**Official** England in New Zealand

[Prince EWS]

Mills and Martin >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Broad.

 

[Leslie1]

Mills and Martin >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Broad.

No.

Broad got wickets on unresponsive wickets. At 21 I'd already rate him better than Mills and Martin. Who are both by international standards, JOURNEYMEN.

 

[Flem274*]

Excuse me Flem, I think you rate our bowlers a bit too highly. Sidebottom and Hoggard and Broad all are better bowlers than our Mills and Martins. The only bowler anywhere near the English bowlers in quality is Franklin, and he's injured. The rest are bits and pieces bowlers with adequate pace, and only bowl well to a plan. Once the batsmen get dominant, they don't have a clue how to get them out. We have only had one really good bowler since Hadlee, and that is Bond. The rest are rubbish. I'll chuck Vettori in that same bunch.

If you need a rough guide, trying You tubing any of those New Zealand bowlers and see if there is any highlights package. Sharma and Steyn have plenty, so do Hoggard, Harmison, Sidebottom. We have none, apart from Bondy. It's a fair reflection.

One thing we do have is we always punch above our weight. We will resort to all sorts of negativity bowling (holding them down in economy rates, make them score slow, frustrate the batsmen), and most of the time, this doesn't win you test series. It gets you the odd win every now and then in 1 game, then the opposition works us out, and we get kicked losing series 2-1. Or we can be just rubbish and get kicked. That's how it will always be.

We won't ever threaten other countries above us in rankings with "awesome" bowlers, we can only toil away and hope they are out of form. Even then it's pushing it.

Utter, bottom class, tripe.

To call Chris Martin, Kyle Mills, Jeetan Patel, Jacob Oram and Daniel Vettori "bits and pieces cricketers" is a joke. You seem to subscribe to the popular myth that NZ are a hard working bunch with no talent. We owned England in many patches of that tour through high quality swing bowling. You don't need to be a fast bowler like Hadlee or Bond to be good. Mills, Martin, Southee and Franklin all use swing extremely well. Add to that that all bar Franklin have excellent accuracy and you have a bunch of good bowlers. Apart from Paul Collingwood and Tim Ambrose, the English didn't have a clue and their only good team total was the second innings at Napier which was a flat track bully zone. I don't mean this as an insult to Englands high quality players, I mean this as a compliment to our accurate seamers that use swing extremely well. Patel and Vettori, whether you like it or not, are good bowlers. All your whinging about Vettori won't change the fact is a quality spinner. Not a world beater ala Warne, Murali bt a spinner that does what he does extremely well.

Now I rate you as a poster but we can safely resign your comments quoted to the same trash bin as "Sinclair is a ******."

 

[Leslie1]

Oh no, they are quality cricketers the lot of them. I totally agree. But they are bits and pieces bowlers. Take their batting out of the equation, and that New Zealand side might as well concede tests without participating. Because the trashing would be embarassing.

When Martin gets a 10-wicket bag from tests he plays in, or become as dominant in a test series like a Sidebottom, he's all class. Until that happens, they are, "bit and pieces" bowlers, because they can't carry a bowling attack on their own. Not even close.

 

[Flem274*]

Oh no, they are quality cricketers the lot of them. I totally agree. But they are bits and pieces bowlers. Take their batting out of the equation, and that New Zealand side might as well concede tests without participating. Because the trashing would be embarassing.

When Martin gets a 10-wicket bag from tests he plays in, or become as dominant in a test series like a Sidebottom, he's all class. Until that happens, they are, "bit and pieces" bowlers, because they can't carry a bowling attack on their own. Not even close.

Sidebottom is in amazing form atm, its hardly a fair comparison.

Martin, if you haven't noticed with your goldfish memory, has taken a hell of alot of wickets in an innings quite often. Kyle Mills has only just begun and he looks high quality. Neither a fast, but they are excellent at using swing and are accurate and they take wickets. What more do you want?

As for the last two sentences in the first paragraph, you're starting to show you should switch to ringing talkback radio and having a good rant. That is garbage, seriously, GAGFC. Show some ****ing pride and faith you defeatist, spineless, glory on losses, worm. Our team deserves better than that, they have genuine potential to be an excellent side.

