Shoaib Akhtar's crazy record against New Zealand in the first half of his career

[Kirkut]

Minnow basher

Pakistani bowlers have always been gun against New Zealand followed by England.

 

[Kirkut]

Generational talent. Should have done so much more.

The Kevin Pietersen of fast bowling. Just that batsmen don't injured as frequently as bowlers.

 

[Flem274*]

what is the reason for this? Can it be really be as simple as Jedi alluded to earlier, how NZ batsmen are more used to facing the likes of Harris and Larsen(exaggeration of course but still)?

Is express pace just not something they are brought up against?

I mean they produced Bond so I can't believe quick bowlers don't exist in the system

it's only since about 2007-08 domestic pitches have borne a greater resemblance to test pitches. cricket in nz used to be a 'front foot down the wicket and smother the movement' game if you were batting, and if you were bowling then hucking it up as full as you could then allowing the pitch to do the rest was a good strategy.

this produced a lot of 125kph medium pacers with amazing bowling averages and top order batsmen unused to anything like test bowling.

wasim, waqar and shoaib enjoy the new zealand length and they did it 30 clicks faster, so even batsmen with talent like fleming and co. were sometimes made to look stupid and less experienced top order batsmen had no chance.

while The Great Flattening in domestic cricket caused a lot of memes, including #agribusiness, #engineroom and #munroslaw, it forced the standard upwards. bowlers had to do more to win games, and the generation of batsmen who entered fc cricket in the late 00s and early 10s were subsequently asked more questions and had to provide more answers than getting as far foward as possible.

there was the odd rapid bowler back in the day, but it's a no contest compared to now. average domestic pace has increased by about 5-10kph. 20 years ago adam milne probably gets thrown into test cricket at 20 years old after bowling heat on green decks and averaging about 12. he averages 32 in the modern shield.

 

[mr_mister]

it's only since about 2007-08 domestic pitches have borne a greater resemblance to test pitches. cricket in nz used to be a 'front foot down the wicket and smother the movement' game if you were batting, and if you were bowling then hucking it up as full as you could then allowing the pitch to do the rest was a good strategy.

this produced a lot of 125kph medium pacers with amazing bowling averages and top order batsmen unused to anything like test bowling.

wasim, waqar and shoaib enjoy the new zealand length and they did it 30 clicks faster, so even batsmen with talent like fleming and co. were sometimes made to look stupid and less experienced top order batsmen had no chance.

while The Great Flattening in domestic cricket caused a lot of memes, including #agribusiness, #engineroom and #munroslaw, it forced the standard upwards. bowlers had to do more to win games, and the generation of batsmen who entered fc cricket in the late 00s and early 10s were subsequently asked more questions and had to provide more answers than getting as far foward as possible.

there was the odd rapid bowler back in the day, but it's a no contest compared to now. average domestic pace has increased by about 5-10kph. 20 years ago adam milne probably gets thrown into test cricket at 20 years old after bowling heat on green decks and averaging about 12. he averages 32 in the modern shield.

interesting and detailed explanation. cheers

 

[Moss]

To add to Flem and TH above, Wasim Akram has regularly mentioned Martin Crowe as one of the best players he ever bowled to (“batsman with the best defence I’ve ever encountered” was a line I distinctly recall in an old magazine). On the 1990/91 tour of Pakistan Crowe was pretty much the only one who stood up to W&W while everyone around him was being wrecked (including a certain David White at the top of the order). He’d even worked out a technique against reverse swing before anyone knew what to call it. His injury-enforced absences the next few times Pakistan visited NZ (three separate occasions between 92//93 and 95/96 when his knee was gone) meant NZ just didn’t have an answer. That lack of a genius-level, truly world class player for so long was a problem which continued into the era of Shoaib and others.

 

[honestbharani]

Yeah Wasim always rated Crowe a class above almost all batsmen he has bowled to, including Sachin and Lara.