Three days into the first test match over 10000 miles away in New Zealand England are starting to get a bit homesick...
After being skittled out for just over 150 England's bowlers struggled to stop debutant Hamish Rutherford, who I keep foolishly calling Greg Rutherford (British Olympic medallist last summer) from scoring a absolutely magnificent buck fifty in spectacular style in his first test innings. The young kiwi hit three sixes on his way to 171, more than all eleven English batsmen could muster up between them!
New Zealand scored over 400 with a magnificent late flurry from Brendon McCullum with help from debutant Martin. England are now 50 odd without loss in reply.
But why have New Zealand had so much success in the first three and a half days (first day wash out) at Dunedin?
Well, the main reason is that they do have some quality players when you look at them individually.
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| Kane Williamson |
Kane Williamson is a good player - playing at number three in the first innings he got a solid 24 while Rutherford done the work at the other end. For a man of 22 he's played quite a lot of test cricket, 20 matches to be exact, and he's definitely got good potential. I don't think he's going to be world class, but I think he could be a solid batsmen for New Zealand for many years to come.
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Ross Taylor
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Sticking with batsmen next, Ross Taylor. A man with more experience than that of six years younger Kane Williamson, Taylor brings some quality to the New Zealand middle order. Taylor is a very impressive ODI and T20 player, but he can do it on the Test circuit too, he's scored over 3000 runs for his country, notching up sixteen fifties and continuing on to a century seven times. I'd rather have him in my T20 team, but he's still a important cog in the NZ Test machine.
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Brendon McCullum
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Brendon McCullum is another man in the NZ team who is a big hitter in the one day and T20 games. He can hit the ball a long, long way, as he demonstrated in his quickfire 50 at Dunedin. He's hit two international T20 centuries, a feat which no other mortal has reached. For this reason he can score quick runs coming in late middle order, which can always be key in certain circumstances! He's a good wicket keeper as well, reliable. Nothing's worse than a liability behind the stumps!
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| Tim Southee |
Tim Southee is a player I like. A tall right armer who can move the ball is always a risk towards the opposition batsmen. Although he only picked up one of the wickets in the England first innings I think we could be seeing him get 2/3 important wickets reguarly in this series. He's not quite as good as Steve Finn but he's still a good player - for that reason he could cause all kinds of problems for Compton and Root in particular. (The rookie English players in this team)
Those four New Zealand players are the ones with the most quality, (in my opinion) but one other could cause England problems for different reasons.
Bruce Martin is playing his first test match game, and is relatively unknown. He's been playing his trade in New Zealand and I don't think England will know too much about the left armer spinner. For this reason he could cause a lot of short term problems for England, he already has taken four wickets in England's first innings!
So New Zealand have got some good quality players in their armoury, and along with the hunger to win they could not only win this test match, but one of the next two as well, which would result in a series win for the Black Caps.
England definitely need to buck up their ideas, put in the hard work inbetween now and the next test match (this game has probably been lost already) to try and turn things around.
Two things are key for England; Cutting out any complacency, and do their homework.
So get down to work Cook and co.
Cheers
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