messy. messier. new zealand cricket.

It's been a while. Since I last updated, and since what I'm about to write about actually took place. Regarding the former, I just didn't feel too particularly inspired to write, and regarding the latter, I must admit that it took me the better part of a week to calm down enough to not just end up randomly stringing profanities together when it came to the matter of the quite spectacular omnishambles that is New Zealand Cricket.

When rumours of Ross Taylor's imminent demotion and Brendon McCullum's promotion started making the rounds, I wasn't as surprised as I probably should've been, given that this was still NZC we were dealing with, the very same think tank full of geniuses who was responsible for the John Wright Cock-Up, and who were never held accountable for it. If anybody would find a way to humiliate the captain after winning a Test in Sri Lanka, including a man of the match performance by Taylor himself, and make the situation so unbearable for him he'd end up taking a break from cricket, it would have to be New Zealand Cricket.

The end result itself, Brendon McCullum being the captain now, doesn't really bother me (though one could argue that his recent performances don't necessarily warrant his continued selection as a specialist batsman, let alone a specialist top order batsman), but the way we've got there was utterly disrespectful towards Taylor and simply horrendous. Taylor's position in the team and inside the NZC setup was never a strong one to begin with, not only because of his rather obvious shortcomings as a leader, motivator, tactician and slip fielder, but also because of the well-known fact that the majority of the team didn't want him but McCullum as captain.

My opinion on Ross Taylor as a captain was obviously never the best, to put it very mildly. Back then, when NZC ran New Zealand's Next Top Model, err, I mean NZC's Search For The Next Test Captain, I did not only not rate him as a leader, but also took into account that they were forcing a captain upon a team that was used to having way too much power, and therefore expected this ~experiment to not work out in the long run. That it shouldn't be the team's, let alone only certain parts of the team's, decision who's being made captain and who succeeds as captain, well, that's an entirely different matter. But the Boys Club members tend to get their way, and the current, frustratingly incompetent administration wasn't going to change that.

Even if I were only thinking the very best of Brendon McCullum, even if he didn't actively contribute to what happened to Ross Taylor, there will always be a sour taste in a lot of people's mouths when they see him in his new role. Personally, I do wonder why he didn't refuse the captaincy, and forced Hesson to look elsewhere (Williamson or, more left-field, Ryder). No matter how badly he may have wanted it, and we all remember how devastated he was when he was overlooked last year, he shouldn't have accepted it given what went down leading up to it, given how badly Taylor was treated (and clearly undeservedly so), because now, regardless of how often and vehemently he denies any involvement, McCullum seems like a war profiteer, and I'm fairly certain that that's not the look he was going for.

When Mike Hesson took over as headcoach from John Wright (which in itself was another disaster altogether), was there an opportunity for him to hand the captaincy to Brendon McCullum, and riding out the calls of nepotism or favouritism or partisanship or whatever fancy words the Kiwi press would've come up with? I don't think it's illegitimate for a new coach to look at the captain and a possible leadership group upon his arrival and make changes if he sees fit, and Hesson should've just made that decision and dealt with it, instead of letting this simmer on for as long as it did. It always seemed like he just inherited Taylor from John Wright, and was never that willing to find common ground and a way to work together for the good of the team and the good of cricket in New Zealand.

I criticised Ross Taylor very heavily for having brought up Hesson's relationship with McCullum during their first meetings, when they were still trying to get to know each other, trying to find out if and how they could work together, and also accused him of showing a good dose of paranoia by focusing too much on an existing relationship between the new coach and his team-mate, instead of focusing on building one of his own with him. Looking at what happened since then - was he really paranoid? Or did he simply know what was coming?

That's probably the most depressing thing about this whole mess, the inevitability of it all. From the day Hesson arrived, something like this was bound to happen. Actually, from the day Ross Taylor was handed the captaincy, it was bound to end in tears. Or earlier, when Pie Chart MC™ John Buchanan was hired on a four-year-contract and brought along Lawn Bowls Nobody™ Kim Littlejohn to play selector for the Blackcaps, his philosophy (or lack thereof) was bound to lead to conflicts with John Wright - and his subsequent departure, because apparently pie charts are more important than a promising and widely accepted headcoach. Or even earlier than that, when somebody decided to hand windbag clowns like Justin Vaughan & Co. the power to make decisions on behalf of the future of cricket in New Zealand.


