*Official* 2022 New Zealand Tour of England, Ireland, Scotland & Netherlands

[RossTaylorsBox]

hang on, if this was true then surely Flem would’ve said ‘former international keeper’

I don't actually know if it's him, it's just a running joke.

 

[thierry henry]

You live in the hope, every hour, every day and when that does die no point in trying.

What about never having hope but trying anyway - then every success becomes a wonderful surprise ?

 

[nzfan]

Yeah, it's highly unlikely with the way the bowling attacks has been going, but looking at the BBC forecast there's a chance that play might not start until 3 or 4 in the afternoon which obviously is a huge boost for NZ. Wind is meant to die down which should hopefully assist swing, so...nah we're ****ed.

Technically one session to get 110+ runs. That'll do for us I suppose. You never quite know.

 

[RossTaylorsBox]

What about never having hope and then even when your team wins the WTC you have a moan the next day because you're just the worst person alive.

 

[straw man]

Technically one session to get 110+ runs. That'll do for us I suppose. You never quite know.

This scorecard viewed without the context of the series would say that NZ still have a pretty good chance to win this.

But viewed within the context of this series, our chances of winning are almost zero. All the momentum is England's way, they've won the tug of war.

 

[Flem274*]

What about never having hope and then even when your team wins the WTC you have a moan the next day because you're just the worst person alive.

Don't kink shame me

 

[Bahnz]

England would absolutely have attacked him and they surely would've had some success as in the two overs Ajaz bowled in the first test. But as that cricinfo article pointed out, even in the second of those overs Ajaz beat and almost clean bowled Stokes. He's a mile more accurate than Bracewell and is not without T20 success either, having had a very good series in Bangladesh a couple of seasons ago. He has guile and he has 273 FC wickets to fall back on.

We have to imagine Ajaz under the captaincy of Stokes instead of this confidence-crushing miserable you-may-not-concede-a-run style of leadership and selection under Williamson/Stead. At times this series Leach has been none or one for seventy and hit for a few sixes, and Stokes has backed him, not blindly but instead with a 'hey let's try this plan' or 'we'll try get this batsman out like this'. It's so great that Leach took a ten-fer the same match we left our spinner out for a part-timer (also because Leach seems like a great guy and someone that's had to toil hard) because it throws into sharp relief just how monumentally abysmal NZ's management of Ajaz has been. You can't even ignore it or escape it any more, it's just so damn obvious. Similar left arm orthodox bowlers, accurate, experienced - with enormous captain & coach backing vs totally without captain & coach backing.

Playing devil's advocate, I can see how it's been a narrow path to walk for the selectors over the past couple of years. The 4 seamers and maybe a part-time spinner hack worked so well from the 2020 India series through to the WTC final that it would've been hard to break away from it.

But dumping Ajaz for a part-timer with fewer than 30 FC wickets after 2 overs of bowling is appalling. Maybe the selectors think Ajaz is looking poor in the nets, but if that's the case, that only makes the Bracewell selection for this tour worse - go for a proper back-up spin option if you're not 100% confident about your incumbent's form.

 

[HeathDavisSpeed]

It's very hard to forget you're a former FC keeper when you make posts like this.

I wondered what happened to Stu Mills.

 

[straw man]

I love him, but Wagner is done and whilst we got SO much wrong in this series, him not playing was not one of them. He's cooked. Boult was excellent in this series, Southee wasn't, but still convinced those are your best two guys.

Wagner is a good question mark because, while it is true he's declined a bit, this series has tipped me (and I think others) over into no longer believing the selectors (inc coach and captain) are making selections that make any sense. We don't trust their decisions any more - is Wagner really done or is NZ just making bad selections and then managing them poorly on the field? The blatant wrongness of a 3-man bowling attack is the final straw - when you make a mistake that bad there is something seriously wrong.

For quite a number of years now I think NZ selectors have earned trust with consistent and fairly good selections. No huge chops and changes, a playing XI that covers all the bases, a squad that somewhat rewards FC performance and somewhat promotes youth. Not perfect but they've even proved some criticism wrong with surprising successes like De Grandhomme and Mitchell. (Though I have to acknowledge Santner and spin in general has always been a huge exception to the positive story here). Lately there have been more and more questionable calls but I guess I've gone along with 'maybe this does make sense if you know the players, see how they're playing in the nets etc' and the side was still winning for a while.

But not any more, this series has shown that what we're doing clearly does not make sense, something is broken in the decision-making and change is needed. And in that new light, you look back at other questionable choices (like dumping Rachin and Phillips as spin-bowling allrounders for Bracewell) and no longer trust that was done for good reasons either.

Oh yeah, sack Stead.

 

[thierry henry]

What about never having hope and then even when your team wins the WTC you have a moan the next day because you're just the worst person alive.

I don’t recommend it

 

[straw man]

Anyway, thoroughly living up to the NZ fans typing angrily with doom and gloom CW stereotype with morning .

 

[Bahnz]

Wagner is a good question mark because, while it is true he's declined a bit, this series has tipped me (and I think others) over into no longer believing the selectors (inc coach and captain) are making selections that make any sense. We don't trust their decisions any more - is Wagner really done or is NZ just making bad selections and then managing them poorly on the field? The blatant wrongness of a 3-man bowling attack is the final straw - when you make a mistake that bad there is something seriously wrong.

Feel for Wagner. He could've had Overton out half a dozen times before tea on day 3, and if he had he likely would've finished with figures of 4 or 5 for sfa. Dropped catch, missed lbw, multiple french cuts and plays and misses. But I can't help but feel that the Wagner of even 12 months ago would've found a way to make it happen, which says a bit about how he's bowling at the moment.

 

[Flem274*]

I think this series has comprehensively shown that players in the squad are held to very different standards.

Some players are completely safe, but others like Wagner (through his entire career) and Ajaz are always on the cusp of being dropped.

Its not just guys on this tour. Phillips played a test, scored a bit of a jammy 50 and was immediately dropped next series. Ferguson getting injured at Perth through woeful management seems to be held responsible for the Australian tour. Ravindra, a player who wasn't ready but played bravely in India after being thrown in the fire, carried the can for the Bangers loss.

Young, doing a brave job batting out of position, is going to carry the can for this tour. You can sense it.

Meanwhile Tom Latham will play 100 tests and average 27 against good pace attacks in SENA for 70 of those games because he's an "in" player.

Senior players get the Pakistan tour under new management as their chance at redemption then we bring in a few hungry players for the failures and give them some rope along with competent management.

 

[thierry henry]

A statistical breakdown might show something different but I feel like late-career Wagner has looked legit dangerous quite often bowling full and swinging it, while looking increasingly tepid when playing Wagnerball. This of course would be perfectly in keeping with how cricket generally works, but understandably hard to accept when it comes to Wagner.

 

[NZTailender]

Wagner is a good question mark because, while it is true he's declined a bit, this series has tipped me (and I think others) over into no longer believing the selectors (inc coach and captain) are making selections that make any sense. We don't trust their decisions any more - is Wagner really done or is NZ just making bad selections and then managing them poorly on the field? The blatant wrongness of a 3-man bowling attack is the final straw - when you make a mistake that bad there is something seriously wrong.

For quite a number of years now I think NZ selectors have earned trust with consistent and fairly good selections. No huge chops and changes, a playing XI that covers all the bases, a squad that somewhat rewards FC performance and somewhat promotes youth. Not perfect but they've even proved some criticism wrong with surprising successes like De Grandhomme and Mitchell. (Though I have to acknowledge Santner and spin in general has always been a huge exception to the positive story here). Lately there have been more and more questionable calls but I guess I've gone along with 'maybe this does make sense if you know the players, see how they're playing in the nets etc' and the side was still winning for a while.

But not any more, this series has shown that what we're doing clearly does not make sense, something is broken in the decision-making and change is needed. And in that new light, you look back at other questionable choices (like dumping Rachin and Phillips as spin-bowling allrounders for Bracewell) and no longer trust that was done for good reasons either.

Oh yeah, sack Stead.

It's weird how extraordinarily harsh they are to some players (mostly specialist spinners) then how overtly nice they are to others and will change the makeup of a side to make sure everyone gets a game.

