Shane Robert Watson is an Australian cricket commentator and former cricketer who played for and occasionally captained the Australian national cricket team between 2002 and 2016. He was an all-rounder who played as a right-handed batsman and a right-arm fast-medium bowler. He was ranked as the world's No. 1 all-rounder in Twenty20 Internationals (T20I) for 150 weeks, including an all-time record of 120 consecutive weeks from 13 October 2011 to 30 January 2014. He began playing during the Australian team's golden era in the early 2000s, and was the last player from this era to retire. In his time playing for Australia, Watson was part of their winning squad in the Cricket World Cup two times in 2007, and 2015 along with the ICC Champions Trophy twice in 2006 and 2009, with Watson named as the player of the match in the final on both occasions, as he scored the winning run in the 2006 tournament, with the winning six in the 2009 tournament.
The Bangladesh National Cricket Team toured England for the first time in 2005. Coming into the tour, Bangladesh had clinched their first ever test series win, against Zimbabwe but were still last in the ICC Test Championship table. England, under Michael Vaughan's captaincy, had moved to second in the Test points table.
Thirteen One Day Internationals were played in England in 2005 - 10 in the NatWest Series between England, Bangladesh and Australia, and three between England and Australia in the NatWest Challenge immediately following the Series.
The Australian cricket team ended the 2005–06 season by touring Bangladesh in April 2006. The series was seen as an uneventful way to end the season as Australia, who were twenty points clear of second place in the ICC Test Championship, played a Bangladeshi team who had won one Test match in their cricketing history and were ranked at the bottom, over 100 points behind Australia. Bangladesh, however, wanted to refute comments made by the tourists' captain, Ricky Ponting who told London's The Daily Telegraph in February ""What I would not have is the minnow nations in the World Cup and the Champions Trophy, and I would not have Bangladesh and Zimbabwe playing Tests at present." On arrival, Ponting pointed out, in support of the home side, that "maybe Bangladesh having Test status will take the game forward". On the back of a three-Test whitewash tour of South Africa, but a 3–2 loss in ODI matches, Australia came to Bangladesh to play two Tests and three One-day International matches, without any warm-up touring matches.
The Australia national cricket team toured Great Britain to play a series of cricket matches during the 2009 English cricket season. The team played five Test matches – one in Wales – seven One Day Internationals and two Twenty20 Internationals against England. The Australians also played four other first-class matches in England, against the England Lions and two county sides. Australia also took part in the 2009 ICC World Twenty20 but they were eliminated in the first round after defeats to the West Indies and Sri Lanka.
The 2010–11 Ashes series was the 66th series of Test cricket matches played to contest The Ashes. The series was played in Australia as part of the England cricket team's tour of the country during the 2010–11 season. Five Tests were played from 25 November 2010 to 7 January 2011. England won the series 3–1 and retained the Ashes, having won the previous series in 2009 by two Tests to one. It was the first time in 24 years that England had won the Ashes in Australia. As of 2023, it remains the most recent occasion that a visiting team has won an Ashes series, and the last time that England has won a Test series in Australia.
The England cricket team toured Australia during the 2010–11 season from 25 November 2010 to 6 February 2011. The series comprised the traditional five Tests for The Ashes, and also featured seven ODIs and two Twenty20s. The Umpire Decision Review System was used for the ODI series.
The 2011–12 edition of the Commonwealth Bank Series was a One Day International cricket tournament which was held in Australia. It was a tri-nation series between Australia, India, and Sri Lanka. This was the first time Australia had hosted a tri-series since 2007–08.
The West Indies cricket team toured India from 6 November to 11 December 2011. The tour consisted of three Test matches and five One Day Internationals (ODIs). On day three of the First Test, Indian batsman Sachin Tendulkar became the first cricketer to pass 15,000 runs in Test cricket.
The Sri Lankan cricket team toured Australia from 6 December 2012 to 28 January 2013. The tour consisted of three Tests, five One Day Internationals (ODIs) and two Twenty20 Internationals (T20Is). Tests were played for the Warne–Muralidaran Trophy. The Test series was preceded by a match against the Cricket Australia Chairman's XI and Sri Lankans.
