SA cricket

giggsy

NZ 45 all out, after winning the toss... Philander with incredible figures of 5 for only 7 runs, the first five wickets to fall, and Steyn got his 300th

psyx

Yeah... It was terrible for the Kiwi's. Their 3rd lowest innings ever

Bob-Dubery

This NZ side are crap, but not that crap. Let's hope it's not a dodgy pitch. IIRC the last test played at Newlands (SA v OZ) was also a low-scoring affair.

chris77

Big Vern seems to like Newlands huh... ?
Lowest total ever against SA, Steyn getting his 300th scalp and king Kallis only 20 away from 13000 test runs. Looks like this will be another one of those tests full of special landmarks and records...
Stuck at work but will try and sneak home for lunch to catch some highlights.

ActionArnie

I'm hoping that we smash NZ properly in both tests well short of the full 5 days so that our cricket board will know next time not to offer a half-bit cricket team our prime summer tour slot. Watching a terribly one sided test is only fun when it's us smashing England or Oz.

Bob-Dubery

ActionArnie wrote: I'm hoping that we smash NZ properly in both tests well short of the full 5 days so that our cricket board will know next time not to offer a half-bit cricket team our prime summer tour slot. Watching a terribly one sided test is only fun when it's us smashing England or Oz.

The ICC has a thing called the FTP - Future Tours Program, which requires all Test countries to host and visit each other in a certain time span.

But there are complications. Everybody wants a series against India because that's where the money is. Several countries have pre-existing arrangements to play each other at regular intervals. Most countries have to have some arrangement regarding the IPL (easier for rich national boards like England or Oz than for poor boards like NZ). Plus some countries have lucrative TV deals that require them to play large numbers of home fixtures (EG England) and so they have to split their season into two small tours rather than one big one.

So everybody is trying to keep their sponsors happy and to try to prevent their players mutinying over IPL. You have historic fixtures that you really want to play, but they take up too much time. And every now and then the ICC will knock on your door and remind you that you need to play so-and-so.

The only series that seems immune to this is the Ashes. Everybody else has scheduling problems and is either on the road a lot or has to find ways to squeeze in lots of home fixtures (which is why Oz are now playing outside of their regular season in places like Cairns).

It's all becoming a bit of a mess.

Also nobody could foresee the problems that have recently reared their head in NZ cricket. The new coach didn't get on well with the captain (and best player) Ross Taylor. That fallout was quite bitter and public and seems to have demotivated several other players. As well their team is upholding the good old NZ tradition of getting injured. None of this was apparent when the matches were scheduled. SA must have fancied they'd be stronger than NZ but they weren't expecting this kind of inequality.

Pity the poms! They get NZ in a couple of months time, and some of the best remaining NZ players will only join in mid-tour because they'll be playing IPL.

ActionArnie

Very interesting, wasn't aware of the forced scheduling. It's just so disappointing that we aren't seeing a proper contest in the test series (yet) over our summer holiday time.

I also feel that there isn't room for all formats, seriously feels like the ODI's are just tacked on at the end of the tour. And although I way prefer ODI's to T20's, if they're going to have so few ODI's on a tour anyway I'd prefer to see them just play tests and T20's only. Rather drop the ODI's and have a longer T20 tournament where the overall series winner is more likely to be the better side by eliminating the randomness of the individual games.

Bob-Dubery

ActionArnie wrote: Very interesting, wasn't aware of the forced scheduling. It's just so disappointing that we aren't seeing a proper contest in the test series (yet) over our summer holiday time.

Which is kind of the problem. If there wasn't an FTP in place then SA, Oz, England and India would just tie each other's fixture lists up, and leave the rest contesting the financial wooden spoon.

It's good for the game to have an FTP. It means that Oz have to play in Bangladesh every so often. Which is fine for BD and inconvenient for Oz.

Down side is that the FTP allows two tests to count as a series. OK... for mismatched sides you can get away with that, but three should be a minimum, and for two good sides (or a good side and those perpetual wild cards Pakistan) four is better and five can produce a truly engrossing series. Our recent series in Oz was just getting going at the end of the third match.

I also feel that there isn't room for all formats, seriously feels like the ODI's are just tacked on at the end of the tour. And although way prefer ODI's to T20's, if they're going to have so few ODI's on a tour anyway I'd prefer to see them just play tests and T20's only. Rather drop the ODI's and have a longer T20 tournament where the overall series winner is more likely to be the better side by eliminating the randomness of the individual games.

I'd like to say it's easy, just ignore the one-day stuff. However, if they canned all the limited overs stuff they could easily revert to three or four test series. Plus side is that the short form games, against all expectations, are serving us a useful feeder for the real thing.

