Tom Craddock, who is recalled to the Essex side for the match at Northamptonshire
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
9:00 AM
ESSEX have named their side in advance of the LV= County Championship match against Northamptonshire, starting today at Wantage Road, and the side includes Ryan ten Doeschate who will make his first appearance in the competition this season.
The 31-year-old has been playing in the IPL for winners Kolkata Knight Riders and head coach Paul Grayson is naturally delighted to have the all-rounder back in the line-up.
“It’s good to have Tendo back, he’s a good experienced cricketer and he’s looking forward to playing four-day cricket again,” Grayson said.
“Last year, when he came back to us, he had been playing a lot of cricket around the world and looked a bit tired but this time, he’s looking fresh.”
Alviro Petersen has returned to South Africa and Essex will go into the match without an overseas player although they do have Ravi Bopara back who missed the defeat to Derbyshire in the previous Championship match because of injury. Tom Craddock also comes into the side with the leg-spinner replacing pace man Tymal Mills.
Although Essex have only one Championship win to their name thus far in 2012, Grayson believes that his side can still have a say in the push for promotion.
“We are still in with a chance in Championship cricket, there are nine games to go and if you get back-to-back wins in four-day cricket, you can soon shoot up the table,” he said.
“We had a very encouraging win against Gloucestershire Gladiators on Monday in the Clydesdale Bank 40 which is just what we needed. I thought that we bowled really well for 35 overs and although they got a few runs at the end of their innings when we didn’t quite get our yorkers right and we need to look at our death bowling, our performance overall with the ball was pleasing.
“Then Ravi batted beautifully and I thought that Tom Westley’s innings was superb and he’ll take a huge amount of confidence from that as well. They made the run-chase comfortable and helped us to a comfortable first win in that competition.”
The match between Essex and Northamptonshire earlier in the season at Chelmsford fell victim to the weather when the only play possible came on day two of the four days and then only 27 overs were sent down. In that time, Essex had reached 54 for six wickets with Mark Pettini was the only batsman to reach double figures.
Of the other 167 County Championship contests between the two counties, Essex have won 53 matches and lost 42 whilst one game finished as a tie.
Essex: J Foster (wkt, capt), M Pettini, T Westley, O Shah, R Bopara, B Foakes, R ten Doeschate, G Napier, D Masters, C Willoughby, T Craddock.
Source: www.eadt.co.uk
Police: Burned SUV with bodies is missing family's - The Guardian
AMANDA LEE MYERS
Associated Press= TEMPE, Ariz. (AP) — An acquaintance concerned about a Phoenix suburban family contacted police, who went to the home of the Butwin family and found "suspicious and concerning" evidence — but not the Butwins — and began treating the case as a murder-suicide.
The family's white Ford Expedition also was gone.
Meanwhile, the Pinal County Sheriff's Office was investigating the discovery of five bodies found burned beyond recognition in a white Ford Expedition in the desert 35 miles south of Phoenix on Saturday morning.
The SUV found burning in the desert was registered to the missing family of five, including three children, police in the Phoenix suburb of Tempe said Tuesday.
The news has left the Butwins' neighbors baffled. Neighbors who talked to The Associated Press said that James and Yafit Butwin were going through a divorce and he was battling a brain tumor.
"From what we know them to be, this is totally unexpected to the point of almost being unbelievable," neighbor Robert Kempton said." We'll choose to remember them in the wonderful, positive light that we knew them."
The Butwin family acquaintance who first called authorities told police on Monday that he was worried about them after receiving a note from James Butwin with instructions on how to operate his construction business without him, Tempe police Sgt. Jeff Glover said.
Investigators went to the Butwin home, but Glover declined to specify what evidence was found. He did say that no murder weapon was found in the home.
Glover said that the Pinal County Sheriff's Office notified them that the SUV in the desert was registered to the Butwin family's home.
He said that although they can't be entirely certain that the Butwins are the same five people found in the burning SUV, investigators are so sure that they're dead that they aren't looking for them and believe there are no outstanding suspects.
Glover said that James and his wife Yafit Butwin were experiencing financial difficulties, and court records show that Yafit filed for divorce in September and that the process was ongoing.
Two of the couple's children were teenagers and one was a pre-teen, but Glover did not have their exact ages.
The five bodies found in the desert have not been positively identified because they were burned so badly beyond recognition, said Gregory Hess, chief medical examiner for Pima County.
He said the bodies could have included older children but not younger ones.
He said the office will have to use dental records to try to confirm the identities of the bodies.
Kempton told The Associated Press that the couple had confided in him about the divorce and James Butwin's brain tumor.
Kempton said that after chemotherapy, the tumor returned and that James was discouraged that treatment wasn't helping him.
Kempton said he and his wife were planning a summer trip to Israel with the Butwins. Yafit Butwin is from Israel.
"I would have thought that they would have worked through this," Kempton said, referring to the divorce. "This is a big shock."