 

[Leslie1]

Yep, so did the New Zealand side (showed promise) with Fleming as captain at 23, Chris Cairns, Nathan Astle, Craig McMillan, Chris Harris, Dion Nash... (name the rest of the mid 90s lineup most from Canterbury btw)

They showed tremendous promise. But why are we constantly at this rebuilding phase. We seem to rebuild forever, never seeing our side become at one stage dominant or at least come second to Australia more often than not.

India is going through a rennaissance atm, in fact has been for the last 4 years. Once they start rebuilding, it's obvious.

We seem to rebuild every season.

I don't want to sound negative, I'm generally not a negative poster. I prefer to know the truth and have a realist view, instead of hyping them up before they play enough etc.

Discussing lineups and their potentials I'm fine, but all I'm hearing at the moment is how good they are compared to other international bowlers and there is nothing to back that up. I repeat nothing. We just got trashed in our last series to England despite being in a strong position to win the series.

We got trashed in South Africa.

Putting a cheerleader hat on doesn't all of a sudden mean other posters might have something that doesn't agree with you "rubbish". I don't think you're rubbish, I don't think Prince EWS Sinclair lover rubbish, all are valid, and I enjoy reading your posts.



I even admit I'm a Vettori basher, so take my posts about him with a grain of salt, or simply don't respond if they sound stupid to you. With Sinclair, well, I'm amazed he's such a legend around here.

 

[NZTailender]

Good god, this is what I'm trying to make sure people avoid discussing. If these two play, we only have Martin and Mills opening the bowling, with Oram the first change. And when Oram is injured, HELLO medium pacers - Elliot, Taylor, Ryder... AS OUR FIRST CHANGE BOWLER~~~~~~~~

If Patel play, SOUTHEE IS out of the side. That's freaking tragic on wickets that doesn't take turn in English conditions. In fact I'll go as far as to argue that's the weakness of the Indian side with Kumble and Harbajan having to take the field at the same time.

IDEALLY, you'd want swing bowlers opening the bowling, then first change should be a bowler with pure pace and bounce. Oram doesn't have the pace. He's more a stock bowler, not a wicket taking bowler. This is tragic. I hope he does us all a favor and quit trying to hog a place in the side with his negative bowling.

First of all, Elliott bowling first change is more to do with the fact there was two spinners in the side, not because he's a decent bowler. It's more of a given, really. There's been quite a few times when Ganguly (for example) has been used as a first change bowler. It's not ideal, but you're relying on them to fill in those awkward overs between a ball being good for swinging and a ball being good for spinning.

If you've even bothered to watch New Zealand play cricket recently, apart from the rare occasions where two spinners have been played, the first change bowler has been, HEAVIN FORBID, a pure bowler. Shall I show you some examples?

To play an effective first change bowler in a side with two spinners you either have to play 3 specialist seamers and one of those spinners being an allrounder, or the first change seamer being an all-rounder. Otherwise you're playing 5 specialist bowlers, and you're unbalanced.

Oram isn't trying to hog a spot in the side with his negative bowling He's picked as an allrounder - a batting one at that, really. Except his bowling is better than your average batting allrounder (like a Styris, or Symonds). Again, did you watch the most recent test series? Oram bowled absolutely superbly. Ignoring the fact he's often used as second change, I'd still prefer him as first change to someone like Iain O'Brien.

No.

Broad got wickets on unresponsive wickets. At 21 I'd already rate him better than Mills and Martin. Who are both by international standards, JOURNEYMEN.

Haha, this is just dire. Martin is a greatly improved test bowler, not great, but I'd still pick him ahead of Broad based on experience. Broad has promise, but no way is he a better bowler now than Martin, let alone Mills who is relatively new (in terms of matches) to the test scene, and basically won us a test and has improved out of sight since his test debut. The South African tour before the last one springs to mind as an indication of this, and he's getting better.

