Youth and experience to the fore for France

Youth and experience provided the perfect balance for France in the European Championships in Antwerp and Brussels. The final finishing position of second is the highest rating France have achieved in an ECC Senior Tournament. Their traditional rivals, Germany, were beaten by six wickets after France restricted them to a target of 133. Importantly, the Man of the Match in that game was Arun Ayyavvooraju, only 18 years of age, a young cricketer of great promise, who made a delightful and eye-catching half-century.

Arun, who works hard at his cricket, is an elegant and very determined top-order batsman and medium-pace bowler. Sometimes, sensible changes in technique can provide great benefits, as is shown in his bowling. Formerly something of a tearaway, he has now become a very accurate medium-pacer, and starred in the overall tournament bowling averages.

Preparation is everything in an event of this kind, and France benefited from working hard in the matches in Luxembourg, Belgium and Switzerland, as well as in the 128-run victory over Belgium in a pre-tournament friendly. In that particular game, France's former captain and offspinner Shabir Hussain performed well, but for every brilliant youngster there is always a canny and courageous older player. Guadeloupe offspinner Guy Brumant, a youthful 44 and with 99 caps for France, filled the bill. In two sessions, each of ten overs, he conceded only a total of 31 runs and no-one hit a boundary from his bowling - a superb performance.

Waseem Bhatti kept wicket very well and averaged 64 with the bat, a figure bettered only by Joe Scuderi of Italy and for France overall, it was a very successful tournament.

Namibia's captain, Deon Kotze,is still smarting from his team's shock defeat to Uganda in the Inter-Continental Cup in April, and has declared they will not be undone by complacency at the African Associates' tournament in Lusaka, Zambia, which started on Monday.

"In the past we have underestimated teams to our cost," said Kotze. "So at this tournament we are going all out - we won't be thinking about favouritism or settling for second spot or any other factors - we will be going at full pace and leaving nothing to chance."

Namibia, along with Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and the African Affiliates tournament winner Botswana, are competing this week for two automatic qualifying places at next year's ICC Trophy in Ireland, and a position for the third place-getter at the repechage event in Malaysia in February.

Kotze is confident that the appointment of the former Zimbabwean Test batsman, Andy Waller, as Namibia's fulltime coach has strengthened their sometimes frail batting. "He started with us at the start of July, and has been working on our batting technicalites, which has been a problem for us for a couple of seasons."

While Uganda are at full strength, Namibia are without Bjorn Kotze and Hugo Luddik (both due to studies) and the fast bowler Burton van Rooi (torn ligaments). On the plus side, their experienced batsman Morne Karg has come out of retirement.

Uganda's captain, Junior Kwehiba, said his team's only concern was the form of the 2001 ICC Trophy hero, Kenneth Kamyuka. "He's been struggling a bit with the ball lately."

Nigeria warmed up for the tournament with three matches in Kenya. Although they lost successive matches to Kenya A, the Kenya Academy and Tanzania, the Nigerians gained valuable practice on turf pitches (as opposed to cement at home) and the opportunity to develop some combinations in their first outing together since playing MCC in February 2003.

Botswana are not without hope in the chase for the vital third place (and a trip to Malaysia): two years ago they reached the final of the Africa Cup, defeating Tanzania, Zambia and A teams from Zimbabwe, Kenya and Namibia. They qualified for this tournament by steamrolling the might of Sierra Leone, Malawi and The Gambia.

This tournament will be tougher, the first authentic African non-Test Championship comprising truly representative teams.

European countries with players aligned to English counties will need to employ the usual diplomatic approach to ensure full-strength teams during next year's ICC Trophy.

The ICC's Chris Briers said there was no chance the counties would be directed to release players to national teams for the World Cup qualifying event. "We think a dictatorial stance creates ill-feeling between the relevant parties. Holland have always enjoyed success getting their players released by working with the counties, so that's the best way to go."

Meanwhile, Scotland will be chasing a win in this week's Inter-Continental Cup match against Ireland in Clontarf to secure the European semi-final spot. Ireland are presently 12.5 points ahead of Scotland, following their decisive victory over Holland earlier this month.

From Scotland's squad, which drew with the Dutch, Asim Butt, Cedric English, Gregor Maiden and Simon Smith come in for Craig Smith, Greig Williamson (unavailable), Majid Haq and Steven Knox (both omitted). For Ireland, Jason Molins and Paul Mooney are included in place of Kyle McCallan and John Mooney. McCallan has the not-so-small matter of his wedding, while Mooney has been omitted.

Ireland go into the tournament confident, after confirming their place as Europe's strongest Associate, in finishing runner-up to England Amateurs in a bowlout. Scotland will be hoping their batting jitters, which plagued their European Championship campaign, do not return.