Just back from Cloud 9 and the Blackcaps are still World Champions!

YES! The Blackcaps from little old New Zealand are the World Champions of cricket. And now, not just the best at ODIs, we're also the best at test cricket. 

WORLD CHAMPIONS!

What a monumental six days of totally absorbing rain-filled cricket that was. How good was India? How good were we? The quality of the cricket on display reflected the enornmity of the occasion. No quarter was given. Every wicket was fought for and earned. 

I can only think of a couple of false strokes in the test where the pressure got to a batter and they attempted to flail their way out of trouble. Rahane probably regrets giving up his wicket in the 2nd innnings. It did appear to be a game changer.  

To the lucky buggers that got to watch the game live, thanks for making enough noise to fill a stadium. Wish I'd been lucky enough to get some in the ballot. 

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What can I add to the millions of lines that have been written already?

I thought about linking to all the articles for posterity, but there's too many. Here's some of the best ones:

Not luck, not fluke - New Zealand deserve to be the World Test Champions - Jarrod Kimber for Cricinfo. I'm no Kimber fan - over the years he's not been our best friend but he seems to be on board now. 

Kiwis do fly, to the top of the world - Sydney Morning Herald acknowledge the result.

The Champion Team - Sportsfreak covers the result

I don't do podcasts much but for posterity's sake Offspin covered the test daily.

For Ross, Kane, Tim, and Trent this is the culmination off their hard work and sheer brillance. For Wags and Watling, this is what happens to top blokes who believe and never say die. For Tom and Henry, the quiet and consistent performers that every team needs, your reward is now here. For Colin and his hairdo, thanks for bringing the lols to the team. For Kyle and Devon, the new boys on the block, cricket is just too easy apparently. I hope they continue to have awesome careers.  

How lucky are we to have so many good cricketers in one generation? And with more in the background ready to jump in and fill their shoes when retirment or injury occurs. Well done NZ cricket administrators for getting the coaching, administration, grounds, and pitches in decent order. 

That super sexy WTC Final jersey

To my fellow blackcaps supporters and kiwi cricket tragics, yes it has been worth us travelling the world to watch the boys at Lords, the MCG, Edgbaston, the SCG, the Basin, the Gabba, the Bay Oval, and Seddon Park (never Eden Park which is a travesty of a cricket ground). This World Championship is ours too, our reward for never ending belief in a team.

To my fellow twitter cricket supporters. Thanks for sharing the experience. You make the game even more interesting, stat filled, and fun. It's been worth you writing your titbits - never doubt your words.

To the rest of the cricket world, thanks for bothering to play us, for without you, we couldn't be the best.

One more pic (try not to cry):

Ross and Kane - World Class

Blackcaps vs Sth Africa – CWC, Edgbaston

Pics from the CWC19 trip to support the boys in the game vs the Saffas. A fine game superbly controlled by Kane’s excellent 100 and the six at the end was incredible stuff.

Bring Hogan's Gear Back to NZ

Maximus Decimus Meridius AKA Russell Crowe is being taken to the cleaners by his previous lady friend and is having one mother of an auction to divvy up the proceeds of his life. Amongst the swords, costumes, artwork and paraphernalia an actor collects is a bunch of historically important cricket artefacts given to him by Martin 'Hogan' Crowe. These include Martin's bat he made his 17th and last century with and his shirt from the 1992 World Cup. Rather than let these items fall into a collector's hands, one good soul has started a funding page to try and earn enough money to bid on these items and donate them to the NZ Cricket Museum.

I guess you could argue that there are infinitely better causes to give your money to but equally few things in life will give you as much pleasure as watching cricket. It's the cathartic experience everyone should have in their life. Nothing beats a beer in one hand, the newspaper in the other, the crack of willow on leather in the distance and the roar of the crowd. Martin Crowe provided many of my favourite memories growing up and I'm sure others of my age will be nodding their head along. If you want to get involved in saving a piece of NZ nostalgia for other New Zealanders to enjoy, visit the Give A Little page and donate a few dollars to help the cause.

Jesus, the cricket?!!!

Holy dingo baby eaters, we're getting our ass handed to us. 389/2 on the first day. We're meant to be killing the worst Australian team since the 80s.

What went wrong boys? Were we too cocky?

Fingers crossed for tomorrow or we're going 1-0 down.

