***Official*** New Zealand tour of Zimbabwe and South Africa 2016

[Zinzan]

Rubbish just rubbish. After 4 good days of cricket. Do the umpires have an early flight out or something?

Obscure memory: Anyone remember this Sharjah tri series final in 1996 where NZ had Pakistan all out for 150 and looked on course for a major upset? I think around 5 dubious lbw decisions that day ensured NZ continued the trend of being Wasim and Waqar's whipping boys in that decade

Haha, I remember that. IIRC Greatbatch was going along nicely before a shocking LBW decision & that was the catalyst for the collapse... virtually everything they appealed for was given.. it wasn't even subtle, just absurd.

 

[Zinzan]

Very excitable....he has convinced AB to go for a number of referrals where the bat and ball where an inch apart and no sound... I will put it down to youth at the moment.

Oh you mean from a fielding perspective. Thought you meant as a batsman.

 

[Meridio]

Yeah a few promising moments for Zimbabwe, particularly with the bat. Williams in the first test, Ervine in the second, and decent innings by a few others. Bowling is the big concern though, Cremer bowled well without luck in the first test but other than that they're really unthreatening. As I understand, they have SL touring next and imo it would be a good idea for them to try and juice their pitches up a bit, if possible. Need to give their seamers some kind of assistance and maybe nullify the SL spinners.

 

[Zinzan]

Some positives for Zim, but *** it's always going to be an uphill battle for them, not only with their talent pool, but the BS politics on top.

Let the real tour begin. Still can't believe it's another pissy 2 test series (well I can actually)..

 

[vandem]

Some positives for Zim, but *** it's always going to be an uphill battle for them, not only with their talent pool, but the BS politics on top.

And the economic situation of both the country and Zim cricket? Zimbabwean posters please feel free to correct me, but I thought a significant reason behind quality players (Taylor, Jarvis etc) giving up Zim cricket was the money they can make in England as Kolpak players - not just for 1 season, but for 5+ seasons if they are any good. Similar NZ examples would be Jeetan Patel and James Franklin, but they've gone to England after their NZ test / LO careers appeared to be over.

 

[vandem]

Sodhi with more runs and wickets in the series than Santa. Makes me wish Blocky was still here ...

 

[OverratedSanity]

**** that was some terrible umpiring. This is Zimbabwe's Sydney 08.

And yes, heads need to roll. Umpires are far too protected a species.

 

[hendrix]

Pretty hollow victory. At least ZImbabwe batted well in this test and our batsmen got to spend some time in the middle.

Not sure how much preparation this is for SA though. Oh well.

 

[SteveNZ]

As others have said, absolutely disgusting umpiring. Reiffel shouldn't stand in another Test through the 2016/17 summer. Ruined what was a pretty hard-fought Test. Of course, it's only Zimbabwe so no ripples are made.

Cannot fathom how Reiffel looks at the Santner and Guptill decisions and thinks yep, no doubt with those. Clearly he did and clearly based on that his eyesight is not fit for international standard. Same with the caught behind, absolute daylight. Just awful. I really feel bad for Zimbabwe, they showed some real fight but there's not many battles you can win with inept umpiring.

Positives wise, we take some guys with time at the crease forward to SA - particularly Tom who looks to be getting better and better. Ross looks mentally right on his game too and KW is being his same old self. Think Gup might get a shock when it starts bouncing and nipping around though, and Nicholls as many have said just doesn't seem up to it. Bowling wise, hard to know where we're at but the seam bowling did improve as the series went on. Hopefully they're better for the run.

 

[Athlai]

Hoping we get some more interesting playing conditions in the next match.

 

[Zinzan]

Positives wise, we take some guys with time at the crease forward to SA - particularly Tom who looks to be getting better and better. Ross looks mentally right on his game too and KW is being his same old self. Think Gup might get a shock when it starts bouncing and nipping around though, and Nicholls as many have said just doesn't seem up to it. Bowling wise, hard to know where we're at but the seam bowling did improve as the series went on. Hopefully they're better for the run.

Yeah, I think any reservations I had that the captaincy might be a year or two early for KW, not tactically speaking, but in terms of affecting his batting were squashed, even though it was weak opposition. Seems he is able to separate the two fairly seamlessly.

 

[NZTailender]

I guess Wagner MOTS was to acknowledge the flatness of the wickets. But Ross scoring over 300 runs without being dismissed is still pretty good damnit

 

[RxGM]

I guess Wagner MOTS was to acknowledge the flatness of the wickets. But Ross scoring over 300 runs without being dismissed is still pretty good damnit

Probably as much a make up call, for the fact that Ross (wrongly) got PoM in first test over him.

