Robin Jackman diagnosed with cancer

Former England cricketer and famous commentator Robin Jackman has become the latest person from the cricketing fraternity to be diagnosed with cancer. He will undergo seven weeks of radiotherapy following two operations to remove malignant tumours from his vocal cords.

"It's not the prettiest, but I got it early and I'm confident I'll be fine," Jackman was quoted as saying in the South African media.

"I won't be in Australia, but I sure will be rooting for the Proteas," he added.

His treatment will be followed by four weeks of rest, and the former player hopes to be back in the commentary box by next year.

Jackman played four Tests and 15 ODIs for England, and was involved with Surrey for 16 seasons starting from 1966. He took more than 1400 first-class wickets and scored 5681 runs.

Jackman maintained close ties with South Africa, coaching and representing Rhodesia and Western Province over 11 seasons.

The news comes less than a month after former England cricketer - Tony Greig - was diagnosed with the disease.

Fine sours comeback for Jesse Ryder

Troubled New Zealand batsman Jesse Ryder was fined for using offensive language on Friday, taking the gloss off a dazzling return to first-class cricket as he strives to revive his international career.

Ryder, a raw talent whose record has been marred by a string of disciplinary lapses, announced he was taking a break from cricket earlier this year to work on "personal issues" after being dropped from the Black Caps.

He made a confident return to the crease in his comeback match for Wellington against Central Districts last week, scoring 117 in the first innings and 174 in the second.

But New Zealand Cricket said Friday that he had been fined NZ$750 ($610) for using offensive and insulting language during the match. It did not detail the offence, which reports said arose from frustration at an lbw decision.

Ryder has been consulting a psychologist as he seeks to get his career back on track and New Zealand officials have said the door remains open for an international return if he can improve his behaviour.

After his latest citing, Ryder's manager Aaron Klee told the Dominion Post newspaper that the batsman was "an emotional individual" who needed to be cut some slack.

"People have to accept Jesse isn't going to be a saint," Klee said.

"He is doing a lot of good things. You are going to get brilliant performances and you are going to get road bumps."

IPL franchises release 107 players ahead of trading window

A total of 107 international and Indian players have been released by the nine IPL franchises from their squads ahead of the players’ auction next week. The deadline for franchises to submit a list of players they wish to retain ahead of the IPL trading window and player auction was October 31 and each of the franchises has met that cutoff. A total of 179 players - 120 Indian and 59 overseas - have been retained on the same financial terms. Among the notable players whose contracts were not included are George Bailey, Joginder Sharma, Scott Styris, Abhinav Mukund, Suraj Randiv, Doug Bollinger (Chennai Super Kings); Darren Bravo, Daniel Christian, Manpreet Gony, Daniel Harris (Deccan Chargers); Glenn Maxwell, Venugopal Rao, Travis Birt, Colin Ingram, Aaron Finch, Doug Bracewell, Robin Bist (Delhi Daredevils); James Faulkner, Romesh Powar, Stuart Broad, Abhishek Nayar (Kings XI Punjab); Jaydev Unadkat (Kolkata Knight Riders); Clint McKay, Thissara Perera, Dwayne Smith, Richard Levi, Davy Jacobs (Mumbai Indians); Michael Clarke, Callum Ferguson, Nathan McCullum, Jesse Ryder, Steve Smith, James Hopes, Tamim Iqbal, Graeme Smith (Pune Warriors India); Johan Botha, Paul Collingwood, Owais Shah, Dinesh Chandimal(Rajsthan Royals); Dirk Nannes, Luke Pomersbach, Mohammad Kaif (Royal Challengers Bangalore) Of the players whose contracts were not extended, there were also 52 uncapped Indian players.

The salary cap for each of the IPL franchises in 2013 is $12.5 million and each squad can contain a maximum of 33 players, inclusive of 11 overseas players. The IPL trading window opens November 19 at which time franchises can purchase uncapped Indian players. From November 1 franchises can re-acquire those players signed on as temporary replacements in IPL 5. 

Current squads with retained players:

Chennai Super Kings - cost of squad $9.3m, salary cap remaining $3.2m

Overseas players: Albie Morkel, Ben Hilfenhaus, Dwayne Bravo, Faff du Plessis, Michael Hussey, Nuwan Kulasekara.

Indian players: MS Dhoni (capt), Murali Vijay, R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Shadab Jakati, Anirudha Srikkanth, S Badrinath, Suresh Raina, Wriddhiman Saha (wk).

Delhi Daredevils - cost of squad $10.8m, Salary cap remaining $1.7m

Overseas players: Andre Russell, David Warner, Kevin Pietersen, Mahela Jayawardene, Morne Morkel, Roelof van der Merwe, Ross Taylor.

Indian players: Ajit Agarkar, Irfan Pathan, Manpreet Juneja, Naman Ojha, Pawan Negi, Shahbaz Nadeem, Umesh Yadav, Unmukt Chand, Varun Aaron, Virender Sehwag, Yogesh Nagar.

Kings XI Punjab - cost of squad $5.3m, Salary cap remaining $7.2m

Overseas players: Adam Gilchrist, Azhar Mahmood, David Hussey, David Miller, Dimitri Mascarenhas, Shaun Marsh.

Indian players: Bhargav Bhatt, Bipul Sharma, Gurkeerat Singh, Harmeet Singh, Mandeeo Singh, Nitin Saini, Parwinder Awana, Paul Valthaty, Piyush Chawla, Praveen Kumar, R Sathish, Siddharth Chitnis, Sunny Singh (Indian).

Kolkata Knight Riders - cost of squad $10.4m, Salary cap remaining $2.1m

Overseas players: Brad Haddin, Brendon McCullum, Brett Lee, Eoin Morgan, Jacques Kallis, James Pattinson, Marchant de Lange, Ryan ten Doeschate, Shakib Al Hasan, Sunil Narine.