Game of Throws - Monopoly: Cricket Edition

On the day the boys are beginning their tour of Australia (and what will prove to be an absolute triumph of a tour and leave Australians crying into their VBs and XXXXs looking for a new national past-time), I've spotted this on the cyber net.

It's the cricket version of Monopoly. Collect grounds from around the world instead of streets, put stadiums and press boxes on them instead of houses and hotels.

Quick video overview of it below. Looks good-ish and might do someone a decent Chrissy present. Lords and the MCG in the top spots, while The Basin is included but bizarrely ranked lower in the order than the abysmal Eden Park AKA 'the worst cricket ground in the world.' TM

The Holy Shit, We've Made It To The Cricket World Cup Final! Post

It's been a while between innings for The AB Enquirer as daily life gets in the way of blog writing. The meanderings are mostly posted on twitter these days anyway, but just occasionally it's nice to do something a bit longer.

I was originally planning a preview of the Cricket World Cup post but left it a bit late and now deep into the tournament and running terribly low on sleep due to the timings of the matches in the UK, a preview is a bit silly. As it is I predicted that Sth Africa, NZ, Australia and Pakistan would make the semis. I'd written India off due to their poor form in the 18 months leading up to the tournament and had Sth Africa down as favourites and us to meet them in the final. As it is SA got beaten twice in pool play so were obviously nowhere near as good or prepared as the world had thought.

ABdV was basically a one man team and if they dished out World Cups for being a nice bloke and trying really hard then he'd have one. As we live in reality though, you need an entire team to perform to win a tournament and they just didn't do enough. Had they won in the semi against us it would have been a travesty.

Great sporting behaviour between the teams though and you could see what it meant to both sets of players. Nice touch from Grant to lift up a distraught Steyn from the pitch. The hurt was visible for all to see on the Sth Africans faces and while in previous tournaments they've been their own worst enemies, this time they turned up and really played. Unfortunately for them they met a once-in-a-lifetime NZ team who are on fire.

Australia have been playing well and in Mitchell Starc they have a special bowler. All their batsmen look in decent touch too, with only Clarke as the slight weak link. I think he'd struggle to get in if he wasn't captain. The pool game against us in Auckland was the obvious highlight of the early games and I'd built myself up into a frenzy of excitement for it. Some background - the Aussies had avoided playing us for nigh on six years (which is a disgrace in itself, how that can happen when they're our nearest neighbours just shows how out of touch the ICC is with cricket). The Blackcaps were on a run of form which meant we'd beaten every major playing nation in an ODI series including England, Pakistan, and Sth Africa away. The Aussies had warmed up by slaughtering the useless poms and an Indian team on holiday.

Nervously anticipated by the entire world, I couldn't bear to look at it - staring weakly through clasped hands. Every ball (and there weren't many) was cheered and screamed at as we ran through them like a hot knife through butter. Destroyed. An annoying last wicket stand upset matters and meant we had to chase a few more runs than necessary. That would prove crucial. Our chase seemed to be going well, but then disaster as the entire middle order was blasted apart by Starc. Don't panic though, the Boy Wonder stepped up and smashed one over long on to win by one wicket. Epic boys own adventure type stuff from KW, who like the AB Enquirer is an Otumoetai College graduate. Conclude of that what you will.

So we're now in the Final against Australia. What should we expect?

The ockers will try to bully and intimidate us throughout. I'd be surprised if the fire alarms don't magically turn themselves on all night in our hotel preventing a decent night's sleep. I'd also be surprised if all of the boys are available to play after they're served some sort of 7-month old, sewage and plague infused, fish curry for tea.

Mitch didn't like Scott.

Surprisingly, they behaved themselves in Auckland but that's probably because they were terrified of the crowd going ass-bastard ballistic on them if they tried their sledging nonsense. However, we don't have 40,000 rabid NZ'ers to help out in Melbourne so expect the filth to be up to their old tricks. I imagine Johnson will be told to sling it in short and then run up and hurl abuse to our boys every ball.

It will be disgusting and we'll just have to deal with it. They know they're second best and just like in the old days under Chappell and Border when they know they're not good enough they resort to cheating and underhand tactics. Sunday will be the same as in those eras.

There's no single batsmen that we need to get out early from the Aussie team specifically. They're all good. Steve Smith has the ability to get a big score, while Finch and Warner can take the game away from you by scoring mega quickly. I think making sure Maxwell has almost no time at the crease will help the most. Like us the Aussies go in with five proper bowlers so there's no one single player to target.

