Melbourne, Feb. 6 : Australia on Friday lost its second placed ranking among one-day international teams to India after being defeated by New Zealand in their second one-day international on the trot at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).

New Delhi - Top England players Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff Friday became the most costly cricketers in the Indian Premier League after being bought for
1.55 million dollars each at a players' auction.

The Twenty20 tournament will be played from April 10 onwards and features teams from New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Jaipur, Chennai, Chandigarh and Hyderabad.

Dusseldorf - The boom times of high-digit growth for German football may have come to an end with the advent of the global financial crisis but the Bundesliga looks better prepared than most to weather the financial storm.

"Football must realise that the business can no longer reckon with growth," said German Football League (DFL) vice-president Peter Peters, even though the effects of the economic slowdown have yet to fully hit many of the country's top clubs.

Dhaka, Feb. 6 (ANI): The Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) has decided to review the bowling action of spinner Abdur Razzak before he faces an International Cricket Council's (ICC) assessment.

The BCB will be sending the video footage of Razzak's action to experts in Australia.

"As per our bowling review committee's observation his action has improved but we need to take suggestions from experts, which is why we sent the footage to Australia," The Daily Times quoted the BCB's cricket operations committee chairman Enayet Hossain, as saying.

Panaji, Feb 6 : Star England players Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff have become the costliest players of the Indian Premier League (IPL) after being sold for a whopping 1.55 million dollars in the second edition.

Pietersen was bought by Bangalore Royal Challengers while Flintoff went to Chennai Super King.

Bangalore Royal Challengers spent most of their 1.95 million dollars on Pietersen who had base price of 1.35 million dollars.

Among other players, Australia''s Shawn Tait was purchased by title holders of the inaugural edition Rajasthan Royals for 375,000 dollars while South African batsman Jean Paul Duminy went to Mumbai Indians for 950,000 dollars.

Melbourne, Feb. 6 : Cricket Australia officals have said that all rounder Andrew Symonds knows what he has to do to regain his spot in the Australian cricket team, and added that they will offer him all the support he needs to get back.

This message was conveyed to Symonds at a meeting at Cricket Australia's Jolimont headquarters.