*Official* New Zealand tour of Sri Lanka 2019

[trundler]

Sri Lanka are the new Pakistan

 

[ajdude]

might not be the topic for it, but i don’t love the fact that a team who wins a two test series 2-0 gets the same amount of points as a team who wins a five test series 5-0

 

[Jezroy]

So there’s been 4 tests at P Sara since we were last there. All since 2015, and nothing in the last 3 years. So hard to say how it will play, but in those games it was pretty even all round. Runs were scored and wickets were taken by all sorts of bowlers. If this is the case I’d like to see...

Latham
Raval
Williamson
Taylor
Nicholls
Watling
CDG
Summertime
Wags
Boult
Patel

I just don’t rate Southee 2019 in these conditions. Should be a home/England specialist. Hard to drop him though as he’s got a stack of wickets at an okay average. But Lockie.

 

[Maximas]

Sri Lanka are the new Pakistan

Touring sides coming here off no preparation aren't really meant to beat us though

 

[Jezroy]

It was that damn cake.

On average we’d normally get around 100 runs a test out of Kane Williamson. Not this week guys.

Put your money on Big Daddy to top score in the next test. He’ll be sad about this.

 

[Maximas]

Looking back pretty much everyone chipped in too with runs of wickets at important times - except for Kusal Perera

Chandimal and BOP will have to sit out again barring injury

 

[vcs]

Really good win that, well played Sri Lanka!

 

[nzfan]

Both the world cup finalists lose the first test championship test matches, at least England have a chance to come back but not us. Would have been better if ICC set 3 test matches at a minimum for every test series. Oh well we won't be winning this but not been a bad effort other than Kane missing out. Likely Astle will make a come back next test match at the cost of Santner and likely Wagner for Southee.

Nothing to take away from Sri Lanka though, they batted very well although there was some amount of luck which didn't go our way. SL are winning test matches frequently.

 

[nzfan]

I'll play the devil's advocate here, Santner should be persisted with for couple more series. He hasn't played long format cricket in a while. If he can't do it in couple more series it will be time to get someone else in. Somerville looking good to play another 2-3 years. Over in Aussie he will be very handy with his height. Plenty of positives still, Ajaz, BJ, Taylor, Somerville had very good match meanwhile Nicolls, Raval had decent outing. I think this team is good to beat SL and has enough batting/bowling prowess to challenge SL but with their tail up our lads need to play outstanding cricket to pluck a win.

 

[mr_mister]

Looking back pretty much everyone chipped in too with runs of wickets at important times - except for Kusal Perera

Chandimal and BOP will have to sit out again barring injury

Perara's 23 was a useful 'put it beyond doubt' knock. If he got out for 2 or something a bit of pressure arises

 

[Athlai]

I back Santa in the team as a general rule, but he doesn’t make sense in an XI with 2 specialist spinners.

 

[Mike5181]

He's too young and inexperienced but Ravindra would be better suited to the role Santner played in this game. He's getting nosebleeds at number 7.

 

[Jezroy]

I guess the thing for me is that I just can’t see Santner taking many wickets. Whether that’s in NZ or anywhere else. The thing with Vettori is that the team he played in, it was helpful having someone in the team that maintained a level of control even with the lack of wickets that he took (unless he was playing Bangladesh or Zimbabwe - gee they helped his average). Whenever he was injured there didn’t seem to be a spinner that took more wickets than him or had better economy. Plus his batting was invaluable. Also the team that Vettori played in around 2008 was pretty average, so he didn’t seem that terrible.

This team doesn’t need an economical spinner that doesn’t take wickets. And they certainly don’t need one that doesn’t fulfill his promise with the bat.

I say he is still such a handy one day player, but he’s got to go learn his first class trade. Go score some runs and take some wickets in domestics please.

 

[The Hutt Rec]

It suddenly looks to me like Southee is in the twilight of his test career ... he looked listless in this test. Unless he’s reinventing himself as a specialist batsman.

 

[nzfan]

On that note, is Santner not a good enough bat? What does he lack? His technique is quite decent but likely lack of batting high enough means doesn't know how to pace his inning or making tactical mistakes. There's no doubt Ravindra will come in and fill in that middle order role with bowling heaps of overs. I don't think they will get Ravindra opening and bowling. That will be too much to ask for.

For now Todd Astle can fill in for Santner but again he's going to get limited number of games to make a decent impact. Ajaz and Somerville are bolted for at least a year's time after this series with Santner in the white ball format along with Sodhi. Reasonably it'll be two years before Ravindra will get into the test team. We are covered for batting with Tom Blundell and William Young waiting in the wings as well. Maybe Ravindra has a chance in the one day format but likely not T20. For now there's no place in any of the format for any new players, it's stacked. If it were 2000's Ravindra would be about 5-10 tests experienced. It's all timing really...

 

[straw man]

Congrats Sri Lanka, a well compiled chase - Karunaratne is a very good opener and NZ must rue that missed stumping chance against him, the defining moment of the match unfortunately for Watling.

NZ have a lot of room for improvement and once again I wish it was a three match series.

 

[straw man]

So there’s been 4 tests at P Sara since we were last there. All since 2015, and nothing in the last 3 years. So hard to say how it will play, but in those games it was pretty even all round. Runs were scored and wickets were taken by all sorts of bowlers. If this is the case I’d like to see...

Latham
Raval
Williamson
Taylor
Nicholls
Watling
CDG
Summertime
Wags
Boult
Patel

I just don’t rate Southee 2019 in these conditions. Should be a home/England specialist. Hard to drop him though as he’s got a stack of wickets at an okay average. But Lockie.

Southee and Santner's spots the interesting ones for the next test. While Somerville didn't get the results he'll be seen as a little unlucky second innings, is the only one to turn the ball that way and also batted well.

I didn't see all his spells but when I saw Southee bowl I actually thought he was decent. Surprised he was only given 7 overs in the first innings while Boult bowled 20. Still, I'll take it from others who watched more that said Southee was mediocre. His batting was better than it has been.

Santner contributed very little, probably our most disappointing player in the match. The frustrating late career Vettori comparison seems apt because he doesn't look like helping us win a match. De Grandhomme is the only guy that could feasibly replace him and his bowling also devalues Southee's somewhat. Probably time to go to the plan B attack as Jezroy posted above, though Astle an option as the hail mary choice as we're one nil down and can justify taking a risk.

CDG
Somerville
Wagner/Astle
Boult
Patel

Astle picked up terrible figures in the warmup and if anyone needs lots of cricket to get into rhythm it's surely the inconsistent legspin bowler, so yeah it would be a risk.

 

[NZTailender]

Santner looked a better bowler than Patel in the 2nd dig but didn't pick up anything. Thing is, he fell back on ODI darts a few too many times when he was looking likely.

Williamson saying they expected the pitch to break up more means they didn't really have a plan beyond "let it turn to a minefield, ????, profit" which is pretty bad tbh. Also makes you wonder how we didn't score more runs when it could be easy batting at times.

Sri Lanka did very well to not let any bowler settle.

 

[morgieb]

It suddenly looks to me like Southee is in the twilight of his test career ... he looked listless in this test. Unless he’s reinventing himself as a specialist batsman.

Most of Southee's recent form has come at home, no? Not that surprising he'd struggle in these conditions.

 

[NZTailender]

Most of Southee's recent form has come at home, no? Not that surprising he'd struggle in these conditions.

His stats in Sri Lanka prior to this were pretty good. Low 20s or even high teens I think. That was during his purple patch as a test bowler though, I think.