fitness

concern By ANDY WILSON ANDY Flintoff's fitness is still causing England concern, coach Duncan Fletcher admitted today.

After a three days England camp at a Cheshire sports centre, Fletcher was generally pleased with the Lancashire star's progress.

But he added: "We have to be a little bit careful about him. He has to take care of his foot, especially when it comes to bowling."

Flintoff broke his left foot during the Cape Town Test and his only bowling spell since was a nine overs stint during a Lancashire one-day match on their recent tour of South Africa.

Now he has just over a month to get back to full fitness before England name their squad for the first Test against Zimbabwe. Fletcher wants Lancashire to use Flintoff and their two other England squad men, Mike Atherton and Chris Schofield in the curtain-raiser at Cambridge University on Friday.

"All the squad need to get as much Cricket as possible before the Tests start in the middle of May" he explained.

Before that however, England have to settle the contracts dispute between Lord's and the 12 players who have been offered Test match deals for this summer. None have yet signed and the England Cricket Board have given them until tomorrow.

Captain Nasser Hussain said: "It is not about money. The contract is a new thing, and it is a highly complex document. We want to make sure that everything is right, not just for us but for players of the future.

"I am sure we will get it sorted. But it will be up to the individuals and if certain players don't sign there will be problems. But I'm not prepared to pre-judge anything."

But it seemed from the Board's terse statement that they have lost patience after weeks of negotiations. The statement said: Following discussions with the players and their representatives over the weekend we have issued final contracts and are expecting the players to agree by Thursday.

"Since discussions first began, the ECB has sought to accommodate the players' wishes in a number of areas and believes that the contract contains substantial benefits over the past and compares favourably with contracts in other countries."

Hussain denies the sticking points were over money. "There were three or four things we wanted changing and the Board have changed two or three," he said.

One of the issues was over image rights, particularly in relation to internet websites, but another concerned paternity leave under EEC regulations.

Ian Botham finished only 16th in a poll conducted by the cricket bible Wisden to find the five Cricketers of the Century. Don Bradman was top, followed by Garry Sobers, Jack Hobbs, Shane Warne and Viv Richards.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.