Bob-Dubery

Well NZ will be batting again today, unless something extremely remarkable happens. Pity the folks who have tickets for the weekend - the third innings will start on the second day, and NZ will need 300+ just to make SA bat again.

Bob-Dubery

Well that's that one done and dusted, and have a good week end.

IceCreamMan

NZ should be kicked out of test cricket ...they bloody useless..... ?

Bob-Dubery

I feel sorry for the commentators. They had to spend hours yesterday showing replays and trying to give enlightening explanations of what happened. They were still at it at half past 6.

Reinhard

I guess it is a bit cruel, but I enjoyed seeing Dale Steyn bowl at the tail enders. He had them ducking and diving. Too many times in the past we have had trouble wrapping up the tail. Maybe this is the way to do it. Body line bowling until they don't feel like batting anymore and give there wicket away like Patel ?

Bob-Dubery

Reinhard wrote: I guess it is a bit cruel, but I enjoyed seeing Dale Steyn bowl at the tail enders. He had them ducking and diving. Too many times in the past we have had trouble wrapping up the tail. Maybe this is the way to do it. Body line bowling until they don't feel like batting anymore and give there wicket away like Patel ?

It's nothing like Bodyline, mainly because you can't do that anymore. With only 2 fielders allowed behind square on the leg side Bodyline (or, as the English would prefer to call it "fast leg theory") ain't going to work.

But yes, finishing off the tail is something that good teams do.

I have little problem with giving the tailenders a hard time (the days when fast bowlers didn't bounce each other are long gone) as long as it doesn't descend to the sort of nonsense we saw with Brett Lee a few years ago when he was bowling with clear intent to hurt Mornantau Hayward rather than get him out. Hayward had bounced Lee earlier in the match, so he must have expected getting something back, but it ended up with him taking 2 or 3 paces back, leaving all three stumps exposed and the ball was still following him. Lee could have got him out easy as anything, but continued to bowl at the batsman. That wasn't testing the batsman's technique or resolve, it was assault.

IceCreamMan

X-rated Bob wrote:
Reinhard wrote: I guess it is a bit cruel, but I enjoyed seeing Dale Steyn bowl at the tail enders. He had them ducking and diving. Too many times in the past we have had trouble wrapping up the tail. Maybe this is the way to do it. Body line bowling until they don't feel like batting anymore and give there wicket away like Patel ?
It's nothing like Bodyline, mainly because you can't do that anymore. With only 2 fielders allowed behind square on the leg side Bodyline (or, as the English would prefer to call it "fast leg theory") ain't going to work.

But yes, finishing off the tail is something that good teams do.

I have little problem with giving the tailenders a hard time (the days when fast bowlers didn't bounce each other are long gone) as long as it doesn't descend to the sort of nonsense we saw with Brett Lee a few years ago when he was bowling with clear intent to hurt Mornantau Hayward rather than get him out. Hayward had bounced Lee earlier in the match, so he must have expected getting something back, but it ended up with him taking 2 or 3 paces back, leaving all three stumps exposed and the ball was still following him. Lee could have got him out easy as anything, but continued to bowl at the batsman. That wasn't testing the batsman's technique or resolve, it was assault.

just the way we like it .......eh cricket played by gentleman behaving like thugs eh

IceCreamMan

them NZ team are really crap

Bob-Dubery

IceCreamMan wrote: them NZ team are really crap

NZ Cricket is in a very unhealthy state, with lots of internal disputes and a board that doesn't have much money. They're short of some their best players for various reasons. With Vettori, Southee and Taylor on board and the team in happy mood (which they are not right now, and not just because they're getting hammered by SA) they'd put up a better fight, lose by less gigantic margins.

They don't have much depth either. Flynn went in at number 5 for this match. This is his 24th test. His record shows 6 balls delivered in test matches, so he's not being picked for his bowling. He doesn't have a hundred in any international game, and yet this is the best they have to send in at number 5.

It's bad. Even with Taylor on board and with Jesse Ryder making himself available, they'd be two injuries away from the situation they're in now (and with Ryder's history, there's no guarantee that he'd be fit and on good terms with the team for any length of time).

Flynn actually is a tough customer, as is McCullum. The latter gets resolutely in line and will not be cowed by aggressive fast bowling. But that's not enough.

Fingerpicker

Only one way to level the playing field(s) - we trade Jacques Kallis for Richie McCaw and AB for Dan Carter. Help our rugby and their cricket at the same time.

IceCreamMan

Looks like same old same old out there right now....

Shibbibilybob

When the proteas have a high profile semi-final, and every time I'm like:
http://media.tumblr.com/ad37ef6b1e01d6ec24afc53bfd509256/tumblr_inline_mhjqkwETL11qz4rgp.gif