Excuse me Flem, I think you rate our bowlers a bit too highly. Sidebottom and Hoggard and Broad all are better bowlers than our Mills and Martins. The only bowler anywhere near the English bowlers in quality is Franklin, and he's injured. The rest are bits and pieces bowlers with adequate pace, and only bowl well to a plan. Once the batsmen get dominant, they don't have a clue how to get them out. We have only had one really good bowler since Hadlee, and that is Bond. The rest are rubbish. I'll chuck Vettori in that same bunch.

If you need a rough guide, trying You tubing any of those New Zealand bowlers and see if there is any highlights package. Sharma and Steyn have plenty, so do Hoggard, Harmison, Sidebottom. We have none, apart from Bondy. It's a fair reflection.

One thing we do have is we always punch above our weight. We will resort to all sorts of negativity bowling (holding them down in economy rates, make them score slow, frustrate the batsmen), and most of the time, this doesn't win you test series. It gets you the odd win every now and then in 1 game, then the opposition works us out, and we get kicked losing series 2-1. Or we can be just rubbish and get kicked. That's how it will always be.

We won't ever threaten other countries above us in rankings with "awesome" bowlers, we can only toil away and hope they are out of form. Even then it's pushing it.

NZ's bowling and batting stocks have rarely if ever looked to match anyone other countries except the minnows. We have a small population, a smaller interest in cricket and a level of domestic cricket and talent to go with that. However, I think you're greatly insulting your own country here. Sidebottom and Hoggard may be better than Martin and Mills (we're not talking streets ahead either), but Martin and Mills are a darn sight better than Harmison, Anderson, Mahmood, Plunkett and, at this stage, Broad for my money.

Also, saying Bond is the only good bowler since Hadlee is an insult to Chris Cairns & Dion Nash; not to mention the short, injury effected careers of Chris Drum, Daryl Tuffey and Shayne O'Connor.

Michael Mason, Mark Gillespie, Chris Martin and Kyle Mills have the ability to be good test bowlers. Two of them already are. I think you're forgetting that it's rare for us to have cricketers who will be remembered as all time greats - but we shouldn't settle for mediocrity either (O'Brien, Wiseman et al). We have the tools to make a good attack, but if anything hurts us most of all, it's injuries. Having 1 'test class' bowler and batsman, backed up by competent players, is good enough to win you matches on your day like it did for us in the 80's. It will take a long time for New Zealand to become a dominant test match nation like Australia with a majority of 'great' players in the same side at once, if at all.


We shouldn't settle for mediocrity, but for crying out loud, we're better than you think.

 

[NZTailender]

Oh no, they are quality cricketers the lot of them. I totally agree. But they are bits and pieces bowlers. Take their batting out of the equation, and that New Zealand side might as well concede tests without participating. Because the trashing would be embarassing.

Given the retirement from tests of Scott Styris, I'd say we're less bits and pieces than ever.

When Martin gets a 10-wicket bag from tests he plays in, or become as dominant in a test series like a Sidebottom, he's all class. Until that happens, they are, "bit and pieces" bowlers, because they can't carry a bowling attack on their own. Not even close.

Haha, this is incredibly poor. A player can't carry a bowling attack on his own so he's bits and pieces? It's not the job of a bowler to carry an attack; it's to be apart of one.

 

[NZTailender]

Yep, so did the New Zealand side (showed promise) with Fleming as captain at 23, Chris Cairns, Nathan Astle, Craig McMillan, Chris Harris, Dion Nash... (name the rest of the mid 90s lineup most from Canterbury btw)

They showed tremendous promise. But why are we constantly at this rebuilding phase. We seem to rebuild forever, never seeing our side become at one stage dominant or at least come second to Australia more often than not.

India is going through a rennaissance atm, in fact has been for the last 4 years. Once they start rebuilding, it's obvious.

We seem to rebuild every season.

I don't want to sound negative, I'm generally not a negative poster. I prefer to know the truth and have a realist view, instead of hyping them up before they play enough etc.

Discussing lineups and their potentials I'm fine, but all I'm hearing at the moment is how good they are compared to other international bowlers and there is nothing to back that up. I repeat nothing. We just got trashed in our last series to England despite being in a strong position to win the series.

