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Among the players that SRH have released now, the biggest Indian name present on the list is Yusuf Pathan while the biggest name from the overseas players is the Bangladeshi star Shakib Al Hasan. Pathan had been with the Orange Army for quite a while but he has lacked consistency of late whereas Shakib has received a one-year ban from competitive cricket. Among the other players that SRH released, Martin Guptill is a prominent name but since SRH have a solid opening pair in David Warner and Jonny Bairstow, the services of the Kiwi opener were no longer required by them....

Keeping that in mind, here are the most important position for each team to strengthen going into the auction in an effort to boost their title challenge. Chennai Super Kings: Big-hitting overseas fast bowler Having released only 5 players, Chennai Super Kings enter the auction with one of the most well-settled sides in the league. With Ambati Rayadu, Shane Watson, Suresh Raina, and Kedar Jadhav as their top 4 with Faf du Plessis and Murali Vijay as cover, they have a very stable top-order....

A pool of uncapped IPL players take part in the tournament every year, some of whom make a transition to the Indian T20 extravaganza after performing well. This year, the Syed Mushtaq Ali trophy was organised before the Ranji Trophy for this very purpose – to scout talent for the IPL ahead of the mega auctions to be held in Kolkata on December 19. Here we take a look at the top five players from the 2019-20 edition, who can go for big money in the forthcoming auctions....

The maverick all-rounder who drove India to glory at the 2011 World Cup has looked a shadow of himself in his comeback performances but a lot of that is down to lack of confidence. The fact that Yuvraj Singh was ruthlessly pursued by a top franchisee at the auctions, the fact that they risked creating an imbalanced squad, and paid almost 25% of their entire kitty indicates the value that he can potentially bring to a team with his all-round abilities....

When we look back at the stats between these two sides, it clear that Mumbai dominated Chennai in the tournament history. Let’s have a look at some key numbers between Mumbai and Chennai. Head to Head in IPL: Mumbai played against Chennai 27 times in IPL and won 16 times whereas Chennai managed to win only 11 games. MI is the only team to register more than ten wins against CSK in the cash-rich league....

After being arrested for alleged involvement in fixing IPL matches, Vindu Dara Singh and Gurunath Meiyappan, who is the son in law of BCCI president and Managing Director of India Cements Limited, N Srinivasan, have been granted bail. Besides Vindu and Meiyappan, six bookies too were bailed for Rs.25,000 each. The court asked all of them not to leave the country and report to the Crime Branch every alternate day....

“It’s important to have the pool of players, who will be qualified to play IPL kind of a league. As I mentioned (in) India A (team) itself we need quality players. Once we have those many players then it will be wise enough to have an IPL,” Mithali, skipper of India’s women’s Test team, said. The Cricket Board is organising exhibition matches for women during the upcoming Indian Premier League’s 11th season....

RCB always had talented Indian cricketers, great overseas signings, and arguably the most passionate fan base. Despite all of this, the number of IPL titles in twelve years is zero. Virat Kohli-led RCB has a win percentage of 48.66 with 72 wins and 76 losses from 153 IPL games, and this stat does not do justice to the kind of talent that it has possessed over the years. The luck factor also has not favoured the RCB as they have ended up on the losing side in all the three finals they have made it to....

There are very few records that Gayle hasn’t broken in the shortest format, and a lot of the records have come in the Indian Premier League (IPL). Over the years, with the way he’s played, he has become an IPL phenomenon. He started off with the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in the first three seasons but didn’t have a great run there. He went unsold in the 2011 auctions but an injury to Dirk Nannes opened the door for him....

Sunil Narine and Kuldeep Yadav are their stars with the ball and their top order has players like Chris Lynn, Dinesh Karthik and Robin Uthappa, with the dangerous Andre Russell in the middle order. With such a dynamic team, they would have surely dominated the opposition on certain occasions; it goes without saying that they have posted some of the biggest totals in IPL history. Here are the 5 biggest totals posted by the Kolkata Knight Riders in IPL history....

The blast Wednesday injured up to six people just as worshippers concluded midday prayers at the Pul-e-Khishti Mosque, located in a crowded neighborhood of the Afghan capital. No group or individual has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, but the Taliban-led Afghan Interior Ministry said it detained a suspect on the scene and brought him in for questioning. The incident follows a series of deadly bombings late last year claimed by the Islamic State militant group’s Khorasan branch (ISIS-K) against mosques, many of which were of Shiite Muslim denomination, drawing particular outrage from neighboring Iran....

