Cricket: Reifer steps in for injured Adams

FLOYD REIFER is to replace the injured batsman Jimmy Adams on the West Indies' tour of South Africa. The West Indies Cricket Board said yesterday that Adams would return to the Caribbean after slicing open a finger on his right hand with a bread knife during the team's flight to South Africa on Monday.

Reifer, the Barbados batsman, toured South Africa with a West Indies A team last season. In 10 first-class innings he scored just 108 runs. The 26-year-old left-hander has played two Tests and a one-day international.

The West Indies are in Kimberley preparing for the opening first-class match of their tour, against Griquland West starting tomorrow.

Muttiah Muralitharan, Sri Lanka's star spinner, has been warned that his controversial action will be under close scrutiny during the triangular tournament against Australia and England in January.

The Australian umpire Darrell Hair has been appointed for next week's first Ashes Test and will almost certainly umpire one of Sri Lanka's matches in the one-day series. Hair, who called Muralitharan for throwing seven times in a three-over spell in a Test at Melbourne in 1995, insists he will judge each ball individually. "I am a ball-by-ball umpire," he said. "I have never prejudged any player ,and that will be the case again."

The Pakistan A tour match against the Northern Conference in Timaru, New Zealand, was abandoned the by umpires Doug Cowie and Chris King yesterday after two of the tourists' batsmen suffered broken bones. Wajahatullaha Wasti sustained fractured ribs and Taimur Khan suffered a broken thumb. The incidents came in the middle session of the second day after the home side had batted without trouble during the morning.

"This pitch never looked good," King said. "Some pitches don't look good and play all right, but unfortunately this one didn't."

Cowie said there were suggestions that the teams continue with spinners, but added: "We couldn't play golden oldies rules at this level". Pakistan A had made 141 for 6, chasing the Northern total of 272.