*** un-Official - New Zealand Black Caps Thread ***

[Arjun]

What are your comments on Lou Vincent wicketkeeping? He can then bat in the middle-order, and given complaints about Scott Styris, they can drop him and promote Vettori to Number Eight and Jacob Oram can be your Number Seven/stock seamer, followed by three bowlers. There's something to think about: what do you do when you've got as many as four bowlers who are more than useful batsmen for their FC teams?

[_Ed_]

Originally Posted by Macka

Completely disagree. Styris takes a long time to get in, and he looks pretty average until he does. He's prone to jabbing at the ball outside of off early in his innings.

Although he does have a few hundreds batting at 3...

Nah. Bad idea in my opinion.

Fair enough. His best test innings though (and one of the best innings I've seen by a New Zealand batsman) of 170 against SA started with NZ at 4-2, and I thought it was a perfect display of top-order batting against a very tough new-ball attack.

[Loony BoB]

Originally Posted by _Ed_

Fair enough. His best test innings though (and one of the best innings I've seen by a New Zealand batsman) of 170 against SA started with NZ at 4-2, and I thought it was a perfect display of top-order batting against a very tough new-ball attack.

Styris bats at #3 best - averaging 142 over four innings and never once out for less than 100 against the likes of India, South Africa and England.

My ideal side would be...

Fleming
Papps
Styris
Vincent
Astle
Oram
Vettori
McCullum
Franklin
Gillespie / Patel
Bond

Yes, Fleming suffered when opening against Australia. But who doesn't?

[NZTailender]

Originally Posted by Loony BoB

Yes, Fleming suffered when opening against Australia. But who doesn't?

Yeah, true that. Averaged 40 in that position against England and the other match (aside from Australia) he was not out 69. Could be worth a shot in this home series.

[Retox]

We either play how/papps and make them open (drop marshall + astle)
or play one of them (papps for me) and have McCullum open Marshall/Fulton if they are to play need to bat in the middle order.


EDIT: Whats everyones thoughts on Oram in the ODI team now? any stats for this ICC Champs for him?

[_Ed_]

Originally Posted by Arjun

What are yoru comments on Lou Vincent wicketkeeping? He can then bat in the middle-order, and given complaints about Scott Styris, they can drop him and promote Vettori to Number Eight and Jacob Oram can be your Number Seven/stock seamer, followed by three bowlers. There's something to think about: what do you do when you've got as many as four bowlers who are more than useful batsmen for their FC teams?

I think it'd be pretty ridiculous to drop McCullum. That's just my opinion though of course.

[Loony BoB]

Completely agree that there's no reason to drop McCullum and I don't think we'll benefit from it at all.

EDIT: I've always thought Oram should be in the ODI side, regardless of how well he bats. He's rated #15 in the world, after all, in that respect.

[Arjun]

Originally Posted by Loony BoB

Completely agree that there's no reason to drop McCullum and I don't think we'll benefit from it at all.

EDIT: I've always thought Oram should be in the ODI side, regardless of how well he bats. He's rated #15 in the world, after all, in that respect.

Originally Posted by _Ed_

I think it'd be pretty ridiculous to drop McCullum. That's just my opinion though of course.

Then how will you fit Lou Vincent into the team? He's clearly not an opener, and unless you have one of Fleming or Astle or even both opening regularly (we're talking regular openers, not test/ODI specialists), he won't find a place in the team. One may even consider dropping one of the middle-order stalwarts to accommodate Vincent, but it's risky, and it's up to you whether you want to do that.

[NZTailender]

Originally Posted by Loony BoB

Completely agree that there's no reason to drop McCullum and I don't think we'll benefit from it at all.

EDIT: I've always thought Oram should be in the ODI side, regardless of how well he bats. He's rated #15 in the world, after all, in that respect.

Yeah, would be foolish to drop McCullum. I'm torn because I think he has the ability to be a quality top order player yet he's vital for us down the order.


Oram is averaging pretty good with the ball regardless of his ODI average, which is somewhat 'ruined' by the fact he comes in in the slog overs. I think he deserves a bit of a promotion, but again, he's valueable to us down the order.

[Loony BoB]

Originally Posted by Arjun

Then how will you fit Lou Vincent into the team? He's clearly not an opener, and unless you have one of Fleming or Astle or even both opening regularly (we're talking regular openers, not test/ODI specialists), he won't find a place in the team. One may even consider dropping one of the middle-order stalwarts to accommodate Vincent, but it's risky, and it's up to you whether you want to do that.

Easy. Open with Fleming. Or, you know, have some squad rotation going, playing them by form, like they do now. It's not like you have to play the same XI every time. Look at football sides and their midfield - they can't play every player every day, so they quite simply don't.

[_Ed_]

Originally Posted by Arjun

Then how will you fit Lou Vincent into the team? He's clearly not an opener, and unless you have one of Fleming or Astle or even both opening regularly (we're talking regular openers, not test/ODI specialists), he won't find a place in the team. One may even consider dropping one of the middle-order stalwarts to accommodate Vincent, but it's risky, and it's up to you whether you want to do that.

That's a good question, but I'd rather leave Vincent out altogether than drop McCullum.

[NZTailender]

Originally Posted by Arjun

Then how will you fit Lou Vincent into the team? He's clearly not an opener, and unless you have one of Fleming or Astle or even both opening regularly (we're talking regular openers, not test/ODI specialists), he won't find a place in the team. One may even consider dropping one of the middle-order stalwarts to accommodate Vincent, but it's risky, and it's up to you whether you want to do that.

He's best suited to the number 4 position in tests, IMO. I think Styris holds that spot at the moment?

[NZTailender]

Originally Posted by _Ed_

That's a good question, but I'd rather leave Vincent out altogether than drop McCullum.

I don't know how we got onto the subject of Vincent keeping but I do believe he needs to be in the test side despite his recent ODI failings.

We managed to get him into the side at number 4 the last time Sri Lanka played, and he scored 200 odd. And then he was asked to open in Zimbabwe, IIRC.

[Arjun]

I got the idea of Vincent wicketkeeping because he's often played as a part-time wicketkeeper, just like McCullum before the home series against the Indians.

Anyway, which of the middle-order regulars would you drop? And why? Let's leave out Hamish Marshall for now; we've all decided to keep him out, so we're left with Fleming, Astle and Fulton, who's just made the team.

[NZTailender]

Astle will probably retire after the world cup, so that'll make things a lot easier.