The ladies love Marty

For us, well it's just a case of continuing on as we have. Marty G to entertain the ladies with his dashing stroke play and BMac to get us off to a good start by peppering the boundaries and smashing the run rate. The Boy Wonder to go deep and ton up with late Ross and Ronchi Donkey cameos of 50 each off about 20 balls. No-one else required (fingers crossed).

Lightning and Timmee, Timmee, Timmee, Timmee, Timmee, Timmee, Timmee...Southee to run through their top order, leaving Dan the Man to finish them off.

The MCG will favour the Aussies, not just because of home support but also as we haven't played there for so long. Nor have many of the boys played in Australian conditions for ages. It's unlikely to swing as much as it has in NZ (I think).

Let's rate the teams:
Bowlers
Starc - 10 v Boult - 10
Johnson - 8 v Southee - 9
Hazlewood - 8 v Henry - 8
Faulkner - 8 v Anderson - 7
Maxwell - 7 v Vettori - 9
Watson - 6 v Elliott - 5
TOTAL - 47 v 48

Batsmen
Warner - 8 v Guptill - 10
Finch - 8 v McCullum - 9
Smith - 9 v The Boy Wonder (#SteadyTheShip) - 8
Clarke - 8 v Taylor - 7
Watson - 7 v Elliott - 9
Faulkner - 7 v Anderson - 8
Haddin - 8 v Ronchi - 8
TOTAL - 55 v 59

Crowd
Australia - 10 v NZ - 2

TV Audience
Australia - 1 v NZ - 10

GRAND TOTAL - 113 v 119

There you go. Statistically based on the The AB Enquirer rating system, the BlackCaps will win. This does not of course allow for the cheating the Aussies will attempt.

It hurts to write Ross down as a 7 but he looks so shaky at the moment. He has been holding an end up though and preventing collapses so let's hope he can achieve that again.

Too excited for words. Let's do this BlackCaps. Go NEW ZEALAND. GO YOU GOOD THING. GO, GO, GO. BEAT THEM AND WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN!!!!!!!

By Monday we could be World Champions of both Rugby and Cricket. Oh my word...

Smashing wickets and breaking records the BlackCaps way

Our mighty Blackcaps have been on a tear since the beginning of the last southern hemisphere Summer. Breaking records galore and unearthing talent that other teams can only dream of. We have batsmen consistently scoring tons, breaking records and posting huge record totals - plus we now have a triple centurion.

Sir Brendon's Triple Century at the Basin Reserve vs India

This week the boys demolished the Windies at home in Sabina Park. Neesham became just the 8th player to score centuries in his first two tests, new boy Latham took to opening like a duck to water, the Boy Wonder tonned up again and we spun our way to victory (yes, spun!!).

Run fella, run.

We're on the brink of a first away series win since 2002 and the first three match series win since 1999 in England. These are historic times and the current team under Sir Brendon will go down as legends in NZ cricket surely.

Since Ross Taylor was deposed by Hesson and McCullum mid-tour in 2012, the Blackcaps have looked onwards and upwards. While there were terribly dark days immediately afterwards (I've stopped remembering about the 45 all out in Sth Africa), steady improvement has now turned into rampant destruction of the opposition. I'd been tempted to write a post for almost a year titled 'What the hell is wrong with NZ cricket?!' but I'm bloody glad I never did now. It all seems so trite when you look back on it. Clearly there were issues with the players responding to coaching and the laissez-faire approach of Ross. Obviously he's an awesome cricketer but I guess with hindsight we can say that perhaps he was struggling to impose his will on the players around him.

The other thing is that there are two sides to cricket - batting and bowling. While batters save tests, bowlers win them. And we now have bowlers coming out of our ears. Who'd of thought we could get 20 test wickets on a regular basis? Even in our losses in England last year we were still able to bowl the opposition out in both innings. Bondy is the bowling coach and I guess this is down to him but there must be a lot of grassroots people working hard in NZ discovering and fine-tuning talent like Matt Henry, Adam Milne, Neesham and Andersen. There is so much pressure on for a place in the team now that incumbents are having to bowl out of their tree to stay in.

