People keep making a point of how New Zealand start so brilliantly, cripple teams and then fall away (myself included).
I don't think this is a weakness in the Kiwis. I think it's the result of captaincy from Stephen Fleming that nobody else uses. Fleming senses an opportunity or a chance to cripple and that's what he goes for. Other captains see that early wickets mean an earlier introduction of the 5th bowler. What this means is that when a team is 6/40, 6/80 or whatever, his best bowlers have been used. Ricky Ponting mentioned this because of the WC match when Australia were crippled at 6/80 but still managed 208. Fleming had crippled Australia but had failed to deliver the knockout punch.
As I said, it's just part of his tactics that do this. Personally, I don't think it's that bad. It's not like the NZ bowlers are especially good, but the way Fleming uses them is. I'd rather have a team 6/40 or 6/80 with my best bowlers used then save them for the final 10 overs to prevent an all out assault. This is for a number of reasons:
1) The chances are the opposition won't score highly anyway (highly unlikely they'll score enough to win)
2) If your top bowlers take 6/40 in their allotted overs they've done well. Using them sporadically or in a conventional manner would probably still not get this result.
3) Even if the opposition do recover they'll be unable to attack until very late in the innings, solely for the fact that they need to bat out the 50 overs. This allows plenty of time for more breakthroughs, more planning and less damage from a batting frenzy in 'happy hour'.
Go Flemmo, you got the ideas, man.
