**Official** New Zealand in Australia

[sanga1337]

Tait averages 24.6 against us
Akhtar averages 19.8 against us
Flintoff averages 25.8 against us
Lee averages 20.8 against us

What that tells me is that we always struggle against extreme pace, and I expect we'll struggle to cope with Tait in this series too.

Siddle is also late 140s, early 150s. He was bowling that in the Tests against SA anyway. So I'm picking on pitches he knows well that we'll struggle to cope with him too.

Siddle is nowhere near that fast on average though. Most of the time he bowls high 130's to low 140's. He only really bowled that fast in 1 spell in 1 test match. I wouldn't really rely on him to ball that fast consistently.

 

[Magrat Garlick]

Rumours that NZ is going to name Boult and Diamante in the squad. Diamante???

An unpolished diamond imo.

 

[Zinzan]

I'd take Tait and Siddle over any of our seamers except Mills.

Think people like Sinclair and especially Thompson can count themselves very unlucky with Diamanti and O'Brien getting picked.

This list says it all really - New Zealand Cricket - MVP Points

There's no way Sinclair can be considered "very unlucky" IMO regardless whether Diamanti was picked or not & regardless of how well he's performed in domestic cricket, as unfortunately Sinclair has shown on numerous occasions now despite dominating Domestic cricket, he's consistently failed at international level for the last 5 years or so during his many comebacks. I mean seriously, what's the point of picking him for the ODI team now. He's 32-33 years old and has never really performed in Aust anyway regardless of his domestic lead-up form. James, with the greatest respect, I do question whether you feel obliged to write this since he's now contributing to your forum as I can't think of any other logical reason to suggest he's 'really unlucky'

 

[Flem274*]

Remember the last time NZ took on Tait in a Twenty20?

Remember the last time Tait bowled straight in an ODI?

Nope, I don't either.

also, in the CB series we handled him comfortably. He's only done well in one ODI against us off memory, one of the 07 WC games.

Lee and McGrath are the biggest killers of NZ, and they're not playing. Wish Lee was tbh, it would be good to see the no.1 Aus team out there instead of the injured rookie one.

Johnson will either get smashed or do extremely well, his CH record is a bit painful, but then all bowlers except Vettori, Bond, Bracken, McGrath and to a lesser extent Lee have been smashed in these series.

At least we haven't kidded ourselves into thinking Martin is an ODI bowler this time around.

I'd like to see for NZ:

McCullum
Guptill
Fulton
Taylor
Ryder
Broom
Elliott
Vettori
Mills
Southee
O'Brien/Boult

Not sure on O'Brien in ODIs or Boult this early. IMO Thompson should be there. Patel to come in if theres some spin.

Ryder, who is not a very good opener imo, goes down the order to five, where he could be a gun. Fulton to three, not at six which I suspect was why he lost his form (stupid to have him at six).

Wish that team had more games under its belt tbh, with the two known liabilities out (Flynn, Gillespie) and its promise in the few games its played, I'd guess it will be a very good team shortly. Now however, I predict 3-2 to Australia.

P.S. please don't let Diremati bowl.

 

[Evermind]

P.S. please don't let Diremati bowl.

Direst pun on CW IMO.

 

[Manee]

This list says it all really - New Zealand Cricket - MVP Points

Only one thing to do and that is get the number one in your side.

 

[straw man]

I'd take Tait and Siddle over any of our seamers except Mills.

Think people like Sinclair and especially Thompson can count themselves very unlucky with Diamanti and O'Brien getting picked. Thompson has an outstanding season to date, is a left-armer, handy lower order batsman, and has many years of proven domestic experience with an outsanding record.

This list says it all really - New Zealand Cricket - MVP Points

On that website Thompson doesn't rank particularly highly if you look at State Shield only - he's done better in the 4-day comp. Neither does Diamante for that matter though. Looking at the top ranked bowlers (by clicking on the sort-by bowling button) is slightly depressing.
Napier - non NZ
Wagner - non NZ
Bond -
Boult - selected
Burson - don't know anything about, but is 30
Woodcock - Hmmm
Arnel - is also 30 and had a long injury layoff when he might otherwise have done well
McClenaghan - fast and inaccurate
Butler - doesn't bowl fast any more and wants to be an allrounder
Tuffey - banned

 

[Tim]

Yes, it's rather depressing to look down that list and see the majority of the top performers are either inelligble or age is against them.

Otago's adamant Neil Wagner's gunning for a Black Caps spot eventually and he's only early 20's so I think we can wait a couple of extra years as he looks the goods.