I thought Ish Sodhi had nailed down the spinner's spot too but along comes Mark Craig - on debut 8 wickets and a MOTM performance. Amazing. There are not enough superlatives for the way this team plays at the moment.

Mark Craig. Whaddya mean? The guy in middle of the picture. The one doing the high fives. Don't panic I'm sure we'll recognise him in future.

We've added real strength to the tail with BJ Watling (classy name!) batting like a barnacle with the bowlers. Stickability is his middle name.

The only real issue in the current team is what to do with Sir Peter of Fulton. His Eden Park heroics are now a distant memory and every time he goes out for less than 5 and exposes the Boy Wonder to a hostile new ball attack we limit our chances of a big score. I'm guessing he's had his ultimatum already so a shuffle will probably happen for the 2nd or 3rd test. Not sure if Neesham can open and I'd suggest it would be dangerous to risk damaging his confidence by moving him up top but somehow we need to find room for both him and Anderson in the team. Some would argue the Boy Wonder should open (as he mostly does that job anyway when Sir Peter departs early) but again it's such a risk to his talents.

Still it's good to have these problems. As it was two years ago, I could have played for the Black Caps and done no worse than the guys in the team. Now...we're world beaters.

Man it feels good.

What we've learned so far from the Blackcaps tour of England

The bits we've gleaned from the tour so far:

- We're better at one day games than tests, which is annoying
- McCullum is a great captain
- but not much of a batter since becoming Captain
- Ronchi isn't much of a keeper - nor is he much of a batter. I unfortunately see not much of a future for him at this level.
- We are hopeless at playing spin. Guptill was bowled out three times between bat and pad.
- Ross Taylor is still head and shoulders above everyone else in the team
- The Boy Wonder (Kane) is getting better and better. Especially at bowling.
- The bowling unit looks pretty good. A couple of dodgy overs from Mitch at the end of the ODI series apart, everybody is doing their part. Southee and Boult will keep all other teams honest for the next five years at least.
- We need a batting coach desperately. There are a bunch of guys in the team who are unwilling to be patient and wait for the bad ball. Instead once bogged down for 5-6 balls they will play at anything. Certain doom at test level. Our collapses were shocking during the tests and to lose a test in an hour and a half after dominating for three days is ridiculous.
- The Guptill's batting in the ODIs was phenomenal. 103*, 189*, 38 for an average of 330 is, as Darth Vader would say, 'Most Impressive'
- We field pretty well.

Marks out of 10 for the Blackcaps tour. 6/10
If we were rating just the tests, I'm giving them a 4 and that's only because the bowlers were very good.

Day 5, Second Test, England vs New Zealand

England 1st innings - 337
NZ 1st innings - 174
England 2nd innings - 287/5
NZ 2nd innings - 158/6

The game is nicely poised with us on six wickets down for bugger all runs, facing either defeat or salvation by poor weather. If it is the latter then England only have themselves to blame as they didn't make us follow on and then set a world record highest score for us to try and chase. Ridiculous. There is no chance of us making 250 let alone 450.

Cook's innings was impressive. He seems finally to have adjusted his game to play us and never looked in trouble. Trott was obdurate as usual and just plain dull to watch. His 76 coming off 210 balls in an innings where they were supposed to be setting us a target. Oh well, lucky them to have the luxury of loafing round.

Our second innings was just as bad as the first. Rutherford looked ok and then got bored and tried to smash every single one of an over and a half of bowling before he buggered up against Swann. He needs to learn some patience that young man. Hopefully it'll come with time. Talent is there for sure, but you have to pace yourself and play within your means. Taylor looked good but eventually succumbed to Swann too. The rest were dire.

Update:

It's all over. Weather didn't save us.

NZ second innings 220 - lost to England by 247 runs.

We scored another 62 runs mostly to Southee and Bracewell who had a little tonk to show the batsmen that it was possible to play shots.

So of five tests, we played 3 and a half of them pretty well against the poms. However, we've ended up losing 2-0. Just not good enough really. The bowlers must consider themselves pretty hard done by. All the good work they put in over the last couple of months has come to nothing.

Our batting has been atrocious in England. Almost no-one has played with any patience. The moment they fail to score for an over or two they look to smash the ball out of the park.

Of note, the same day we were getting killed the one day team played a Nottinghamshire XI and scored 350 with Dan the man scoring 150 no. I'm expecting that the one dayers will be a lot tighter than the tests but that should be of no consequence. The real cricket has been lost..

