*Official* New Zealand in Australia 2019/20

[quincywagstaff]

I remember Kerry O'Keeffe saying a few years back that if you think Australia's a hard place to tour that it will be a hard place to tour. It just seems to me that NZ always have that mindset whenever they tour Oz; they're mentally on the back foot before the series starts and it shows in their performances. Even if they toured here last year sans Warner/Smith I don't think they would've beaten Oz.

In very hot conditions, losing one of your frontline pacemen should've been a massive factor in the match against Australia, regardless of how good the rest of the attack is. And yet they didn't really bat much time in either innings, let alone score many runs. Events that should've been pivotal like the mess of a run out Australia made against Watling early on Day 3 didn't mean squat.

 

[sunilz]

Warner + labuschagne( Huge potential ) + Smith in AUS are as good as Hayden + Ponting + Steve Waugh or Sehwag + Dravid + Tendulkar in home conditions. I don't see anyone beating AUS now at home tbh.

 

[quincywagstaff]

Re: Australia in the overall rankings, they've still got to do the business against even modest opposition away from home. Since the 2015 Ashes, they've won only one series away from home (NZ in 2016). Their planning and effort for the India 2017 & England 2019 tours was very impressive but they still missed the opportunities to win the series on those occasions with poor final Tests.

Pretty amazing to think that Pat Cummins stil hasn't played in a winning Test series away from home yet.

 

[Pup Clarke]

Might be a moot point, but it's a scary thought when Marnus/Head are infinitely more threatening than Santner.

 

[vcs]

Yeah his innings stood out in a pretty bowler dominated game. Allowed Australia a very comfortable position after the first innings to see them dominate.

TBF, Starc did contribute handy lower order runs in both innings. Then again, Labuschagne took a wicket. Important runs in both digs, held the innings together first time around.

 

[honestbharani]

eh, fair, india are the ultimate hometown bullies historically. change 'india' to 'generic spinny country of choice' in that post then.

I don't think so. I expect NZ to do a lot better in India next time they tour than I expect Australia.

 

[Daemon]

To get NZ all out for <200 twice with a bowler down is incredible. Starc is on fire right now, the only thing that can stop him this summer is injury imo.

 

[Hicheal Michael]

Starc's 'revival' as a red ball bowler makes me what sort of bowler Steve Finn could have been.

 

[morgieb]

Re: Australia in the overall rankings, they've still got to do the business against even modest opposition away from home. Since the 2015 Ashes, they've won only one series away from home (NZ in 2016). Their planning and effort for the India 2017 & England 2019 tours was very impressive but they still missed the opportunities to win the series on those occasions with poor final Tests.

Pretty amazing to think that Pat Cummins stil hasn't played in a winning Test series away from home yet.

Yeah the England series was a bit of a missed opportunity in hindsight, though England played pretty well and are a pretty tricky side to beat at home we probably should've won that series. We have Bangladesh mid next year which is a very good chance to get the monkey off the back.

 

[Gob]

 

[Moss]

Might be a moot point, but it's a scary thought when Marnus/Head are infinitely more threatening than Santner.

Scary maybe but not much of a shock. Think the Santner selection went along expected lines.

 

[stephen]

I think the thing about Australia is that it doesn't reward half measures. Playing dibbly dobbly all rounders in Australia isn't going to get you anywhere - you need real pace or turn and batsmen who can deal with it. Which is part of why I think NZ find it hard to tour here, since their team balance is usually to play three guys who can both bowl a bit and bat a bit. It's part of the reason Moeen Ali was so awful here as well.

Having said that, you can make up for a lack of pace with intelligence, control and movement, particularly in day/night tests. Southee in particular bowled really well this test, exploiting movement when it was on offer and exerting control when there was no movement to be had.

New Zealand is a very good team at the moment and these conditions were very foreign to them. I would expect a better showing at Melbourne and Sydney.

Full credit to Australia. Warner/Burns is a good opening partnership. Every time they're together good things seem to happen for Australia. Marnus is a revelation. Smith probably should have insisted on batting at number three before now, because with Marnus ahead of him and the team doing generally better he isn't scoring quite as well as his usual standard (I'd take Australia winning over Steve Smith records any day of the week though).

Australia's real team weakness is Wade/Head at 5 and 6. They're the best in position for now, but Patterson should replace Wade at the next opportunity. Head should be persisted with given his natural talent, but he needs considerable work on his technique to reach his potential. Dropping Wade and playing Neser and Pattinson in Melbourne might be a good call, depending on the pitch. Playing Paine one position higher is scary but it's not like Wade or Head have been making a huge case for retention.

Wade seems to be a rocks and diamonds batsman. On his day he'll hit a ton, but most days you'll be lucky to get 20 out of him, which is why he came home from England with a series average in the mid 30s despite hitting two tons.

 

[slippy888]

Jeet Raval a top man but he rally not good enough to be opening batsman

 

[quincywagstaff]

I think the thing about Australia is that it doesn't reward half measures. Playing dibbly dobbly all rounders in Australia isn't going to get you anywhere - you need real pace or turn and batsmen who can deal with it. Which is part of why I think NZ find it hard to tour here, since their team balance is usually to play three guys who can both bowl a bit and bat a bit. It's part of the reason Moeen Ali was so awful here as well.