McLenaghan's the one that interests me the most as I've heard he's very sharp, but he's too often going for 50-60 runs off his 10 overs...if he's taking 3 wickets in the process, it may not be so bad however.

 

[Julian87]

That says everything.

Nah. Because the last time he played a proper one day tournament, also the pinnacle of that version, he Pwned. You can't deny a fit Tait is one of the best limited overs bowlers around.

 

[Julian87]

I never said i'd pick them ahead of anyone. I just laughed when he said he would trouble Fulton, as if it was a foregone conclusion.

I guess we will have to wait and see. I was hardly dissing Fulton, as he is one of my favourite NZ cricketers. If you watched the recent test series against Australia, you would have seen why I think Fulton will struggle.

 

[James]

Ttihere's no way Sinclair can be considered "very unlucky" IMO regardless whether Diamanti was picked or not & regardless of how well he's performed in domestic cricket, as unfortunately Sinclair has shown on numerous occasions now despite dominating Domestic cricket, he's consistently failed at international level for the last 5 years or so during his many comebacks. I mean seriously, what's the point of picking him for the ODI team now. He's 32-33 years old and has never really performed in Aust anyway regardless of his domestic lead-up form. James, with the greatest respect, I do question whether you feel obliged to write this since he's now contribung to your forum as I can't think of any other logical reason to suggest he's 'really unlucky'

Not at all, they select him for Auckland, he makes one failure and that's it discarded, that just seems a bit harsh to me, regardless of what has gone before.

 

[Tim]

The fact is, Fulton demands selection. He has a number of positives over Daniel Flynn.

A) Fulton averages 44 in FC cricket and 36 in List A after 7 or 8 seasons in domestic cricket.
B) his form is relatively good right now.

If Fulton's in form, then it should be a no brainer to put him in ahead of Flynn who's be struggling in the shorter format.

 

[James]

On that website Thompson doesn't rank particularly highly if you look at State Shield only - he's done better in the 4-day comp. Neither does Diamante for that matter though. Looking at the top ranked bowlers (by clicking on the sort-by bowling button) is slightly depressing.

The difference with Thompson though is that he's still young (only 29) and has been around for a good while now and has performed while in all forms of cricket the past few years. Just wondering what makes the selectors prefer Diamante over him.

Edit - Thompson averages 20 with the bat and 24 with the ball in List A cricket.

 

[Tim]

The difference with Thompson though is that he's still young (only 29) and has been around for a good while now and has performed while in all forms of cricket the past few years. Just wondering what makes the selectors prefer Diamante over him.

Yes, i'm not sure why they discarded Thompson for Diamanti...Diamanti seems to be a run of the mill bits and pieces player while Thompson seems to have just that little bit more x-factor about him.

 

[Smudge]

An unpolished diamond imo.

Taxi!

 

[straw man]

Nah. Because the last time he played a proper one day tournament, also the pinnacle of that version, he Pwned. You can't deny a fit Tait is one of the best limited overs bowlers around.

Agreed that Tait will demolish our (NZ) top order at least once out of the 2-3 games he manages to be fit for... .Think only McCullum and Ryder have quick enough reflexes to deal with Tait at full pace, but they're both perfectly capable of getting themselves out without any help from the bowler at all.

 

[Tim]

Agreed that Tait will demolish our (NZ) top order at least once out of the 2-3 games he manages to be fit for... .Think only McCullum and Ryder have quick enough reflexes to deal with Tait at full pace, but they're both perfectly capable of getting themselves out without any help from the bowler at all.

Having said that, if Tait doesn't get it right..he'll go for plenty. There's no guarantee Tait will turn up in all 5 ODI's with accuracy.

 

[straw man]

Yes, i'm not sure why they discarded Thompson for Diamanti...Diamanti seems to be a run of the mill bits and pieces player while Thompson seems to have just that little bit more x-factor about him.

Don't know why they picked Diamanti either - they seemed to talk about his lower order slogging more than anything else in the news articles I read. At the same time, I remain to be convinced about Thompson's 'x-factor'.

I just think good backup OD bowling options are thin on the ground at the moment, and the State Shield top bowler list seems to back that up (though yeah, would be great if we could get Wagner!)

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

But if you take a look at Tait's stats against us and look at some of the game scorecards you will see he has gone around the park the majority of the time and has cleaned up the tail a bit also (from memory, don't quote me on this).

Why even say it then? It doesn't make sense. "Here's a fact, oh but you can't use it against me if I'm wrong, k?"

 

[Polo23]

Nah. Because the last time he played a proper one day tournament, also the pinnacle of that version, he Pwned. You can't deny a fit Tait is one of the best limited overs bowlers around.

Yes I can.