And the saddest part is, those who are solely responsible for the situation the Blackcaps have found themselves in now - heading to South Africa without their captain and best player, and also still without Jesse Ryder (and who can blame him, who would want to return to an environment as toxic as this) - are still sitting happily in their ergonomic office chairs, running a sports federation they clearly have no clue about nor any passion for, and people who may have made mistakes or have had their individual weaknesses to deal with but whose commitment you could never question, are being hung out to dry, like John Wright earlier in the year and now Ross Taylor. Cricket is struggling enough as it is in New Zealand, ugly displays like these are only going to drive more fans further away from the game. Shame.

~~~

That said, hopefully someone somewhere is close enough to Ross Taylor to tell him to shut the hell up now. He's got the public on his side, enough people couldn't stand Brendon McCullum already before all of this went down, enough people weren't behind the appointment of Mike Hesson, and pretty much everyone has called for the heads of NZC chairman Chris Moller and CEO David White - he really doesn't need to convince anyone of how badly he was shafted. He should do what he announced last week, spending time with his young family, clearing his head and preparing himself for facing England home and away in the new year. Airing more dirty laundry isn't going to do him nor his team-mates who've just arrived in South Africa to face one of their toughest challenges of recent times any favours whatsoever.

shining a light 'cause they wanted it seen.

This past weekend (plus Friday and Monday) was overall a bit odd. First Ross Taylor scored an actually quite beautiful century in Bangalore, then Jade Dernbach bowled Hashim Amla at the Oval, then Kruger van Wyk scored runs, then Ravi Bopara bowled Hashim Amla at Lord's, then Craig Kieswetter remembered how to keep wicket, then Brendon McCullum clearly forgot how to keep wicket - and all of that topped off by the sinusitis from hell. Lovely.

In all seriousness though, that was quite the knock from Ross Taylor. Yes, it was about time he delivered something significant, and I'm still not sold on him (and I probably never will), but he certainly deserves credit for discovering his off-side (67 of 113 runs scored on the off-side) and more importantly for getting up after the thrashing in Hyderabad. The whole team actually deserves all the credit in the world for that, because them getting through this second Test with their heads held high was not only not a given, but also something only the eternal rose-tinted-glasses-wearers among us (yes, they still exist) would've dared to hope for.

I'm usually not the type of person to bask in the glory of having been right about something, but didn't I say after the Caribbean Adventures Tour that Trent Boult and Tim Southee should be certain starters and the remaining bowlers had to fight for the remaining places? Boult's performances, while unlucky to not pick up more wickets, in both Tests in India and Southee's staggering numbers of 7-64 in Bangalore speak their own language, don't they? It's been an overall more than commendable effort from all bowlers, and while the sentimental part of me doesn't want to see the back of neither Chris Martin nor Daniel Vettori (the bowler) just yet, I wouldn't be too upset if we were to stick with these four for the foreseeable future.

Naturally, there were still a lot of things that could've been done better, and while I appreciate the runs both Kruger van Wyk and Daniel Flynn have contributed, I still don't really understand the continued omission of BJ Watling. For starters. The batting order isn't right, but I'm annoyed at myself for continuing to moan about the opener of all openers, Brendon McCullum, so I won't even start this time around, my thoughts on that subject are well-known.

New Zealand posted a good first innings total, though probably still a bit below par given the state of the wicket, but then allowed India to score way too many middle-order runs. When you have a team at 80-4, especially after you've put a respectable total on the board, you put your foot down and bowl them out, you don't allow the 5-8 batsmen to score 252 runs between them. And with the inevitable return of the brain explosions in New Zealand's second innings, they failed to post a defendable total. Chasing down 260 on that wicket with almost six sessions to go wasn't that big a task on that wicket, and even less so with the head start the bowlers gave Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir to lay a good foundation for the incoming batsmen.

And again, maybe even the 260 could've been defended, if the Blackcaps had a captain who appears to know what he's doing and why. Sometimes he gets lucky, a decision he's made actually pays off, but surely that's not enough? His bowling changes and field settings overall are so clueless, he makes Alastair Cook look like Steve Waugh. Who allows two new batsmen to get comfortable via easy singles by failing to bring the field up, when he's only got 100 runs to work with? The bowlers struck after a rain-break right away, India lost three wickets for only 14 runs, and he allowed Virat Kohli and MS Dhoni to settle and repeat their first innings heroics.

If you lack world class players in your team, you can't also afford to carry a hapless captain along with you, just because The Blazers didn't want to give the captaincy to Brendon McCullum. All this talk about Ross Taylor needing more time and more advice and more help from McCullum ‒ no, what Taylor needs is to not be captain. It'll give him the much needed opportunity to focus on his batting, and the team is more inclined to follow McCullum anyway.