Day 4, Second Test, England vs New Zealand

England 1st innings - 337
NZ 1st innings - 174
England 2nd innings - 116/1

Day 3 - Just about the worst day's play ever by a NZ cricket team. Having got the last few wickets cheaply, we started batting knowing that we had to improve on the performance at Lords.

Fulton and Rutherford were solid and attacked when required and we were 55/0 at one stage. Anderson whinged about the ball, it got changed and the game ended for us. The second ball was a different kettle of fish and we were ruined. It was 124/9 at one point and only some sophisticated slogging by Boult and Wagner got us to the eventual total of 174. Absolutely disastrous again. Some of the batting was truly laughable. Brownlie and Guptil's dismals were embarassing, getting bowled between bat and pad. No application to the cause at all.

The only thing that saved us was the decision by England not to put us in again, as the match could conceivably been over with all 20 wickets falling in one day. As it is England are batting and nurdling it around for a massive lead by the looks of things. Cook looks awesome.

These are not good days to be a Black Caps supporter.

Day 3, Second Test, England vs New Zealand

England - 337/7

We bowled brilliantly yesterday or at least Southee and Boult did, just didn't get the results. 337 is a lot of runs to concede in a day and we looked knackered at the end of it. Bracewell not so much as he was carted round the ground. The ball seamed and swung all day and at lunch we had them on the ropes. However, that Joe Root bloke can bat. Bat awesome. We really should have had them out for 250 but things didn't go our way.

The state of the game is that if we get the rest of them out for less than 350 then we have a chance to secure a result. Any more than that then we are in saving the test mode. Can we last the remaining two and a half days batting against Anderson, Broad and a fired up Finn? Probably not. We are now looking for the weather to intervene unfortunately...

Fingers crossed for the boys.

Day 2, Second Test, England v New Zealand

There was no Day 1. No, we didn't lose the test in a day!

 

Enforced changes have been made to the Black Caps lineup from the First Test, with Martin and Watling both bustified. In comes Guptil and he should shore up the batting a bit and Bracewell takes Martin's place. Dan the Man was flown out to take Martin's place but he looks like this now and was ruled out on the basis of generally being a hobo and possibly a terrrorist.

The boy wonder is going to bowl a ton of overs then and hold the batting together too. KW is the man for the task I'm sure but seems a shame to burden him so much.

With the first day rained out, our chances of drawing the series have been reduced. We just need a good showing from the boys then so that we can leave with our heads held high. Runs have got to be the order of the day. We must make some runs. Lots of them.

Come on Black Caps.

 

Day 5 - There is no day 5 :-( First Test, England vs New Zealand

Eng 1st innings - 232
NZ 1st innnings -207

Eng 2nd innings - 213
NZ 2nd innnings -68 !!

NZ lose by 170 runs -WTF?!

After a bit more Southee magic in the morning (including his first 10 for in a game), we had a target of 238 to win the game. Awesome. Difficult but gettable. Even if we got close that would be pretty magic.

Under two hours later we had lost and been thrashed. Fucking unbelievable. The top six contributed a total of 29 runs. Broad and Anderson were devastating.

Seems hard to believe that we could have been so competitive for 3 and a bit days then lose it all in an hour and a half. I feel gutted for the Blackcaps and us supporters. 

Nothing for it but some significant batting practice over the next few days and pray to the invisible deity of your choice that we can get some runs and turn things round in the next one. Seems like Martin and Watling will be crocked for the next game, so Guptil and A.N.Other to play, probably Bracewell.

Ass biscuits.

Day 4 - First Test, England vs New Zealand

Eng 1st innings - 232
NZ 1st innnings -207

Eng 2nd innings - 180/6

It is perilously poised this test match. Could go either way and with the weather holding up (no rain) it looks for sure that there will be a result either today or tomorrow morning.

At least McCullum and the rest of the boys won't die for trying in this match. The tactics, field placings, bowling, fielding, everything has been superb. They're playing like men possessed at a level far beyond what any of us thought possible. Perhaps we really are seeing the birth of a new era in NZ cricket? If only the batsmen could get some significant and consistent runs.

It was desperately bad yesterday afternoon when the sun came out. Trott and Root almost won the game there in that 2-3 hour period. It may prove that they still have but at least with the late afternoon cloud cover and some genius from Southee we have a chance today.