When Jamieson comes in to the side as cover for Wagner and does well, in the next match when Wagner returns they drop Patel to make room for him. We know how Jamieson's initial foray into tests went and having him in the side was match winning. And yet, over that period, we managed to fit all 4 seamers in with Patel sitting out most matches. The ruthless thing to do would've been to drop Boult, who was performing the least of the 4. We had CdG on top of all that. It was just overkill to have 4.5 seamers and have a spinner sit on the sideline not gaining skills. The NZ mindset seems to be unless it's a dustbowl and the spinner will take 5fer, no point in playing. That's a lot of wasted potential for Patel to play and develop his game on non-spin friendly pitches. Australia have pretty much backed Lyon all over the world because they had enough decent seam bowlers that they could usually absorb any shortcomings Lyon may have had on a particular surface in a particular test, because long term it'd pay off. We've had a fairly similar pool of quality seam bowlers but instead of backing a spinner to develop, we've just decided to play all 4 instead because they were so ****ing short sighted about it all, rating the 4th seamers as being a safer bet to help get 20 wickets than a spinner. And then they pick the under developed, under utilised spinner for one test on an overseas tour to England and just discard him because, shock horror, he hasn't the form or experience to just turn it on at the drop of a hat.

The selection of Bracewell is just the natural result of a ****ed up notion of how spinners operate in this side, and that those who can bat will forever be preferred over specialists because they don't have the guts to do what needs doing in the long term.

 

[Xix2565]

A statistical breakdown might show something different but I feel like late-career Wagner has looked legit dangerous quite often bowling full and swinging it, while looking increasingly tepid when playing Wagnerball. This of course would be perfectly in keeping with how cricket generally works, but understandably hard to accept when it comes to Wagner.

 

[Bahnz]

A statistical breakdown might show something different but I feel like late-career Wagner has looked legit dangerous quite often bowling full and swinging it, while looking increasingly tepid when playing Wagnerball. This of course would be perfectly in keeping with how cricket generally works, but understandably hard to accept when it comes to Wagner.

Yeah, when the ball is swinging Wagner's looked very handy. The problem is that he's not a new ball over, and so typically will only get 5-10 overs out of every 20 where he can put those new skills to work.

 

[nzfan]

I can see Ajaz going the same way as Wagner. He will have bowled 2 overs at test cricket before he plays Pakistan. Then won't play for a while and will again after like a year. Wagner also had lots of stops and starts. The decline of Wagner could be equated to his lack of playing opportunities. No matter how much you are bowling in the nets it's never quite like bowling in the middle. I can understand why Wagner wasn't selected but it doesn't help. Besides both Wagner and Ajaz don't play t20 leagues either which means they are pretty much bowling at a much lower level i.e. domestic cricket. Ajaz is going to be 34 shortly and Wagner is 36. Can't see them both having more than a year or two with black caps. What's the point even I think, they can ply their trade in county cricket and earn some coins while they are still good at it.

 

[straw man]

A statistical breakdown might show something different but I feel like late-career Wagner has looked legit dangerous quite often bowling full and swinging it, while looking increasingly tepid when playing Wagnerball. This of course would be perfectly in keeping with how cricket generally works, but understandably hard to accept when it comes to Wagner.

Also think we've only rarely fully committed to Wagnerball in the last 12 months. Needs over after over after over of relentless short ball bowling with no break in sight - instead it's been a here and there thing. It becomes a game-within-a-game (I kinda hate that term but it seems accurate) which the fielders around the bat get right into, the batsmen can get caught up in the moment and suckered into playing on Wagner's terms and skying a pull shot.

It's very similar to a period where a spin bowler continually tosses the ball up to a batsmen who is trying to hit him while there are a couple of close fielders. There's a whole atmosphere to it, demands batters take risks and face different challenges.

Unsure how much the change in Wagner's approach is due to himself and perhaps limitations of age, or due to captain's requirements.

 

[jcas0167]

I thought the absolute drubbing on the tour of Australia was the lowest point as a fan of the "new" (i.e. post Vettori) Black Caps side but somehow this feels worse.

That is still the low point for me. Finally given a Boxing Day test after 32 years and we were embarrassed. Not remotely competitive. At least this series has provided games that could have gone either way and England have had to produce some remarkable innings to chase down the targets. That said, the selection of Bracewell has been worse than the selection calls on that tour.