We got trashed in South Africa.

Putting a cheerleader hat on doesn't all of a sudden mean other posters might have something that doesn't agree with you "rubbish". I don't think you're rubbish, I don't think Prince EWS Sinclair lover rubbish, all are valid, and I enjoy reading your posts.



I even admit I'm a Vettori basher, so take my posts about him with a grain of salt, or simply don't respond if they sound stupid to you. With Sinclair, well, I'm amazed he's such a legend around here.

NZ is truly in a rebuilding phase right now, though, given the retirement of Fleming, Astle and McMillan in recent times and Bond going to the ICL (plus the likes of Tuffey, Adams and Vincent). Previously, we were injury plagued and fielding sub-strength sides because of this.

 

[Flem274*]

Yep, so did the New Zealand side (showed promise) with Fleming as captain at 23, Chris Cairns, Nathan Astle, Craig McMillan, Chris Harris, Dion Nash... (name the rest of the mid 90s lineup most from Canterbury btw)

They showed tremendous promise. But why are we constantly at this rebuilding phase. We seem to rebuild forever, never seeing our side become at one stage dominant or at least come second to Australia more often than not.

India is going through a rennaissance atm, in fact has been for the last 4 years. Once they start rebuilding, it's obvious.

We seem to rebuild every season.

I don't want to sound negative, I'm generally not a negative poster. I prefer to know the truth and have a realist view, instead of hyping them up before they play enough etc.

Discussing lineups and their potentials I'm fine, but all I'm hearing at the moment is how good they are compared to other international bowlers and there is nothing to back that up. I repeat nothing. We just got trashed in our last series to England despite being in a strong position to win the series.

We got trashed in South Africa.

Putting a cheerleader hat on doesn't all of a sudden mean other posters might have something that doesn't agree with you "rubbish". I don't think you're rubbish, I don't think Prince EWS Sinclair lover rubbish, all are valid, and I enjoy reading your posts.



I even admit I'm a Vettori basher, so take my posts about him with a grain of salt, or simply don't respond if they sound stupid to you. With Sinclair, well, I'm amazed he's such a legend around here.

I wouldn't call myself a cheerleader at all. I refuse to admit defeat yes, but I give my honest assessments, just as you do. I believe Kyle Mills, Chris Martin and Tim Southee are all high quality seamers and all three can take teams apart. You've seen Mills and Southee do it in this series.

Yup, we got trashed in South Africa, and we choked in the England series. England did not win comfortably however, they played some horrendus cricket and were put to the sword by our bowlers. Our batsmen however, threw the advantage away.

We are in a longer rebuilding phase than usual because our batsmen that were supposed to continue on (Marshall, Vincent, McMillan, Sinclair, Styris) are gone for various reasons. At this stage ideally we'd only be introducing Fulton, Taylor and Ryder to test cricket but because those five haven't come through for us we have had the rug pulled out from underneath us. We will pick ourselves up off the floor though.

Nash, Cairns, Doull, Allot, etc were all ruined by injury which was a setback.

We only have the lower order and the bowlers left from the group which should be forming our side right now.

Why are they good compared to other bowlers? Go look at Kyle Mills' cricinfo profie and discover the world of statistics. Martin is our reliable workhorse, Southee is showing promise, Franklin is our best seamer full stop, Vettori..no I won't go there with you Mason is our line and length, long spell, infuriate the batsmen reserve bowler, Mark Gillespie sorta resembles a toned down Harmison in that he's either going to destroy teams or struggle. Tuffey is another who was part of the plan I'm sure but thanks to injury he is gone.

 

[NZTailender]

Also slightly mystified at the attack on bowlers re: loss to England when it was clearly the batting that let us down...

 

[Leslie1]

NZ's bowling and batting stocks have rarely if ever looked to match anyone other countries except the minnows.

We shouldn't settle for mediocrity, but for crying out loud, we're better than you think.

Okay. Like I said, if these bowlers (who are better than I think they are) can perform away from home (less we forget we played and lost a home series) like on this English tour, feel free to repeat the above post.

