***Official*** New Zealand in Australia 2011

[Ruckus]

Yeah it went under the bat, but it was quite far from leg stump, probably about 2 1/2 to 3 stumps away in fact.

Ah, I must be going blind. It's funny how in the post match interview he mentioned he was trying to make his hat-trick ball a similar one to Siddle's last year, yet Siddle mentioned in his post match interview after that match he was actually wasn't attempting to bowl a yorker.

 

[Spark]

Did you mean off stump? Barely missed off stump.

 

[Flem274*]

In other news, NZ will bat first at Hobart and score 620/3 dec.

I figure I may as well pretend we have a decent side. My imagination might be the only good side we get.

 

[Ruckus]

yes, yes I did haha...and I can see Nufan's attempt at humour now

 

[hazsa19]

If you assume Watson won't be able to really hold his own as a batsman, and his injury problems aren't going to get worse with heaps of bowling (I doubt either of those things will be true though tbh), it would actually be pretty awesome if he could be the 3rd pace option and you could play another batsman. You could have bowlers like Cummins and Pattinson taking the new ball, with Watson bowling the middle overs and keeping things nice and tight + have the added benefit of knowing your gonna have proper batsmen all the way up to 8.

A mere pipe dream, but it would be kind of cool.

Pretty sure I suggested he bat 6 as part of a 5 man attack, about eight pages ago, and was rubbished.

 

[Spark]

Batting him at 6 is a bad idea simply because unless the circumstances are seriously dire, he'd be playing spin very early in his innings. Just...

 

[Ruckus]

Pretty sure I suggested he bat 6 as part of a 5 man attack, about eight pages ago, and was rubbished.

That's not what I was talking about there though. I was just meandering about having Watson as one of the main bowlers in a 4 man attack.

 

[hazsa19]

Batting him at 6 is a bad idea simply because unless the circumstances are seriously dire, he'd be playing spin very early in his innings. Just...

All-rounders aren't usually known for their deft play of spin. But at 6 you can bat aggressively, without the responsibility of opening. Watson usually starts against spin when he's 50 n.o, with every man and his dog is wondering if he'll actually make 100 for once. Plus you take full advantage of his quality bowling.

I'll be laughing if Australia come to England in 2013 with a 3 man pace attack plus 'Watto' opening.

 

[Spark]

So why not actually allow him to bat competently at 4?

 

[hazsa19]

So why not actually allow him to bat competently at 4?

If he can average 40+ and bowl 15 overs a day at 4 then yeh, go for it. Can't see it myself though.

 

[Furball]

"Very ordinary" isn't winning or drawing series though. Surely no one defines "very ordinary" with 1-1 in SA or 1-1 in SL.

That's definitely not what I associate with the term. They won in NZ, WI, drew in SA and drew in SL. They lost in Aust in a closely fought 2-1 series. They lost in Eng badly of course but before that won.

They are far from a great team. Hell you can argue they aren't/weren't a very good team. But they weren't "very ordinary" away from home. Their away record isn't too much worse to England.

Getting seriously into semantics here, but India over the last 5-7 years are a team that have had a number of very good away series results without actually winning all that many Tests. They've had some good results like drawing away in South Africa, but I think some of the results individually have been fairly average, such as winning only 2 out of 6 Tests against New Zealand and the West Indies. Put together as a whole and it's a good sequence of results in places where India have traditionally found it hard to win, but I don't think "ordinary" is too far off the mark to be honest. Personally I think it's a little better than that, but not by much.

I'd never seek to downplay what the Indian team has achieved in the last 3 years; they were quite clearly the best side in the world at the time and fully deserved their number 1 ranking, but I certainly don't think, even in arguably their best ever period, that they've been all that special away from home.

edit: going back to the last time they were in Australia (which I think covers away series against everyone except Pakistan) India have won 8 out of a possible 25 Tests away from home (6 out of 23 if we don't count Bangladesh), losing 9. That's been good enough for 3 series wins, 2 draws and 3 losses. In the same period, England's away record is P23 W8 D9 L6, for a series record of P7 W3 D1 L3. Faily similar, but England managed to win multiple Tests in New Zealand and Australia, which IMO is slightly more impressive than India winning single Tests in every series until they came to England.

 

[KiWiNiNjA]

Oh we will over time..oh yes...you'll see the light..when he's pumping the rest of the country to all parts in the HRV Cup, you'll see.

You're really talking yourself up now.

 

[Top_Cat]

The one to Williamson was a genuine ripper, he had to play at that one with the angle that it was going at the beginning. Ross Taylor's was not a good shot at all.

Yeah, best of the lot for mine, Williamson initially had it covered I reckon but it really drew him away in the end. Beautiful.

Less said about Taylor's, the better.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Is Dan Christian more of a batsman who bowls or vice versa?

Judging by what I saw of him at Hants I'd've guessed the latter, but checking his cricinfo profile he seems to have been batting #6 for SA.

Anyway, long story short: if he comes in who misses out?

 

[howardj]

I would have thought Hughes would miss

 

[robelinda]

They might drop Warner though, it is possible. Hughes might have had a bad match but is the incumbent, rather than the replacement.

 

[howardj]

Interesting to hear Malcolm Conn on Inside Cricket last night say that the Blundstone Arena game should be Pootang's swan song. I'm inclined to agree. I mean, when Watson and Marsh come back for Boxing Day, Ponting and Hughes should make way

Usman
Warner
Marsh
Watson
Clarke
Hussey
Haddin
Harris
Cummins
Pattinson
Lyon

 

[howardj]

They might drop Warner though, it is possible. Hughes might have had a bad match but is the incumbent, rather than the replacement.

Since being recalled, Hughes has made two scores over 36,

SInce his debut series in SA, in the 13 Tests he has played since, Hughes has hit a mere 633 runs at 27.5.

Leaving aside his figures, he gets out too early too often for an opener, and often gets out the same way.

 

[robelinda]

Interesting to hear Malcolm Conn on Inside Cricket last night say that the Blundstone Arena game should be Pootang's swan song. I'm inclined to agree. I mean, when Watson and Marsh come back for Boxing Day, Ponting and Hughes should make way

Usman
Warner
Marsh
Watson
Clarke
Hussey
Haddin
Harris
Cummins
Pattinson
Lyon

Solid. Though you really think the big call will be made to move Watson down AND drop Punter? Both are unlikely, though possible.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Would be mildly perverse to ditch him after back-to-back 50s having stuck with him thru the thin times for so long.