor performances.Conditions should favour the batsmen and while batting first has to be the main consideration on such a good pitch, the fact remains that New Zealand did win after an outstanding 280-plus run chase last year.That sort of score will not be to the fore this year given the nature of the lower scores since the bouncer law came into effect, but the game still has the potential to be the highest scoring encounter of the series.New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming ruled out opening the innings as he did last year.The batsmen had been selected as openers and that was their role. Fleming’s job was to get the majority of runs on the board and said he would be doing that in the middle-order.He hinted that New Zealand would retain the same 11 as in Auckland, meaning Brendon McCullum will bat on his home ground with Ian Butler again 12th man.Fleming said the instructions for the batsmen were simple: “It’s a fine line between being aggressive and being reckless and we spent too much time in the reckless zone.”What I’m asking for, and looking for, as a batting unit is that you are getting one or two performances, or half performances but you’re getting nothing else, so it’s all or nothing. And it’s not one, two or three players, it’s one or nothing.”What we’ve got to get is contributions. If a guy is having his day you have got to get guys supporting that with 30, 40 or 50 while he goes on to get 80-100. That’s how you get the big scores and that’s when you see (Chris) Cairns, (Chris) Harris and (Andre) Adams come in and finish the innings,” he said.

MatthewHoggard Photo Photosport

England had been bowling very well at the top of the innings and Matthew Hoggard had produced two especially impressive opening spells.”There’s a fine line between giving them respect and taking the initiative, that’s what the guys at the top and the guys through the middle have to assess,” he said.Having another dasher of a batsman in McCullum at the top of the order was a case of trying to extend the strike rate.It didn’t use many more overs, but it did require a higher risk rate.”That is what we are trying to do, create a longer period of the ability to get a strike rate,” he said.Fleming was also looking to take impetus from the Carisbrook crowd.”It’s a good crowd, a great crowd. We enjoy it, they are very loud. These are our people. It’s like Auckland. That’s why we were so disappointed. It’s the first time we’ve ever played in front of a full house in Auckland and we wanted to win desperately.”It’s the same down here. We get a good crowd, they’re very passionate about it. We just want to do well, so we will tap into that if we can and play well and get them on our side,” he said.The weather forecast is for a fine day and the perfect finale to a 15-game campaign for the CLEAR Black Caps in which the overall count is six won, eight lost, and one to play.

When play commenced on day three of the Shell Trophy match at Molyneux Park, it was quite uncertain who held the advantage.True, Otago held a first innings lead of 78 and that Canterbury one wicket lost in their second innings for 41 had a little to make before getting into credit but that should not have extended them too much and both sides seemed to have an equal chance of victory.Canterbury started slowly but lost the nightwatchman Stephen Cunis early on and from that point never really got on top of a controlled Otago attack.Jarrod Englefield batted well for a professional like 66 and looks a player of the future. He with wicket-keeper Gareth Hopkins was the only Canterbury batsman to score over 50. Hopkins carried his bat for 51 and while he was at the crease Canterbury had a chance of giving Otago a larger total to chase.But, he ran out of partners and that, as they say, is that. Captain Gary Stead with 28 and Robbie Frew with 38 fought hard but both would have liked to have carried on. The Canterbury innings finished at 224.The Otago attack bowled in a heat of 34 degrees and looked weary towards the end of the Canterbury innings and it would have to be said they impressed with their resolve. O’Connor (3-51), McSkimming (2-56), McCullum (2-10) and Cumming (2-11) were the main wicket-takers. Acknowledgement should however be given to Pryor (1-48) and Sewell (0-32) who improved his line and length from his first innings stint.Horne handled his attack well and the fielding was steady. Martyn Croy behind the Otago stumps looked very competent with an outstanding catch to dismiss Robbie Frew.Otago commenced its second innings needing 147 for victory and a faint chance that this total may be reached today but reasonably accurate bowling by Canterbury and the early loss of Mark Richardson put paid to that situation.Matthew Horne and Craig Cumming batted through to stumps with the Otago total at 39-1, and still requiring 108 for its 55th victory over Canterbury in a first-class game.As long as the weather remains dry this should be achieved tomorrow.

Celtic correspondent Kieran Devlin has claimed that Jota should be back for the weekend after missing the Scottish Cup quarter-final through injury.

The Lowdown: Jota’s absence

Jota, who has been a regular for the majority of the campaign, missed seven games prior to the winter break due to injury and was missing from the Hoops squad again on Monday evening.

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Ange Postecoglou’s side ran out 3-0 winners at Tannadice and will now face Rangers in the semi-final at Hampden Park, looking to take another step towards a domestic treble.

The Celtic manager, who labelled the Portuguese winger as ‘unbelievable’, said the 22-year-old was missing due to a knock, while Liel Abada also missed out due to illness.

The Latest: Devlin shares news

Devlin ran a Q&A on The Athletic ahead of Celtic’s clash with Dundee United on Monday.

He relayed news regarding Jota and Abada, posting that the pair should both be back for the visit of Ross County on Saturday.

“Abada and Jota should both be back for the weekend against Ross County it seems.”

The Verdict: Phew

Plenty of Celtic fans may have been extremely worried after not seeing Jota or Abada in the squad on Monday, so this update is a real relief.

Jota has looked extremely dangerous during his season-long loan, contributing to 18 goals in 29 games and creating 49 chances. [BBC]

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The Hoops need all their stars available as we enter the crunch stage of the season, so losing Jota for an extended period of time would have been a big blow. Thankfully, that is not the case, and we may see Jota running down the wing at Celtic Park once again this weekend.

In other news: ‘Hope it’s not true… ‘ – Celtic pundit fumes at ‘massive’ Parkhead news after insider’s reveal