If we get dorked on English soil in the tests, please do refrain from hyping them up like they are world beaters. I responded to Flem274's comparison with the English bowlers which sounds totally out of it when read from someone who's not a Kiwi. In fact, I'd argue any bowler in England who plays County cricket is probably better (for the xp) than our domestic scene developed bowlers on average.

I also hope I don't become a one-eyed supporter (like a typical Crusader fan) of Black Caps without realizing that other countries have bowlers better that ours because of how many they can pick from in their respective countries.

Give me a (current and playing) world 11 test bowling team and it won't have a New Zealander in it.

I hope I get proven wrong, not by you guys, but by them performing year in year out in the test arena, not just based on what happened in the home series just past, ignoring the whopping we got in South Africa.

Go Black Caps *waves flag.

Edit: Oh if rankings are anything to go by, our top bowler is Bond. Then its a long way down to Martin. Hope that provides a bit of perspective, esp. to Flem's post about saying our test bowlers are similar to England's.

That England bowling unit of Harmison, Flintoff, Hoggard, Jones destroyed Australia in Ashes 05 at their peaks. Dare we dream of doing the same with Martin, Mills and Southee at their peaks?

 

[Flem274*]

Okay. Like I said, if these bowlers (who are better than I think they are) can perform away from home (less we forget we played and lost a home series) like on this English tour, feel free to repeat the above post.

If we get dorked on English soil in the tests, please do refrain from hyping them up like they are world beaters. I responded to Flem274's comparison with the English bowlers which sounds totally out of it when read from someone who's not a Kiwi. In fact, I'd argue any bowler in England who plays County cricket is probably better (for the xp) than our domestic scene developed bowlers on average.

I also hope I don't become a one-eyed supporter (like a typical Crusader fan) of Black Caps without realizing that other countries have bowlers better that ours because of how many they can pick from in their respective countries.

Give me a (current and playing) world 11 test bowling team and it won't have a New Zealander in it.

I hope I get proven wrong, not by you guys, but by them performing year in year out in the test arena, not just based on what happened in the home series just past, ignoring the whopping we got in South Africa.

Go Black Caps *waves flag.

Hmmm does Geg want to reveal the trump card?

There's a difference between one eyed and positive. Martin will never be world class, Mills will be very good, Southee looks like having unlimited potential and Franklin has the potential to be world class.

Your average County bowler wouldn't get a look in at the NZ side. I'm not sure how Plunkett and Mahmood got near the English side.

A world XI would only contain one English bowler, Ryan Sidebottom. Try and tell me James Anderson or Harmison are better than Mills, Martin and co. Broad would have a good chance of making our side, doesn't mean he's better than Mills though. he's a line and length bowler in the 140s with only a slight amount of movement. A goo bowler but not an outstanding one.

I don't believe our current side are world beaters, they have alot of potential, but atm we aren't ahead of Aus, SA, India. I aven't seen the rest play for a while so I have no idea how they'd compare to us. We're on par with England IMO.

 

[NZTailender]

Okay. Like I said, if these bowlers (who are better than I think they are) can perform away from home (less we forget we played and lost a home series) like on this English tour, feel free to repeat the above post.

If we get dorked on English soil in the tests, please do refrain from hyping them up like they are world beaters. I responded to Flem274's comparison with the English bowlers which sounds totally out of it when read from someone who's not a Kiwi. In fact, I'd argue any bowler in England who plays County cricket is probably better (for the xp) than our domestic scene developed bowlers on average.

I'm not hyping anyone up as world beaters, I'm saying our bowlers aren't as bad as you think. I'm more realistic if anything; we have a good group of bowlers to select from, unfortunately we don't have any all time greats playing for us right now unlike some of the other countries (India with Kumble (IMO), SL with Murali, SA with Ntini).

As for the English County thing...gee no really? Do you know how many games those guys play? More than our domestic players. So, you know, it'd be worrying if they didn't have more experience than our guys. But does that make them better? Sajid Mahmood says no.

I also hope I don't become a one-eyed supporter (like a typical Crusader fan) of Black Caps without realizing that other countries have bowlers better that ours because of how many they can pick from in their respective countries.