It will be nervous stuff. If the lead gets above 250 then we are pretty much done for. That pitch holds no hopes for anyone batting fourth and getting any decent runs. Anything below 250 and you have to hope that if Fulton and Rutherford get starts then we can do it.

Fingers crossed. Go Blackcaps!!

Day 3 - First Test, England vs New Zealand

Not much to say really. We are dominating at the moment.

As predicted we got them out for under 250, in fact 232 all out. Southee was fantastic in the second hour of the day keeping the ball up and enticing the drive. McCullum continued to set aggressive fields that encourage batsmen to look for runs. When they do, our boys are up for the catch. It's great stuff. The pitch has helped, and there was a load of swing available to both sides yesterday.

Felt sorry for Fulton and Rutherford. The new ball is almost unplayable in these swinging conditions. They didn't do anything wrong just got nipped out by uber devious swing. Taylor was majestic, taming the pitch and the ball to do what no other batsman had done in the game - smash it round. Ably aided by the boy wonder holding up his end and doing nothing stupid, it's up to Kane to go on and ton up today. Brendon is probably due another 50 so we'll get that and probably get a small lead of about 50, with any luck. Of course, I'm hoping for more but it's overcast again meaning more swing, the pitch is roughing up and beginning to take turn, and it seems you're never really 'in' this game.

Best of luck to the boys. Let's put the hammer down, get a big lead and then put them under pressure.

Day 2 - First Test, England vs New Zealand

Brownlie takes an awesome catch off Boult bowling to Trott

Seldom have we ever dominated a side more than what happened in day two of the first test. OK, so wickets didn't fall but the poms only scored 160/4 in an entire day of cricket. Ridiculous.

Boult charged in and was generally magnificent, well on the way now to becoming the dominant bowler I expect him to be. He had Cook in knots.

Martin was his unbelievably difficult self, bowling all day for less than two an over. He looks a terrible bowler and at least two balls in every six are full tosses, yet somehow he gets wickets. You got to rate a trier.

Southee and Wagner worked hard all day with little reward. Conditions should be perfect at the moment for Southee's swing bowling, yet he is struggling to be consistent with it. Maybe the second test will be kinder to him.

Boult though has this. If we give him three overs with the old ball this morning, knocking a couple over in the overcast conditions with a little dew in the ground, then we take the new ball, the Englanders are all out for under 250. Plus, Trent gets his name on the honours board.

Have at them Blackcaps.

Hoping for some sunshine on Day 1 - First Test v England

Day 1 dawns and it is blue sky above. Hallelujah. That really is a miracle given the absolutely atrocious conditions of the last week. I had the heating on yesterday just to stay alive.

Lords looks good - here's a pic tweeted from their account this morning:

The poms have Bresnan and Swann back but still no Pieterson. They will clearly be stronger than they were in the last test at Auckland. Plus they have the Duke ball, some sort of mystery device that swings like a banana.

As for us, it'll be the same team I think. Don't imagine Bracewell has done enough to play himself back into the side during the warm up games. So that will mean Bruce Martin will continue his marvellous, unbelievable international career. Amazing. We really need Southee to step up to the mark and bring his A game. Can't afford to have him in the side for much longer with an average of 60 per wicket. If he fails this test, then I think we may have to go for broke and let him go in the second, which would be a hugely radical move.

The key for us is Fulton and Rutherford. If they can keep their run of parternerships going then we give the boy wonder and Rossco a greater chance of hanging around.

Good luck boys.

Darkest before the Dawn

Whisper it quietly but we may, just may, have a half decent New Zealand cricket team on our hands.

Back in 2010/2011 we had lost to just about everyone imaginable. Defeats against Bangladesh, India and Pakistan in test series and in one day series were followed up later by a huge loss to Zimbabwe in an ODI.  Had we played the Cook Islands we would have lost to them. But as the saying goes, it is always darkest before the dawn. Just as web sites were being made laughing at our inability to play cricket (damn there was supposed to be a link here to a website purporting to be a Black Caps supporters site with amusing things for sale like buckets to cry into and stuff - can't find it now though). Languishing in 8th place in test cricket and with that miraculous semi-final in the World Cup seemingly a long time ago, we pitched up to Australia and took a beating in the first test.