Although the indictments didn’t publicly mention the name of the intended victim, she “outed” herself. Masih Alinejad is an Iranian-born U.S. citizen, a journalist and a vocal critic of the Iranian regime. She is an outspoken advocate of women’s rights—including the right to remove the law-enforced hijab in Iran—as well as a presenter and producer at Voice of America Persian Service and contributor to numerous other media outlets. Much of the material she presents is video and audio from Iranian people desperate to find someone to spread their story in the West....

Iranian Health Ministry spokesperson Sima Sadat Lari said the country’s total pandemic death toll now stands at 28,544, making it the hardest-hit nation in the Middle East. On Sunday, Tehran confirmed a record single-day death toll of 251 people, while local media reported that at least two senior officials in the government were among those infected. Ali Akbar Salehi, head of Iran’s atomic energy organization, tested positive for COVID-19. He has been a leading critic of the Trump administration re-imposing sanctions on Iran after pulling out of the Obama-era nuclear deal in 2018....

Considering the economic sanctions that limit some of Iran’s more ambitious economic intentions, and the many miles that separate the Islamic Republic from the African continent, it may seem unlikely that Iran would have significant interests in Africa. Nonetheless, alongside ISIS, al-Qaeda and various Sunni terror groups, Iran is aggressively seeking to fulfill its own Islamist conquest. This campaign involves the activities of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its many proxies—most famously Lebanese Hezbollah....

Al-Hilal of Saudi Arabia defeated Iran’s Esteghlal 1-0 in Group D in the 2013 AFC Champions League. In the match held at Tehran Azadi stadium Tuesday, Nawaf Al-Abid scored the only goal for the visitors 11 minutes before half-time, reports Xinhua. In another match of the same group, Qatar’s Al-Rayyan snatched a 2-1 win over Al-Ain of the UAE. After four rounds of matches, Iran’s Esteghlal remains at the top of Group D with seven points, one ahead of Al-Ain, Al-Hilal and Al-Rayyan....

Reuters cited a senior Trump administration official Thursday as saying that the U.S. is “looking at measures that can be taken” in response to Venezuela buying fuel for gold from Iran. The remark provoked furor in Tehran, where Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Abbas Mousavi accused Washington on Monday of threatening “piracy” and “seeking a kind of global anarchy” that should alarm the international community. “If the Americans take action against the free and legal movement of our ships, they will face a decisive response from us,” Mousavi said....

“The Iraqi resistance was earlier than the Afghans in forcing the United States to withdraw from Iraq in 2011,” Nasr al-Shammary, spokesperson for the Hezbollah al-Nujaba Movement, told Newsweek, “and today the Iraqi resistance is stronger and more numerous.” The resistance, he argued, “has the ability to confront, prolong, and insist on expelling any foreign forces from Iraqi soil.” “We have our own unique and rich experience, and great cultural and ideological legacy,” Shammary added, “and we respect all the experiences of free peoples....

That assassination elicited outrage across Iraq, Iran and other parts of the region. Just days after the one-year anniversary of the event, which was noted by Iran and other nations in the region, a Popular Mobilization Forces spokesperson told Newsweek the group welcomed Fayyadh’s enemy status in the eyes of the U.S. “We congratulate the friend of the martyrs, Popular Mobilization Committee Chairman Falih al-Fayyadh, on his inclusion with the honorable ones whom the U....

Iraq’s ivory tower is under siege. Thousands of academics have fled the country, classes are frequently canceled, students often stay home and research has slowed to a standstill as sectarian militias increasingly target academia. Between 250 and 1,000 professors have been killed since the 2003 invasion, according to different estimates. Many more have received bullets through internal mail, had death threats tacked to their office doors, or received anonymous phone calls warning them not to come to work, often for showing a lack of zeal in the sectarian conflicts....

But the anticipated plan is already being met with reservations both by those uncertain of Iraq’s ability to tackle threats such as those posed by the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) without hands-on U.S. backing, and those who demand a total U.S. military exit from the country. As the fourth session of the U.S.-Iraq Strategic Dialogue takes place in Washington, the second under U.S. President Joe Biden, attention is fixed on the future of the U....