 

[Zinzan]

Probably as much a make up call, for the fact that Ross (wrongly) got PoM in first test over him.

Yeah this, Taylor even acknowledged it should have been a bowler given the nature of that wicket after the 1st test.

 

[SteveNZ]

Yeah, I think any reservations I had that the captaincy might be a year or two early for KW, not tactically speaking, but in terms of affecting his batting were squashed, even though it was weak opposition. Seems he is able to separate the two fairly seamlessly.

We've actually been wonderfully well served in terms of captains who have carried the responsibility very squarely on their shoulders and in fact increased their batting average while in charge. Brendon's is 10 runs better, Ross' is better even despite his recent deluge of runs, and Dan V's was 14 runs higher. I know that is slightly skewed by their respective early careers and lack of runs, but 45 for Baz, 49 for Ross and 39 for Dan is pretty impressive. So hopefully Kane follows the same tune.

 

[Hurricane]

Some random comments:

1) I watched an interview with Ross after day 1 of the first test. He seemed to be overtly more excited about serving under Kane's captaincy and hoped it would usher in a new era for NZ test cricket.
2) Kane's captaincy was top drawer from what I could see. I was never a fan of Brendon in test cricket with his constant meddling with fields, Kane appears to be as good as anyone I can remember and so far is better than Ross was. Couple that with some very shrewd moves at the T20 world tournament and we could be looking at a world class captain in the making. Look for us to win more often.
3) This bowlng coach - Shane Jurgensen. Give the man some props. Boult appears to be close to being back. Southee was a bit too inconsistent when I watched but looked much improved from recent tours. According to the comms Jurgensen timed Boult's run up and found it was 0.2 of a second slower than when he was at his peak and had him correct this. That is exactly what we want from our coaches. Actual insightful analysis. The useless commentators poohpoohed this story and said how can 0.2 of a second make a difference. It makes a big difference if you watch sprinting races. I am not a bowler but when I do bowl my crap mediums , my run up is everything to me, I am either in rhythm or not in rhythm well before I get to the crease.
4) The Boss
5) I would take anyone over Nicholls for the next series. Including Ronchi, in fact Luke probably has a decent claim to the position. I reckon Luke would be a sporadic hot and cold batsman who would string together three 50s in a row and get everyone talking about what a find he is, and then he would go frozen cold. Seems like such a touch/confidence player.

 

[hendrix]

anyone but Ronchi.

 

[Zinzan]

Some random comments:

2) Kane's captaincy was top drawer from what I could see. I was never a fan of Brendon in test cricket with his constant meddling with fields, Kane appears to be as good as anyone I can remember and so far is better than Ross was. Couple that with some very shrewd moves at the T20 world tournament and we could be looking at a world class captain in the making. Look for us to win more often.

.

Bit rough on BMac there Cane. You need to be proactive & creative with your fields when the likes of Australia are 2-350 & nothing is doing, a little easier to be measured against the likes of Zim.

Besides, I thought KW adopted some very inventive McCullum-like fields on Day 5. At one stage he had two slips, two gullys and two short-catching men in front of the wicket on the off-side IIRC.

 

[hendrix]

Bit rough on BMac there Cane. You need to be proactive & creative with your fields when the likes of Australia are 2-350 & nothing is doing, a little easier to be measured against the likes of Zim.

Besides, I thought KW adopted some very inventive McCullum-like fields on Day 5. At one stage he had two slips, two gullys and two short-catching men in front of the wicket on the off-side IIRC.

Baz went ******* after about 4 overs of the first test when Southee and Boult were actually bowling well. Screwed with simple, effective bowling plans, and Boult lost rhythm and was rubbish for the rest of the series. Obviously Boult was responsible for his own rubbish bowling, but McCullum was way too meme-Cullum right at the beginning when conventional plans would have been the best option.

 

[Zinzan]

Re: Nicholls' number 5 spot, lest we forget Brownlie tonned up and was probably our best performing batsman in the last tour of the Republic. Looking at his recent FC run, he didn't ton up, but did score 3 50s in his last 4 matches.

Clearly he's out of favour or is possibly considered too old at 32. If there was ever a case for a horses for courses selection, this was it for me, even if he didn't score the runs Nicholls did in the 'A' series.

At least we know Brownlie's up to facing quality international pace bowling