That said, they should all be very proud of their efforts. Being this pleased about a defeat by five wickets with more than a day left in the game says an awful lot about what we've grown accustomed to, especially after the disastrous outings in the West Indies and most recently in Hyderabad. But at this point it isn't really about winning, it's about adopting the right mentality, about wanting to improve, and a win here and there will come sooner or later. I can handle losing, it's part and parcel of following sports, and it seems to be the norm when following New Zealand cricket, but what I can't handle is a team capitulating and players looking like they couldn't care less, and I know I'm not alone in that. Watching them during this Test and witnessing an obvious 180° change in attitude and body language was great ‒ and all of a sudden the Test became interesting and was nowhere near as one-sided as we had to deal with in the past, who would've thought? You might be on the right path here, boys!

(Title taken from "Future Love Paradise" by Seal.)

how do you get up from an all time low?

Yes, it's come to that. I'm quoting The Wanted. I don't even know whom I'm referring to here, the Blackcaps or myself, because as horrific as their performance has been once more, I find myself weighed down by a strange mix of rage and apathy, which shouldn't even be possible.

Losing the first Test didn't come as a surprise to me (nor to all semi-realistic cricket viewers and Blackcaps supporters), and to be honest, neither did losing the first Test by an innings and 115 runs. The tour of the West Indies had been pretty close to catastrophic, and with Wright's departure and Hesson's arrival and no warming-up period, you would have to have been beyond deluded to expect a positive outcome from said first Test and the tour as a whole.

Of course, there were some positives again. I was again very impressed with Trent Boult's bowling, Kane Williamson at l(e)ast showed some grit and some determination in (parts of) his both innings and got to 50 once, and someone managed to shame/bully/whip Brendon McCullum into not batting like a complete idiot in the second innings (unlike the magnificent ugliness he delivered in the first innings), but is that enough? Can you build a team, a team culture, around two or three tiny rays of lights per match? Surely not.

"You have to have self-responsibility and be accountable for your actions in the middle. You just can’t come off [after being dismissed] and wave it away with phrases like ‘that’s the way I play’ and ‘I didn’t quite execute’."

(John Wright, former Blackcaps headcoach)

The experienced players have to start delivering consistently and quit basking in the questionable glory of each having played a more or less memorable innings a year or two ago, acting like their contribution to New Zealand cricket is complete already. Not one member of this current Blackcaps team nor the fringe players genuinely lack talent, they are all capable of playing cricket, some even a bit better than the average domestic cricketer. But they're lacking in attitude, application and certainly in the necessary ability to self-assess and improve.
 
Instead of talking turkey for once and calling the entire team out for what was again an embarrassing performance, the Test itself has thrown quite convenient excuses New Zealand's way. There's DRS to cry for, lack of warm-up games to blame, supporters who clearly have misunderstood the concept of 'support'  and who go on and on and on about that call against McCullum and talk up Team India's performance ‒ which wasn't all that. They played well(ish), but nothing about their efforts justified yet another capitulation like this, not even remotely.

If this had been a limited overs game, and New Zealand had been chasing and ended up losing by 20 runs (and I'm being very generous here), I'd understand the moaning a bit more and probably even join in the chorus. But this was a Test match in which the Blackcaps had been forced to follow on, and when McCullum was dismissed, New Zealand were 98-2 and still trailing by 181 runs. I accept that his dismissal gave India momentum, no doubt about it, but realistically speaking, how many more runs would McCullum have made until the next inevitable brain fart? And would these runs have made a difference in the end? Hardly.

Being inferior to your opponent is one thing and surely something New Zealand cricketers should be used to for generations now, but even with that in mind, I'd expect a team to at least get the basics straight, especially after the near-apocalyptic experience that was the West Indies tour. The basics that don't have anything to do with a small talent pool or no warm-up games ‒ energetic fielding, held catches, no fishing after deliveries as wide as the Grand Canyon and no sweeping. India most certainly still would've won, but at least New Zealand would've saved face and prevented to look like either incapable or disinterested hobby cricketers.

