SPORTS SATURDAY, JULY 16, 2016

Top players to travel to Manchester with VIVA

KUWAIT: VIVA, Kuwait’s fastest-growing and soccer team coaches. A team from VIVA in these young athletes in bringing them closer ers. Each of them were judged based on their most developed telecom operator, addition to professionals and coaches will to their dream of becoming professional foot- foot-balling capability and talent, physical fit- announced that the top 16 qualifying players accompany the players to take care of them ball players.” He added: “ MUSS is one of the ness, discipline, their communication skills will be travelling to Manchester, England, to and ensure their safety. initiatives that VIVA aims to support the youth amongst each other as players and their gen- practice at Manchester United Academy’s Commenting on this occasion, Mr Ayman through it, enhance their skills and grant eral conduct on and off the field. The training ground, from 16 July until 24 July, 2016. Salem Al-Mutairi, Corporate Communications them the opportunity to learn and communi- program focused on different technical areas, Players were selected from over 300 par- Senior Manager at VIVA said: “We are looking cate with international and professional such as dribbling, short passing, turning and ticipants who joined the MUSS tryouts, held in forward to an exciting trip with this group of coaches to earn the needed experience that finishing. The programs were also designed to last April, and will get the opportunity to trav- young players, as they have shown great lead them to fulfill their dreams.” develop young players in other fields, such as el to Manchester United, UK to join a training potential and are keen to learn more. We are A judging committee from Manchester tactical understanding, and mental, physical camp to be educated and trained by famous very pleased to have been able to support United Soccer School chose the top 16 play- and social growth.

Pakistan hits low point with Yasir strikes after Amir qualifying debacle denied against England : Pakistan’s sporting decline has left the vast South Asian nation that once prided itself on producing the world’s best LONDON: restored Pakistan’s grip four balls as strayed onto the left-han- 282 for six overnight, were bowled out for 339. hockey and squash players facing up to an on the first Test after the returning Mohammad der’s pads. Root joined in with five fours, Misbah only added four to his overnight 110 Olympics for which none of its athletes Amir was twice denied the of England including a classic straight drive off Rahat. But before he was bowled by have qualified. While remains a wild- Alastair Cook on yesterday’s second Yasir turned the tide after lunch when he had after the 42-year-old had become the oldest ly popular game in Pakistan, a nation of day at Lord’s. At tea, England were 153 for for Root carelessly hole out off a miscued sweep. player in 82 years to make a Test century on almost 200 million people, most other four in reply to Pakistan’s first innings 339, a Vince and the recalled Ballance, both failing Thursday. Amir, booed by a small section of a sports have shrunk in popularity as the suc- deficit of 186 runs. Cook was 75 not out, having to ‘pick’ Yasir, were lbw as he the spinner-who capacity crowd as he walked out to bat, inside cesses of the 1980s and early 1990s have gone past India great Sunil Gavaskar’s record of returned from a three-month drugs ban after edged his first ball in in six years, become a distant memory. 9,607 runs to become Test cricket’s highest- this year’s Word Twenty20 — took two for two from Broad, for four. He was last man out for In dilapidated gyms and crumbling scoring opener. in eight balls. Earlier, England all-rounder Chris 12, caught in the slip off Broad, who took three sports fields Pakistani athletes lament the Jonny Bairstow was unbeaten on one after Woakes took a Test-best six for 70 as Pakistan, for 71. — AFP dated equipment and obsolete training leg-spinner Shah accounted for Joe Root (48), methods which leave them struggling James Vince (16) and the recalled Gary Ballance against foreign foes who adhere to the lat- (six). Amir, making his return to Test cricket at est science-based techniques. Female ath- Lord’s-the scene of his 2010 spot-fixing crime letes have an even bigger mountain to which saw him given a five-year ban from crick- climb: most young girls in the deeply con- et and a jail term for deliberately bowling no servative Muslim nation are pressured by balls as part of a betting scam, opened the their families to stop exercising in public, attack. What made the fact it was Cook who was while those with family backing face the twice reprived off his bowling all the more wrath of their communities. “We are behind poignant, was that the England skipper had said the rest of the world,” said Inam Butt, a that if it was down to him, all fixers, including Pakistani wrestling champion who won Amir, would be banned for life. gold at the 2010 Commonwealth Games. “Our budget, training and facilities are just Pat on the back nothing. How can we compete?” Butt, like Left-arm quick Amir, who served a five-year other athletes, says the future will remain ban and was given a jail sentence for his part in bleak until Pakistan’s government starts the spot-fixing row, should first have had Cook pouring money into sport. out for 22. Cook was drawn forward by an excellent only for first slip Mohammad 1980s training methods Hafeez to drop the routine catch. It was a simi- Those in charge of promoting sport in lar story when Cook, now on 55, again edged Pakistan despair. The grassroots system is Amir but wicket-keeper Sarfraz Ahmed, going almost non-existent, children in schools slightly to his left, floored the two-handed rarely play a sport which is not cricket, and chance. It was a miss that revived memories of top athletes seldom compete against the former Pakistan gloveman ’s world’s best as cash-strapped federations worst blunders. cannot afford to send them abroad. Waqar Amir screamed in frustration before sharing Ahmed, deputy director of the Pakistan a wry smile with captain Misbah-ul-Haq, who Sports Board, said federations also cannot gave the 24-year-old paceman a consoling pat afford to hire top coaches familiar with sci- on the back. After the early loss of opener Alex entific training techniques and end up rely- Hales, Cook and new number three Root LONDON: Pakistan’s Yasir Shah celebrates taking the wicket of England’s James Vince for ing on Pakistani trainers with “obsolete” shared a stand of 110. Cook, belying his reputa- 16 runs on the second day of the first Test cricket match between England and Pakistan methods from the 1980s.—Reuters tion as a steady run-maker, struck three fours in at Lord’s cricket ground. — AFP