Give me a (current and playing) world 11 test bowling team and it won't have a New Zealander in it.

They'd be rarely a time when any New Zealander would make any current 'world 11 test bowling team'.

Let's put it this way, most of the other nations premier playing bowlers (i.e. #1, #2) bowlers are better than New Zealand's. But are their remaining bowlers? Not entirely.Martin could make a few of the current test sides, IMO.

I hope I get proven wrong, not by you guys, but by them performing year in year out in the test arena, not just based on what happened in the home series just past, ignoring the whopping we got in South Africa.

Go Black Caps *waves flag.

I hope so to. Ideally, I'd love for New Zealand to win every single match we play. But, that's improbable.

 

[Leslie1]

Hmmm does Geg want to reveal the trump card?

There's a difference between one eyed and positive. Martin will never be world class, Mills will be very good, Southee looks like having unlimited potential and Franklin has the potential to be world class.

Your average County bowler wouldn't get a look in at the NZ side. I'm not sure how Plunkett and Mahmood got near the English side.

A world XI would only contain one English bowler, Ryan Sidebottom. Try and tell me James Anderson or Harmison are better than Mills, Martin and co. Broad would have a good chance of making our side, doesn't mean he's better than Mills though. he's a line and length bowler in the 140s with only a slight amount of movement. A goo bowler but not an outstanding one.

I don't believe our current side are world beaters, they have alot of potential, but atm we aren't ahead of Aus, SA, India. I aven't seen the rest play for a while so I have no idea how they'd compare to us. We're on par with England IMO.

I just find that hard to believe when we haven't won a test series against a serious test nation for the last ten years. We even lost our short test series to Sri Lanka not that far back. Actually interesting, if someone can pull up our test series record by New Zealand over the last 5 seasons. How many we won and lost?

 

[Flem274*]

I just find that hard to believe when we haven't won a test series against a serious test nation for the last ten years. We even lost our short test series to Sri Lanka not that far back. Actually interesting, if someone can pull up our test series record by New Zealand over the last 5 seasons. How many we won and lost?

Oh my God, how wrong can you get?

 

[KiWiNiNjA]

Also slightly mystified at the attack on bowlers re: loss to England when it was clearly the batting that let us down...

Touche

 

[NZTailender]

Hmmm does Geg want to reveal the trump card?

Yeah, may come as a shock to Leslie1, but I'm not actually a real New Zealander. Born in Australia, emigrated to Dunedin last year.

There's a difference between one eyed and positive. Martin will never be world class, Mills will be very good, Southee looks like having unlimited potential and Franklin has the potential to be world class.

Chris Martin will never consistently be World Class, but he can be so on his day. This is better than someone who will only ever achieve it once in a blue moon or never at all.

Your average County bowler wouldn't get a look in at the NZ side. I'm not sure how Plunkett and Mahmood got near the English side.

AWTA. There are a few Australian state players I could say "I wish they'd play for us" but no county (ones who aren't in the current English test team) who I could say that about. Charlie Shreck at a stretch, but maybe because he's done well in our conditions this season.

A world XI would only contain one English bowler, Ryan Sidebottom. Try and tell me James Anderson or Harmison are better than Mills, Martin and co. Broad would have a good chance of making our side, doesn't mean he's better than Mills though. he's a line and length bowler in the 140s with only a slight amount of movement. A goo bowler but not an outstanding one.

Agreed with this. If you made an XI based on current form plus career and not being injured (ruling out Sharma) you'd have an XI of something like Kumble, Ntini, Steyn, H Singh, Murali, Vaas, Sidebottom, Asif, Clark, Lee and...Vettori

I don't believe our current side are world beaters, they have alot of potential, but atm we aren't ahead of Aus, SA, India. I aven't seen the rest play for a while so I have no idea how they'd compare to us. We're on par with England IMO.

To be world beaters we have to have the right conditions; those mainly being everyone in our 1st XI fully fit and reasonably experienced.

 

[Leslie1]

Oh my God, how wrong can you get?

 

[KiWiNiNjA]

Can we stop feeding the troll now?