papps has been well for a few weeks now so i don't know what your definition of an 'abnormally long injury' is, he is also in form having scored two centuries already in new zealand's pre-season and will no doubt pile on the runs when the state championship starts next week.Richard said:
but only because we have a limited pool of known resources at this level - who else do they have to choose from after Macca - Sinclair & Vincent are the only other 2 potential middle order batsmen available, the other batsmen used recently have both been openers...............nzidol said:
except if you score all your runs on those wickets only and score 1 100 followed by 5 failures you arent doing the team a favour.Macka said:
you know whats the worst part? styris isnt out of form, hes simply not good enough. hes had 2 big scores recently(in the last 3 tests), the 100 in england and the 80 odd against b'desh and yet he struggled against australia.Macka said:
astle hasnt done anything for a long time and styris has? they've both struggled in england and in australia.Macka said:
this doesnt bear any relation to my post.Macka said:
doesnt that make things worse? i mean if someone is not out of form and still failing( a la hayden in england and tresco in australia) it might suggest that hes not good enough in those conditions?Prince EWS said:
Totally agree. Styris does not warrent the number four position. You want your number four batsman to make runs consistently for you and Styris is a far to risky proposition to be coming in if NZ are two down for not many runs. Give Fulton or somebody new a crack against Sri Lanka. Whats the worst that could happen? If he fails in all four innings and Styris proves through domestic cricket that he can consistently get over 40 runs with very few failures then he can be given another opportunity in the return series against aussie. Half the problem with NZ's batting is that these players like Styris and Astle probably don't have the focus and determination to consistently score runs because they know that if they fail it doesn't matter because the selectors will not drop them. Styris needs a reality checktooextracool said:
not good enough ?tooextracool said:
there are also seven other test playing nations.....tooextracool said:
an average that is coming down rapidly, the only reason he averages 40 is because hes been proficient on the flattest of pitches. of course the last couple of series have given him a reality check since hes played better quality bowling. he was fortunate enough to start of his career on a series of flat wickets and he will continue to disappoint against quality teams with quality bowlers and on non-flat wickets.bryce said:
err i was referring to the ' astle hasnt done anything for a long time' comment where you suggest that he should be dropped ahead of styris. fact is astle has only failed for the same period of time that styris has, so by that comment i should assume that styris should be dropped too.bryce said:
you cannot put a black mark against his test records because he gets in on flat tracks, someone has got to score the runs and it's credit to him that he cashes in on flat decks, flat wicket or not, the value of runs never changes no matter what the pitch is like.tooextracool said:
actually styris had a very good south africa series when astle was injured and astle hasn't had a good series since india, sure astle had been injured but styris had been scoring big runs before the england tour and astle hasn't for over a year which goes in styris' favour, anyway i don't think either of them should be dropped yet.tooextracool said:
of course, thats exactly why we can't do that. we don't have the luxury of throwing away a player good enough to average over 40 in test match cricket. and lets take a leaf out of australias book when it comes to styris. you wouldn't see australia (nor did you when ponting had a horror run a few years ago, or when martyn was struggling a year or two ago) dropping someone after 1 bad series, he scored a hundred in his last series against decent opposition, england (doesn't matter what the track was like, a test hundred is still a test hundred). Do we really want to go through the revolving door policy NZ employed in the 1990s where we give batsmen 10 or so tests then dump them? Or do we stick with a guy like Styris who is obviously up to it but is having a lean run. Like someone said earlier, sending him back to domestic cricket will do nothing for him. And someone earlier said that he's a bit arrogant.. GOOD. thats exactly the attitude you need to be successful and take on the best, and i for one think hes a very good test match cricketer.anzac said:
I would think scoring runs no matter the situation is doing your team a favour. Let's keep this in perspective, I was comparing him to Astle and McMillan who both have had poor runs of form (for much longer than Styris), including that England series.tooextracool said:
What absolute rubbish. Not good enough? A test average of about 40, test centuries against West Indies, India, South Africa and England. He was out-classed by the Australians in his first test series against then and suddenly he's 'not good enough'? Many a player has not performed against Australia.tooextracool said:
Alright, Styris has scored test centuries this year, Astle has not. Styris even has an ODI century this year, Astle has one against USA. I can't be bothered stating you up, I have more important things to do, but I'm sure if you look (and I bet you do) Styris will have a better record over 2004. I'm not sure but 'a long time' seems longer to me than two test series (no Bangladesh doesn't count).tooextracool said:
I wasn't aware I couldn't comment on other issues in one post, how silly of me. Should I post 5 or 6 times in a row instead?tooextracool said:
