Newsgroups: rec.sport.cricket
Subject: NZ Test Players Details
From: howard@grace.cri.nz (Howard Silby)
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 93 21:32:19 GMT
Organization: Gracefield Research Centre

THE FOLLOWING IS A SUMMARY OF NEW ZEALAND TEST PLAYERS AS AT
THE CONCLUSION OF THE PAKISTAN TEST

BATSMEN: (age,tests,hs,runs,ave,100's,comments)

Andrew Jones    33  28  186  2166  48.13  6  very dissapointing season
Martin Crowe    30  63  299  4591  47.82  15 averaging 61 in his last 40 tests!
Mark Greatbatch 29  23  146* 1500  44.11  3  runs very hot and cold in form
John Wright     38  79  185  5097  37.47  12 sorely missed against Pakistan
Rod Latham      31   4  119   219  31.28  1  like G'batch bats anywhere 
Ken Rutherford  27  35  107* 1231  22.79  2  had a disastrous first 4 years
Dipak Patel     34  19   99   689  21.53  -  now primarily a spin bowler
Chris Harris    23   3   56    99  19.80  -  young, brilliant 1-day performer
Blair Hartland  26   6   52   237  19.75  -  one of our many tried openers

Other batsmen used in the last 2 seasons: 

Trevor Franklin (opener beset by injury woes), Shane Thomson (did quite well
but Chris Harris seems in favour now), Justin Vaughan (1 test only)

BOWLERS: (age,tests,bb,wickets,ave,5wi,comments)

Murphy Su'a     26   7  5-73  27  23.11  2  left armer with surprising success
Michael Owens   23   3  4-101  8  33.37  -  looks good but needs guiding
Chris Cairns    22   5  6-52  20  35.00  2  strike bowler unavailable vs Pak
Danny Morrison  26  26  5-41  86  35.97  6  the other main strike bowler
Willie Watson   27  12  6-78  32  37.03  1  very steady but uninspiring
Dipak Patel     34  19  6-50  33  41.90  2  improved meteorically recently

Other bowlers used in the last 2 seasons:

Simon Doull (medium pacer who looked promising before injury), Chris Pringle 
(took 7-52 in Pakistan and has a good 1-day record but poor recent form),
Dion Nash (steady medium pacer), Mark Haslam & Grant Bradburn (unsuccessfull
young spinners).
                                        
In Summary, the New Zealand batting has four strong performers but still 
relies far too heavily on Martin Crowe who since 1985 has fashioned a 
phenomenal record. Sadly there are no young batsmen grabbing the two
remaining batting places with any conviction -for some reason this is
customary in New Zealand and young players tend to start badly (Crowe and
Rutherford being two good examples).
The New Zealand bowling was feared to be in dire straits after the retirement
of Sir Richard but Cairns, Morrison and Sua form a reasonable attack. Of
particular concern is the complete lack of quality young spinners.
Also of concern is the number of injuries New Zealand players have been
encountering lately among bowlers this season (Doull, Morrison, Cairns)
and that the two most experienced batsmen (Wright, Crowe) are often not at
at full fitness.

Given the way Australia are playing currently it is hard to see New Zealand
not losing the forthcoming series unless the batsmen can learn to handle 
a quality pace attack. New Zealand has only lost one series against Australia 
since 1981 (in Aus. 1987/88 which featured the famous third test at Melb.
in which Whitney padded up to several overs of dead-straight Hadlee to earn
Australia a draw). Determined batting, Sir Richard and the spin of Bracewell
were responsible for much of NZ's run of success against Australia. This time
its much harder too see how we could achieve victory.

                                        
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