Having said that, you can make up for a lack of pace with intelligence, control and movement, particularly in day/night tests. Southee in particular bowled really well this test, exploiting movement when it was on offer and exerting control when there was no movement to be had.

New Zealand is a very good team at the moment and these conditions were very foreign to them. I would expect a better showing at Melbourne and Sydney.

Full credit to Australia. Warner/Burns is a good opening partnership. Every time they're together good things seem to happen for Australia. Marnus is a revelation. Smith probably should have insisted on batting at number three before now, because with Marnus ahead of him and the team doing generally better he isn't scoring quite as well as his usual standard (I'd take Australia winning over Steve Smith records any day of the week though).

Australia's real team weakness is Wade/Head at 5 and 6. They're the best in position for now, but Patterson should replace Wade at the next opportunity. Head should be persisted with given his natural talent, but he needs considerable work on his technique to reach his potential. Dropping Wade and playing Neser and Pattinson in Melbourne might be a good call, depending on the pitch. Playing Paine one position higher is scary but it's not like Wade or Head have been making a huge case for retention.

Wade seems to be a rocks and diamonds batsman. On his day he'll hit a ton, but most days you'll be lucky to get 20 out of him, which is why he came home from England with a series average in the mid 30s despite hitting two tons.

A lot of good points there. Agree that relying on bits-and-pieces players (a NZ tradition) rarely comes off in Australia. Santner's bowling felt more at a Travis Head level than Nathan Lyon.

The Smith/Labuschange dynamic observation is an interesting one. Marnus has been so solid this summer that Smith has become a non-necessity after being the main man during the Ashes and I wonder whether he's struggling with that a bit. He was so used to being the rock of the innings but with the top 3 doing so well he perhaps isn't sure what his role in the side is (Head & Wade are the aggressors). It's a bit like how Michael Bevan seemed to be in the latter stages of his career as the batting lineup became more aggressive and he seemed like an anachnorism. But he was needed still when it mattered and I'm sure Smith will be, especially overseas.

 

[lockton2skipper]

Need to find another opener and a proper front line spinner , shame about lockie's injury , hope he gets another chance. Part time spinners don't work in oz. Look at moen ali.

 

[quincywagstaff]

The Joe Burns situation is an interesting one. He seemed to have cemented his place by 2016 but a couple of horror Tests in Sri Lanka totally derailed his career and save for one Test against SA he was pretty much discarded for a couple of years. I suspect the Australian side would look at that with a bit of regret now as he was discarded too quickly. I was impressed with his 2nd innings start as he stayed solid through a very solid start to score a half-century on Days 3/4 where no one else was making easy runs.

 

[SteveNZ]

I remember Kerry O'Keeffe saying a few years back that if you think Australia's a hard place to tour that it will be a hard place to tour. It just seems to me that NZ always have that mindset whenever they tour Oz; they're mentally on the back foot before the series starts and it shows in their performances. Even if they toured here last year sans Warner/Smith I don't think they would've beaten Oz.

In very hot conditions, losing one of your frontline pacemen should've been a massive factor in the match against Australia, regardless of how good the rest of the attack is. And yet they didn't really bat much time in either innings, let alone score many runs. Events that should've been pivotal like the mess of a run out Australia made against Watling early on Day 3 didn't mean squat.

Could well be right that our mentality is less than it needs to be when we tour Australia. There's definitely still the remnants of the big brother syndrome in our trans tasman relationship.

However, I think the fact that we got Perth first up was the biggest factor. We went from docile NZ pitches to one that bounced and we weren't able to adjust. If the G or Sydney were first, I'd have backed us to do a lot better - and I think we will from here. At least with the bat. Having said that, Southee and Wagner (who were both epic in this test) will be blunted and our 'spinner ' is still terrible, so I dont expect us to take 20 wickets

 

[vandem]

...In very hot conditions, losing one of your frontline pacemen should've been a massive factor in the match against Australia, regardless of how good the rest of the attack is. And yet they didn't really bat much time in either innings, let alone score many runs.....

Both teams coped OK with going a fast bowler down. The quickening pitch and difficult of playing under lights helped both under-strength bowling attacks. None of the 2nd, 3rd or 4th innings went past 70 overs.

I think the loss of a fast bowler hurt NZ more than Aussie. After Ferguson went off at tea, Aussie only scored 8-256, probably less than expected from being 2-160, but they were able to bat carefully and slowly in 2nd session on day 2, mainly against friendly bowling from Santner + Raval (79 runs from 29 overs), which allowed then to start bowling to the NZ top order in more favourable conditions under lights. A fit 3rd quick bowler wouldn't have changed the result of the game, but would probably have made the 1st innings lead closer to 150.

 

[Jezroy]

Ferguson flying home. Replacement will be sent over. Will it be an opener?

 

[Chrish]

Warner + labuschagne( Huge potential ) + Smith in AUS are as good as Hayden + Ponting + Steve Waugh or Sehwag + Dravid + Tendulkar in home conditions. I don't see anyone beating AUS now at home tbh.

That’s what they said last time before SA toured there. Smith and Warner were as good as ever and Voges was averaging 80.

That’s why cricket needs strong SA. To keep overhyped Aussies in check.