The Australia national cricket team toured India between 10 October to 2 November 2013, playing a Twenty20 International match and seven-match One Day International series against India. Due to an ongoing back injury, Australian captain Michael Clarke was replaced by Callum Ferguson and George Bailey captained the side. During the second ODI match, all of the first five Australian batsmen made a score of fifty or more, a feat which no side had previously done. In the second match, India chased down the target of 360 runs to win, making this the second highest run-chase to win an ODI game. Two weeks later in the sixth match, India again chased down the Australian total of 350 runs to record the third highest run-chase to win a game. Coincidentally, all three highest run chases had come against Australia. In the seventh and final match, Indian batsman Rohit Sharma became the third man to make a double-century in ODI cricket, when he scored 209 from 158 balls. His innings included 16 sixes, the most in an ODI innings beating the previous record of 15 held by Australian cricketer Shane Watson. The record was later broken by England's Eoin Morgan who hit 17 sixes against Afghanistan in 2019.
The South Africa cricket team toured Australia from 2 to 23 November 2014. The tour consisted of three Twenty20 Internationals (T20I) and five One Day International (ODI) matches. During the ODI series, the International Cricket Council undertook a trial to broadcast the discussions between the on-field and television umpires. Australian captain Michael Clarke injured his hamstring during the first ODI game and was ruled out for the rest of the series. George Bailey captained the side for the remaining fixtures.
Pool A of the 2015 Cricket World Cup took place from 14 February to 14 March 2015. The group consisted of co-hosts Australia and New Zealand, and along with them, England, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Scotland. This phase of the tournament was played as a full round-robin between all seven teams, with the top four teams, New Zealand, Australia, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, advancing to the quarter-finals.
The Scotland national cricket team represents Scotland in the game of cricket. In 1992 Scotland severed their ties with the Test and County Cricket Board and with English cricket, and gained associate membership of the International Cricket Council (ICC) in their own right in 1994. They competed in the ICC Trophy for the first time in 1997, finishing third and qualifying for the 1999 World Cup, where they lost all their games. They also qualified for the 2007 and 2015 World Cups.
The Ireland cricket team is the cricket team representing all of Ireland. Since 2017 they have been a Full Member of the International Cricket Council. Although Cricket in Ireland has had a presence since the early 1800s, it was in 1993 the Irish Cricket Union, the predecessor to Cricket Ireland, was elected to the International Cricket Council (ICC) as an Associate member. In the 1997 ICC Trophy, Ireland narrowly missed out on qualifying for the 1999 Cricket World Cup, which was ironically co hosted by Ireland, Scotland, England and the Netherlands. Ireland qualified for the World Cup for the first time in 2007, and has since played in the 2011 and 2015 tournaments, and the 2010, 2012, and 2014 World Twenty20 competitions. Ireland's best performance was in 2007, where they surprisingly qualified for the Super 8 Stages.
The England cricket team have appeared in every edition of the Cricket World Cup to date, being crowned champions in 2019. In addition, they were losing finalists in 1979, 1987 and 1992. England have been eliminated from the tournament in the group stage on five occasions
The Indian cricket team toured Australia from 8 to 31 January 2016 to play two tour matches, five One Day International (ODI) and three Twenty20 International (T20I) matches. The full schedule for the tour was announced by Cricket Australia on 9 July 2015.
The English cricket team toured Bangladesh in October 2016 to play three One Day Internationals (ODIs), two Test matches and three tour matches. A terrorist attack in Dhaka four months before the tour started raised concerns about team safety. This led to two members of the England team, regular one-day captain Eoin Morgan and opener Alex Hales, to withdraw from selection.
The Bangladesh cricket team toured South Africa in September and October 2017 to play two Tests, three One Day Internationals (ODIs) and two Twenty20 International (T20I) matches. It was Bangladesh's first tour of South Africa in nine years. Ahead of the series, Faf du Plessis was appointed captain of South Africa's ODI side, replacing AB de Villiers, therefore captaining South Africa in all three formats. However, du Plessis suffered an injury during the third ODI ruling him out of the T20I series, with JP Duminy replacing him as captain.
The Zimbabwe cricket team toured Bangladesh in February and March 2020 to play one Test match, three One Day International (ODI) and two Twenty20 International (T20I) matches. On 26 January 2020, the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) confirmed the itinerary for the tour. It was the first time that a tour between the two sides featured a one-off Test match. Zimbabwe last toured Bangladesh in October and November 2018, and last won a series in the country during their tour in November 2001. On 9 February, the BCB moved the three ODI matches from Chittagong to the Sylhet International Cricket Stadium, to give the venue more exposure and international attention. The one-off Test match was the 100th international match to be played between the two sides.
