**Official** Pakistan v New Zealand in the UAE 2014

[Hurricane]

Wow - I thought 260 odd was a reasonable effort based on some of the deliveries from the spinners I saw before I went to bed. From the wickets I saw only Williamson will be kicking himself. Ross is always vulnerable early doors to left arm spin.

I guess we must have played poorly in the final sessions.

For my take I am very encouraged by our performance even though we will lose this test.
Ish Sodhi may not be a bust after all. Tom Latham is the real deal - or at least he is on low pace turning tracks. This is major news. That basically gives us a team good enough to compete anywhere that isn't the UAE. And given Australia just finished getting thumped here I don't think we need feel down at all.

If you asked me what we needed a year ago I would have said two openers and a spinner and then we have a complete side. We have some progress on that front from this game (and the windies series as far as Latham's performance goes).

 

[Frost]

Spending time with Younis and Misbah in the middle is invaluable experience. They might not play the moving ball very well in RSA or England, but at least they will know how to pace an innings, not play stupid shots, and grind out a mammoth total.

Fair point,but they should be learning that at first class level

 

[RossTaylorsBox]

For my take I am very encouraged by our performance even though we will lose this test.
Ish Sodhi may not be a bust after all. Tom Latham is the real deal - or at least he is on low pace turning tracks. This is major news. That basically gives us a team good enough to compete anywhere that isn't the UAE. And given Australia just finished getting thumped here I don't think we need feel down at all.

If you asked me what we needed a year ago I would have said two openers and a spinner and then we have a complete side. We have some progress on that front from this game (and the windies series as far as Latham's performance goes).

Same, I'd be happy to lose this thing 3-0 if it means we can establish a decent opener for the next few years.

 

[Blocky]

Latham looks the goods - what I like is his patience and ability to be gritty. Reminds me of a certain Mark Richardson.

Kane was a little unlucky, Ross is just Ross, Anderson and Neesham were soft dismissals - Anderson is almost punishable by death considering how easy their partnership had been and the fact that Latham stayed.

 

[hendrix]

Latham's grittiness not to be confused with lack of shots though. He has all the shots in the book and is a pretty decent limited overs player.

 

[RxGM]

No, but then he has no one to blame but himself - he refuses to go and play off season cricket unless it's IPL/T20.

In this particular instance Taylors rustyness is probably just due to his lack of batting time due to his hamstring/groin injury. Though I dont think he looked any worse than he has over the last 3 years at the beginning of his innings.

 

[Agent Nationaux]

Fair point,but they should be learning that at first class level

Yeah but Pak's first class system isn't really that good.

 

[Bahnz]

Yeah but Pak's first class system isn't really that good.

I'm a bit suprised by that given the regularity with which you guys pull awesome players out of the ether.

 

[ohnoitsyou]

Latham and Williamson both bowled by inswinging yorkers. So why the **** are southee and boult refusing to bowl yorkers.

 

[Days of Grace]

Boult bowled one first ball at the start of this innings.

 

[straw man]

Wow - I thought 260 odd was a reasonable effort based on some of the deliveries from the spinners I saw before I went to bed. From the wickets I saw only Williamson will be kicking himself. Ross is always vulnerable early doors to left arm spin.

I guess we must have played poorly in the final sessions.

I was referring as much to our fielding effort as our batting; neither were great. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised at the way McCullum, Neesham and Anderson got out even though they were disappointing. McCullum trying to do the right thing and play late with soft hands, but it's not natural to him and ended up a hard-handed fiddle. Neesham and Anderson could do with reading Ricky Ponting's article several times over, though I know that with the limited experience they have, they're not likely to be able to adapt their approaches too much. Taylor was the most disappointing, looking 'lost' seems to describe his innings well.

I know the series has only just started but we are losing badly because none of Southee, McCullum, Taylor and Williamson have been able to make an impression on this match so far, with the only bright spots being Latham and to a lesser extent Anderson and Sodhi.

Lastly for a side that's already on the receiving end to have moments of complete ineptitude e.g. the two dropped catches off Sodhi, the Craig/Watling mixup runout, the disgraceful cbf innings from Southee, is disastrous for team morale and difficult to recover from.

 

[Swingpanzee]

Main positives were Latham's knock and Watling's gritty innings. NZ have to drastically improve in all other aspects - fielding the most since had Shehzad been stumped and a few catches taken it wouldn't have been so one-sided.

 

[hendrix]

They just have to look at the 4th innings as an opportunity for the batsmen to give us some momentum. It's a very difficult path, but if we can get in excess of 300 batting in the 4th innings, even if we lose, winning the toss and batting first in the second test could be where we turn things around.

 

[WindieWeathers]

Yea come on WW,west indies wouldn't be doing much better than oz or nz in the same circumstances. Nz did beat WI home and away

I know people like to talk about past series to make themselves feel better...but i'm not looking at the past i'm looking at now, and the fact is NZ don't appear to have the spinners to compete in these conditions and we do!!..does that mean we would win? no..but i'm damn sure we'd at least be in the fight.

 

[Blocky]

I know people like to talk about past series to make themselves feel better...but i'm not looking at the past i'm looking at now, and the fact is NZ don't appear to have the spinners to compete in these conditions and we do!!..does that mean we would win? no..but i'm damn sure we'd at least be in the fight.

Might help should your players actually want to play, not strike.

 

[WindieWeathers]

Might help should your players actually want to play, not strike.

We will be playing SA next month....

 

[Bahnz]

I know people like to talk about past series to make themselves feel better...but i'm not looking at the past i'm looking at now, and the fact is NZ don't appear to have the spinners to compete in these conditions and we do!!..does that mean we would win? no..but i'm damn sure we'd at least be in the fight.

Yes, because WI were so convincing in spin-friendly conditions in India last year.

 

[hendrix]

Yes, because WI were so convincing in spin-friendly conditions in India last year.

Bahnz!!!! Our best spinner wasn't playing!!! and our number 2 chucker was playing but our number 1 wasn't!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Blocky]

At the moment though, you've got four Pakistan batsman playing near pro mode cricket against teams (Australia and NZ) that are coming in severely underdone and out of season. If NZ escapes this match I think the second one should go closer, but the problem with NZ is that you're never sure if they'll show the discipline even if the skills are there.

 

[RossTaylorsBox]

I know people like to talk about past series to make themselves feel better...

Cool sig.