But with John Wright in charge, a shuffling of the batting order, discovering some decent bowlers in Bracewell and Boult, adding some steel and grit in Brownlie, and actually having a decent fight for places in the team (Ryder no longer a certainty) has made us into a decent scrapper again. If we could get McCullum to wear the gloves again we really do have a decent team. Removing Vettori from the captaincy has been a fit of genius. Without him having to be the best batter, bowler, captain, selector, coach, manager and masseur, we've freed up everyone else to be a bit better at their game.

The test series draw in Australia was fantastic, the follow up smashing of Zimbabwe was great including a first victory ever at Maclean Park, traditionally the home of our greatest humiliations, and today a beating of the world's best team, South Africa. Alright it was only in the pretend pub sport of T20, but a win is a win. And how good is Guptil at the moment, 6 half centuries in a row equalling Andrew Jones record for NZ. Bloke was unstoppable today, even after wearing one on the head from Rusty. Not bad for a 'skinger'.

You shouldn't make our Marty angry

We may well end up losing in the test series but I feel more confident that we'll give them a decent game now.

While we're talking cricket, this looks a bit blinking good. Fire in Babylon, the story of the Windies cricket team of the late 70s and 80s. Hopefully there's a bit of coverage of their loss to us in the test series in 79/80.

Cricket World Cup or Rugby World Cup?

What if we live in a mutually exclusive world? Can we have our cake here and eat it too in the rugby world cup later in the year? Or will we be using up our proportion of luck, skill and talent to have success in the CWC?

What if the success of our cricketers is going to be equally mirrored by the ABs going out early doors again in the RWC? Are we stealing our Ying here to have Yang removed later on?

What would you prefer? An AB victory in the RWC or the Blackcaps as champions of the world?

Semi Final Baby

It's been an awesome World Cup for us. The overwhelmingly huge defeats we inflicted on the Associate nations just put us in a mood for more good cricket. And once on a roll we've seen ever better performances. I've no idea if our second game against the quite brilliant Sri Lankans will be better than the first, but at least the boys have given their all and actually achieved.

It's clear that the new tactics of batting ourselves in, setting down roots for the first 30 overs and trying to restrict wicket losses to 3 or 4 is definitely helping (it may even help the guys play better in the tests too). It also helps that the team clearly appear to have formed into a close knit unit and have thoroughly enjoyed the underdog tags that we took into this World Cup. Sure, our form was awful going into this but should the media really have been so surprised that we beat Kenya, Canada and Zimbabwe so comfortably and by huge margins. Those results gave us the momentum to believe in better things. Winning is just important, no matter who it is against and how you achieve it.

Rossco really does look the bees knees out there now. I've been guilty of calling for him to spend a bit of time on the bench to reflect on how poor he has been for 18 months. But his form now is bang on. Importantly he has learned to hang in there (even if he has to rely on the opposition to help him). 

He still has a bit to learn about the game and is terribly leg-sided in his approach (why aren't teams setting 2-7 fields to him?) but his striking of the ball...wow. Add to that a resurgent Oram, glorying in being an elder statesman now, smashing the ball with no pressure on his shoulders and rolling in his dobblys to great effect. Things look good.

The game against the Saffas was fantastic. Here's a great recap from the live text service provided by the telegraph.

I'm a bit dismayed though at the reaction of the media and the South African fans themselves who seem disgusted and equally amazed that they lost to us. Read some of these posts by other bloggers:

http://www.cricketwithballs.com/2011/03/25/how-south-africans-might-feel-after-that/

http://paddlesweep.net/a-south-african-and-an-australian/

Totally dismissing the Blackcaps in the lead up to the game, the Proteas just expected to win. But the victory was earned by bloody hard work, top fielding, great batting and some super tight bowling. They have nothing to harp on about at all. No injuries, no terrible umpiring calls, no sickness. In fact all of the hardships were being dealt to us. Playing in heat that is basically alien to NZ dna, with our best bowler missing (although he did some wonderful sledging - which is apparently illegal now??!!! tell that to Ponting and co.), and our skipper a basic hologram of himself as he limped around the field, we overcame adversity to deliver our best one day win ever.

Here's my early prediction of victory:

God I was excited. Here's the tweet from when the 9th SA wicket fell.

And to the obnoxious loser who posted this: 

Hahahahahah, no-one likes you, and you're rubbish at cricket.

Can't wait for the semi-final. Whatever happens it's all been worth it. Nice one Blackcaps.