Indian players: Debabrata Das, Gautam Gambhir, Iqbal Abdulla, L Balaji, Laxmi Ratan Shukla, Manoj Tiwary, Manvinder Bisla, Pradeep Sangwan, Rajat Bhatia, Sarabjit Ladda, Shami Ahmed, Yusuf Pathan.

Mumbai Indians - cost of squad $10.7m, Salary cap remaining $1.8m

Overseas players: Aiden Blizzard, Herschelle Gibbs, James Franklin, Kieron Pollard, Lasith Malinga, Mitchell Johnson, Robin Peterson.

Indian players: Abu Nechin, Aditya Tare, Ambati Rayudu, Amitoze Singh, Apoorv Wankhade, Dhawal Kulkarni, Dinesh Karthik, Harbhajan Singh, Kuldeep Yadav, Munaf Patel, Pawan Suyal, Pragyan Ojha, Rahul Shukla, Rohit Sharma, RP Singh, Sachin Tendulkar, Suryakumar Yadav, Sushant Marathe, T Suman, Yuzvendra Chahal.

Pune Warriors India - cost of squad $8.5m, Salary cap remaining $4m

Overseas players: Alfonso Thomas, Angelo Mathews, Luke Wright, Marlon Samuels, Mitchell Marsh, Wayne Parnell.

Indian players: Ali Murtuza, Anustup Majumdar, Ashish Nehra, Ashok Dinda, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Dheeraj Jadhav, Eklavya Dwivedi, Harpreet Singh, Krishnakant Upadhyay, Mahesh Rawat, Manish Pandey, Mithun Manhas, Murali Kartik, Rahul Sharma, Raiphi Gomez, Robin Uthappa, Shrikant Wagh, Yuvraj Singh.

Rajasthan Royals - cost of squad $4.1m, Salary cap remaining $8.4m

Overseas players: Brad Hodge, Brad Hogg, Kevon Cooper, Shane Watson, Shaun Tait.

Indian players: Ajinkya Rahane, Ajit Chandila, Ankeet Chavan, Ashok Menaria, Rahul Dravid, Sreesanth, Shreevats Goswami, Siddharth Trivedi, Stuart Binny.

Royal Challengers Bangalore - cost of squad $9.7m, Salary cap remaining $2.8m

Overseas players: AB de Villiers, Andrew McDonald, Chris Gayle, Daniel Vettori, Muttiah Muralitharan, Tillakaratne Dilshan.

Indian players: Abhimanyu Mithun, Arun Karthik, Cheteshwar Pujara, Harshal Patel, KP Appanna, Karun Nair, Mayank Agarwal, R Vinay Kumar, Sreenath Aravind, Saurabh Tiwary, J Syed Mohammed, Vijay Zol, Virat Kohli, Zaheer Khan.

Team Hyderabad - cost of squad $5.5m, Salary cap remaining $7m

Overseas players: Cameron White, Chris Lynn, Dale Steyn, JP Duminy, Rusty Theron, Kumar Sangakkara.

Indian players: Abhishek Jhunjhunwala, Akash Bhandari, Akshath Reddy, Amit Mishra, Anand Rajan, Ankit Sharma, Ashish Reddy, Bharat Chipli, Biplab Samantray, Ravi Teja, Ishant Sharma, Parthiv Patel, Shikhar Dhawan, Veer Pratap Singh.

Ganguly opts out of IPL 2013

Former India captain, Sourav Ganguly has said that he has no intentions of playing in the upcoming Indian Premier League despite holding a contract with the Sahara Pune Warriors for one more season. Ganguly has revealed that he has told his bosses at Pune that he wished to end his playing time and would not be available for selection during the 2013 season of the mega tournament.

"I had a wonderful time playing in the IPL for five seasons. It gave me a chance to keep playing top-class cricket even after quitting international cricket. But I can't go on forever, and I have requested the franchise owners not to consider me for IPL 6," Sourav told TOI on Sunday.

Ganguly played the first three seasons of the Indian Premier League for the Kolkata Knight Riders. He led the team as an icon player in the first edition. A poor show meant that 'Dada' as he is fondly called was stripped of his captaincy during a disastrous second edition in South Africa. Ganguly did return to the helm in the subsequent season but failed to take his team to the semi-finals.

He then had to bear the humiliation of not being considered good enough by any of the 10 franchises during the 2011 auctions but later made a late entry into the Pune team following an injury to Ashish Nehra. He took over as the captain in the fifth edition and led his franchise to a last place finish.

They were rumors floating along that Ganguly would not be a part of the Pune management's plans for the 6th edition of the tournament and instead would be offered a role in the team as a 'mentor'.

Sourav Ganguly has also decided to opt out of the Ranji Trophy Team for Bengal for the upcoming season. Ganguly had retired from international cricket in 2008 but had continued to be a part of the domestic set-up.

In Ganguly's absence, Manoj Tiwary has been named the captain. There were indications given by a senior official in the Bengal Board that 'Dada' could return later in the season. "He would not play the first two matches, but depending on our team's position we may get his services later on," Sujan Mukherjee, the secretary of the Bengal board said. "It's a youthful side but we have players with international experience, looking forward to a positive season," he added.

Squad: Manoj Tiwary (capt), Parthasarathi Bhattacharjee, Rohan Banerjee, Jayojit Basu, Writam Porel, Anustup Majumdar, Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Laxmi Ratan Shukla, Iresh Saxena, Ashok Dinda, Sourav Sarkar, Arnab Nandy, Veer Pratap Singh, Subhomoy Das and Aritra Chatterjee