MUMBAI:West Indies, massively boosted by their five-wicket win in the first Twenty20, will take on hosts South Africa in the first Test match starting Boxing Day, and Ten Sports, the most watched sports channel in the Sub-continent, will telecast ball-by-ball coverage of the enthralling competition.

The match, to be played at St. George?s Park in Port Elizabeth, also the venue of their Twenty20 victory, gets underway on Wednesday, December 26, with the live coverage starting 2:00 pm IST.

However, the bad news for West Indies is that captain Chris Gayle may not recover from his hamstring injury, which he picked up during the tour of Zimbabwe.

A frustrated Gayle sat out the Twenty20 match, as well as the three-day warm-up game against South Africa A and admitted: ?I?ll weep if I can?t play in the first Test. I?m finding it very frustrating to see the boys play while I have to sit here in the dressing room. It?s frustrating me endlessly.?

West Indies will be hoping Gayle takes out all his frustration on the South African bowling whenever he returns to the team. If West Indies wants to avenge their 2-0 defeat at home to South Africa the last time the two teams clashed in 2004-05, Gayle will play a big role with his swashbuckling and dominating batting style.

Dwayne Bravo has been leading the team in Gayle?s absence since the third ODI against Zimbabwe at Harare earlier this month. He led West Indies to a 3-1 series victory, followed by the five-wicket win in the first Twenty20 international against South Africa.

South Africa have retained the same 12-man squad from the two-Test series against New Zealand for the first two matches against West Indies. Which means Graeme Smith, who missed the Makhaya Ntini benefit match and the Twenty20 international, returns to lead the side.

But veteran Shaun Pollock was continued to be left out of the playing XI in favour of Dale Steyn, who was extremely impressive against the Kiwis, wrecking them with ten-wicket hauls in both games.

West Indies play three Test matches, five one day internationals, and one more Twenty20 international match during their South African journey. The complete series will be available live and exclusive on Ten Sports.

Schedule:

MUMBAI: Keeping up with the momentum and providing viewers with some more entertainment and non-stop masti is Nach Baliye‘s Dance for Charity.Supporting the cause for children, the Dance for Charity invites all viewers to donate one‘s desired amount to childline India Foundation. Hosted by the effervescent Juhi Parmar, the dhamakedar episode will be featured on Friday 28 December and 4 January on Star Plus from 8 to 9 pm. From the very charismatic to the enigmatic, the performances will ensure that the Nach Baliye fever is here to stay.

The donation would include the following process:
Sending a Cheque / DD to childline India Foundation
Log on to childline web site ( www.childlineindia.org.in ) and use the online donate option.

MUMBAI: Red FM Delhi, the ‘station for expression‘ of millions of music lovers is the official radio partner for Delhi‘s ‘s three biggest college events ‘Confluence‘, organized by Hansraj college, ‘Mecca‘ arranged by Hindu College and ‘Crosswinds‘ arranged by St.Stephen‘s. Keeping in tune with its strategy to target the youth and reach listeners at various touch points, Red FM promises to add much more excitement, entertainment to these youth festivals.

During the day Red FM team will be present all through the event and conduct various interactive games at the Red Dhamaal Zone setup at Hindu and Hansraj College. Students can win loads of Red FM branded merchandises. Live songs requests would be taken from the campus and these would be aired on Mera wala Gana with RJ Smriti.

Commenting on this initiative Akash Verma, Station Head Delhi said, "Along with ground-breaking on-air content, Red FM participates in various on-ground activities to reinforce the bond with our listeners and reach out to them in every possible way. With our interesting concepts surrounding college events we want to reach out to the youth of Delhi and provide a ‘platform of expression‘ for the youth."

Red FM has numerous interactive and exciting initiatives targeting college students. These initiatives give Red FM a great opportunity to interact and engage with the young students and ensure non-stop entertainment to not only the college audiences but also to all the listeners who are ardent fans of the Radio station.

MUMBAI: Shemaroo Entertainment releases award winning, evergreen, classic ‘The Graduate‘. This film completes 40 years this year and is still alive amidst contemporary movies.

The essence of The Graduate is that, the film is not confined to a particular era and will never fade out from the minds of audiences.

Directed by Mike Nichols, the movie is a romantic comedy starring Dustin Hoffman, Katharine Ross and Anne Bancroft among others.

The Graduate has won the 1968 Academy Awards, USA and Mike Nichols has also won the Oscar Best Director. The film is also the winner of 1969 BAFTA awards, Best Direction and Best Film.