Kempton said he has lived in the well-manicured, upper-middle-class neighborhood for 12 years, and the Butwins moved in a few years afterward.
Kempton said that he thinks the children were a 16-year-old girl, and 14- and 8-year-old boys.
Yafit Butwin's Facebook page shows her last post came on Friday — a picture of James, with the three smiling kids and a caption that reads: "Happy birthday, Jim. I am so proud of my three children:) and they know why."
An attorney for Yafit Butwin, Steven Wolfson, told The Arizona Republic that Yafit Butwin immigrated to the U.S. in the mid-1990s from Israel and married Butwin in New Jersey. He said the couple was still living together during the divorce under a temporary agreement to share the home.
"She was looking forward to starting over, and she loved her children very much," Wolfson said.
Wolfson said that Yafit Butwin never sought an order of protection and said there was no hint of domestic violence problems. "This is out of the blue as far as we're concerned," he said.
Earlier Tuesday, the sheriff's office said they were also investigating the possibility that the burned bodies belonged to five men involved in illegal activities.
Sheriff's spokesman Tim Gaffney said a man who asked to remain anonymous called investigators Saturday and said that his brother-in-law was involved in illegal activity and feared that he could be among the dead. The man said his brother-in-law told him the night before the bodies were found that he was "going to Vekol Valley to make money" with four of his acquaintances.
The man told investigators that when he tried to call his brother-in-law and the other men on their cellphones, the calls all went straight to voicemail.
The men were last seen driving a Ford SUV, but detectives have been unable to talk to the tipster since Sunday.
The sheriff's office declined to answer any questions about the information in the statement or whether they thought one possibility was more likely than another.
Sheriff Paul Babeu said Monday that the location of the smoldering SUV in a known smuggling corridor and the nature of the crime itself had him all but certain that a violent smuggling cartel was responsible.
Babeu said that the burned car likely is the same car that a Border Patrol agent saw four hours earlier Saturday when it was still dark.
The agent saw a stopped white Ford Expedition and became suspicious, but when he approached, the vehicle fled and the agent lost track if the vehicle, Babeu said.
When the sun came up, the same agent saw car tracks in the area leading into the desert and shortly after, found a smoldering white Ford Expedition, Babeu said.
When the agent approached the car, he saw four burned bodies lying down in the back of the vehicle, and one body in the back passenger seat; no one was in the driver's or front passenger's seat.
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Associated Press Writer Whitney Phillips contributed to this report.
Follow Amanda Lee Myers on Twitter at https://twitter.com/(hash)!/AmandaLeeAP
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
Loose bowling tops County order of Essex troubles - This is Gloucestershire
ALEX Gidman was left to rue a sluggish start with the ball as a Ravi Bopara-inspired Essex eased to an eight-wicket CB40 victory over Gloucestershire.
On his return to the Eagles line-up the England star stroked an imperious unbeaten 120 as the hosts powered through to win with 19 balls to spare.
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Kane Williamson hit 73 for Gloucestershire
Earlier a superb 73 from Kiwi star Kane Williamson and gutsy half-century from Ian Cockbain helped Gloucestershire post a competitive 224 for five.
But despite claiming the early wicket of Mark Pettini, thanks to a catch from skipper Gidman off Ian Saxelby the Eagles took control.
Bopara took control, combining in a partnership of 185 for the second wicket with Terry Westley (82) to punish some errant bowling as the hosts took firm control.
"We didn't bowl as well as we can at the start of the Essex innings. If you give class players easy scoring opportunities they will take them," Gidman said.
"The pitch stayed pretty consistent all through and if you bowled at the top of off stump it was hard to score. Essex did that better than us."
Gidman was happy with the way his side wrestled back their innings after a slow start in which the Essex bowling attack got on top.
Kiwi star Williamson, who will leave for New Zealand's tour of the West Indies at the end of the month, again looked in fine form.
There were also telling lower order contributions from Ian Cockbain, who hit an unbeaten half-century, and seasonal debutant Jack Taylor who blasted 22 off 12 balls.
"I felt momentum was with us at the end of our innings. We are a developing batting unit and have guys who can strike the ball well in the closing overs," Gidman said.
"It might have been a slightly below-par score, but if we had taken a few wickets early on it would have been competitive.
Dspite defeat Gidman remains confident that Gloucestershire can challenge for the top positions in their CB 40 group this term.
The Netherlands have raced away at the top of the table, but with plenty of home games to come, not least a triple header at the county's Cheltenham Festival fortress, Gidman is taking an optimistic outlook.
"It's a blow, but only the Netherlands are on a roll in our group, with the rest of the teams beating each other, so we are still well in it," he said.
Gloucestershire return to CB40 action on Sunday when they make the short trip to New Road to face Worcestershire.
The Friends Life t20 then kicks-off on Thursday with the visit of local rivals Somerset to Bristol for a game that star t20 signing Muttiah Muralitharan is set to play.
Source: www.thisisgloucestershire.co.uk
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