Crowd trouble mars Indian win at Rajkot George Bernard Shaw would have felt vindicated. The third one-dayer at Rajkot did not have featured flannelled fools in the middle, but it certainly exhibited a few fools in the stands. Chasing a target of 300 - made possible by some wonderful batting from Chris Gayle (72), Ramnaresh Sarwan (84) and Shivnarine Chanderpaul (74) - India were cruising to a forceful win. The opening pair - but primarily Virender Sehwag - set out to collar the living daylights out of the West Indian bowling, and in the process they put on 196 for the first wicket in only 26.4 overs. Sehwag got to his century off 75 balls, and although Ganguly fell in the 27th over, any self-respecting cricket fan would have settled back for some unabashed hitting from Sehwag with only 100 more runs to get. But apparently that breed of fan was in short supply at Rajkot, for a few bottles started to rain on the boundary fielders. Understandably irritated at the third successive instance of crowd trouble, the tourists refused to go on, and India won on the Duckworth/Lewis method.

Procter defends decision to stop play India bounced back in the one-day series with a win at Rajkot, but Sourav Ganguly would have preferred that it came under the team's own steam, and not the crowd's. But he avoided much reference to the crowd trouble, and concentrated instead of Virender Sehwag's batting. "He (Sehwag) is outstanding. It's good to bat with him," said Ganguly. "I never tried to stop him playing shots. He should continue to play that way." Ganguly also said batsmen-friendly conditions had made things tough for bowlers. "We need some mercy for bowlers in India. There is not much room for error. It's good to have a win. We will be a confident side in Ahmedabad." West Indies captain Ridley Jacobs said 300 should have been a defendable total. "We batted well, but did not bowl well. The total looked good at first. But after we had bowled, we realised we should have scored a few more runs." Man of the Match Sehwag said that he had been determined to come good after managing only 28 and one in the previous two games. "The wicket was very good. I realised if I play along the ground in the first five to six overs, we can win easily," he said. Match Referee Mike Procter was perhaps the most sought-after man after the game. He defended his decision to discontinue the match, saying, "We tried to prevent serious injury. We have had problems in all three games. If the bottle had hit somebody on the face, it could have seriously injured him. I think security in general in India, the Indian board has done a fantastic job," continued Procter. "But obviously there is problem with crowd control. It can be pretty difficult if there is a bad element who can cause problems."

ICC seeks to increase power after crowd trouble The International Cricket Council (ICC) said it was looking at expanding its powers to remove international status from venues after crowd trouble again marred India's one-day series with West Indies on Tuesday. India were declared the winners of the third one-dayer at Rajkot when play was abandoned after West Indies fielders were struck by objects thrown from the crowd. ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed said while it did not at present have the authority to remove the international status of a venue, its Safety and Security Committee would consider it "imminently". "We have asked this committee to consider appropriate penalties for venues which consistently fail to meet their obligations in meeting minimum standards of security," Speed said in a statement. "This is likely to include the ultimate sanction of withdrawing international status from a ground, combined with a heavy financial penalty."

Get session-by-session audio updates as CricInfo keeps you abreast of the play. Click Here This could be your first step towards cricket journalism fame. Send in your rants and raves to "The Writer in You." Click Here Missed the match? Just press replay. CricInfo's Action Replay photo feature. Click Here