The story revolves around a college graduate Benjamin Braddock who is trapped into an affair with the wife of his father‘s business partner, Mrs. Robinson. Having accepted an offer of sex from this older woman, the affair is well and good until the protagonist is pushed to go out with Robinsons‘ daughter Elaine and falls in love with her.

Certainly an affair to remember, which comes back to haunt Ben, when he finds himself falling for Elaine, Mrs. Robinson‘s daughter.

Dustin Hoffman shows why he is one of the late twentieth century‘s leading actors with a splendid performance as the often bewildered Ben Braddock.

Leading lady Anne Bancroft is a smouldering cauldron of sexual prowess as Mrs. Robinson, while Kate Ross plays the na?ve and beautiful, innocent Elaine.

Needless to say, a must watch by one and all!

MUMBAI: FILMY‘s Bathroom Singer, concluded with Delhi based Veena Parashar winning the contest.It is for the first time that a woman has won a music based reality show in India. Along with the title, Veena has won a whopping sum of Rs. 25 lakhs as prize money!

The show was a hunt for an untrained singer, with the unique combination of singing and an entertainment quotient or ‘jhaag‘. Out of more than ten thousand auditions, twelve people were chosen and the final match was between the 22 year old Veena and the 38 year Dr Gautam Banerjee.

On winning, Veena Parashar states: "I feel great on this achievement. It has been a 4 month long journey for me, away from my family. I feel really happy that all the sacrifices and hard work have reflected in my performances and have been appreciated by the viewers!" On asking what she intends to do with prize money, Parashar states: "I want to donate most of it to my grandmother‘s dharamshala, while the rest I will give to my parents for all the love and support that they have given me."

Dr Gautam Banerjee states: "The concept of the show was extremely unique and with no music background, I never thought I would reach even this far. It was a great experience to be a part of the show, and being one of the final two is a big victory in itself for me."

Judging the performances of the contestants was an eclectic jury panel comprising of disco king Bappi Lehari, Bhojpuri superstar Ravi Kishan, and the talented singer-cum-composer Shibani Kashyap.

Bappi Lehari said: "Bathroom Singer was a refreshingly original concept as it broke the monotony of the traditional music reality shows. It appealed to me for both its setting and the kind of natural and spontaneous talent it promised to unveil. It was really tough for us to guess who will be the winner. I must thank the viewers for making the job easier for the judges. For me both Veena & Dr Gautam are the winners and I will give them their first break as playback singers in Bollywood."

Says Ravi Kishan: "I was extremely excited to be a judge on a show like ‘Bathroom Singer‘, as it was about an ordinary person who had to win a million hearts. Veena Parashar came out as the sure winner by doing just that!"

MUMBAI: This New Year‘s Eve, Star Movies viewers can power into 2008 with the X-Men trilogy.In a first for Asia, all three X-Men movies will air in a back-to-back marathon starting 29 December at 11 p.m. and runs for three consecutive nights. Don‘t miss your chance to catch this super-powered series on Star Movies!

On 31 December at 9pm, Star Movies premieres X-Men: The Last Stand. This final chapter follows what happens when scientists discover a cure for mutants. Although some mutants welcome the breakthrough, others fear that it will threaten their population with extinction.

While the first two X-Men films were helmed by Bryan Singer (Superman Returns), this last entry was directed by Brett Ratner, the man behind the Rush Hour trilogy. Since The Last Stand was to be the final film in the series, Ratner wanted to go out with a bang. "I went to the writers and I said, ‘What are the things that weren‘t in the first two movies that fans are dying for, that real fans of the comics want to see?‘" he explained. "[The Last Stand] has everything you want in a movie. It‘s got drama, action, emotion, intelligence."

Critics agreed. The Wall Street Journal‘s reviewer called Ratner‘s film "terrifically entertaining" while the movie critic for the Dallas Observer noted that, "If this is the last stand, it‘s a stylish farewell indeed." Finally Seattle Post-Intelligencer‘s William Arnold wrote that "X-III packs more action and razzle-dazzle visuals into its 104-minute running time than Mission: Impossible III, Poseidon and The Da Vinci Code combined."

The X-Men movie franchise has been wildly successful, taking in over US$1 billion worldwide. Each film in the series has earned more than its predecessor with X-Men: The Last Stand, bringing in over US$235mil at the US box office.

On New Year‘s Eve, Star Movies viewers can ring in 2008 with a back-to-back marathon of the X-Men series. Catch the action-packed trilogy every night at 11 p.m. from December 29 - 31st exclusively on Star Movies.