But maybe all of this could've been dealt with if the Blackcaps weren't stuck with a captain who rather speaks of the advantages of Rahul Dravid's and VVS Laxman's absence, who wants us to believe that a few more days at home are as good a preparation for a subcontinental tour as warm-up matches, with West Indian and Indian conditions being very similar anyway (because the Blackcaps were so on top of their game in the Caribbean), and who sweats his insecurity over the close relationship between Mike Hesson and Brendon McCullum out of every pore ‒ instead of focusing on selecting the right squad, picking the right playing XI (though congratulations on picking Boult, I didn't expect that), applying the right tactics and maybe even bothering to perform a bit better himself too, both with the bat and in the slip cordon.

And you know what the saddest part is? I feel like I have written this blog post before.

*****

 
PS: Dear Mike, I know it's tough being Mike Hesson and all, and I don't blame you for anything that's happened in that first Test, I actually pity you, but please stay out of the third/match umpires' box in the future, it's unbecoming of a grown man. Thanks in advance. Love, me.

(Title taken from "All Time Low" by The Wanted.)

life is what you make it.

Yesterday, the unthinkable happened. England dropped Kevin Pietersen. For now only for the third Test of the series against South Africa, and we'll have to wait and see where both parties go from here, but I believe it'll be tough for him to come back from this and to regain a place in this team which he's felt increasingly isolated in. Hearing the news yesterday has quite surprised me, because I would've expected those in charge to cave. To fall for his Youtube sob story trap and cave, as they've done numerous times in the past. Instead, they've finally made a decision, which couldn't have been easy for them, and I can only respect them for it.

Pietersen apologists continue to throw the ~fact that he was dropped because of texts, and texts only, at you when you dare to agree with his omission, citing a clear breach of trust for these private conversations to even have come to the ECB's knowledge. Call me crazy, but is the important thing really how they know or that they know? He was asked to provide the ECB with proof that he hadn't sent texts containing derogatory remarks about his captain to members of the opposition team (texts containing derogatory remarks, not just plain "hey, how's it going? i'm bored bru" texts) inside a clear timeframe, which the ECB also prolonged by a couple of hours to give him every opportunity to at least repair some of the damage, or even deny sending them altogether. He did neither, which implies he was in the wrong, and couldn't possibly be understood in any different way by Flower, Strauss and the ECB.

For me personally, those texts alone would've been reason enough to drop him, to at least suspend him for a Test or series. (And let's just remind ourselves again, that it's not about texting opposition players, but about the content of those texts.) But he also could've gotten the boot after his pathetic press conference at Headingley last Monday, where he blamed basically everyone and his dog for his misfortunes, when he's brought this all on himself. Or after he'd asked to play the full IPL and miss out on Test matches, while maintaining it wasn't about the money. Or after his retirement from one-day cricket. Or when he decided he didn't want to sign a contract with a county anymore. Or actually after the Moores affair back in 2009. Do we see a pattern here? Or is that my well-known reputation as a "KP hater" speaking?

According to Jonathan Agnew, publishing his interview on Youtube was a violation of his central contract, and ECB officials had actually asked him not to go ahead with it, yet he did it anyway ‒ retracting and contradicting literally everything he's said before (how credible), and for what? A lame last-ditch effort to get the public on his side, so they can run with the "he was dropped for texting" story. And judging by some of the comments in the past 24 hours, all I can say is: despite a regrettable lack of tears and wobbling bottom lips in the video, it's working.

The fact that the comments from Hugh Morris clearly identify the texts as one key point, indicating that there were others ‒ let's ignore that. Let's also ignore all his previous well-publicised transgressions that would barely fit on a toilet paper roll, especially and most recently his embarrassing press conference after the second Test in Leeds; let's ignore that he was told not to publish his self-serving PR stunt joke of a video interview but did it anyway; let's ignore that he did not only screw Peter Moores but also tried to screw Andy Flower with him; let's ignore that the majority of the team seem to not trust nor respect him anymore.

Actually, let's ignore everything and just focus on the fact that England have dropped their arguably best batsman for being able to operate a mobile phone after his arguably best innings at Headingley for the must-win Test at Lord's. Which, according to the overly dramatic Pietersen apologists, England are certain to lose, now that Pietersen is not playing. Just like the first Test at the Oval, which England lost by an innings and 12 runs without KP. Oh wait...

~

Having said all that, both sides have handled this mess in the worst possible way, and the ECB is heavily at fault as well, and has been for quite some time. They should've either reigned him in earlier or got rid of him earlier; letting him get away with all his antics and then sitting there thinking "We've created a monster!" reeks of The Sorcerer's Apprentice, and they should've known better. They should've known that this was never the right way to go about dealing with someone like Pietersen ‒ obviously a genius, obviously a flawed character. 

It's evident that Pietersen wasn't cut from the squad for Lord's over the texts only, and people who believe that are beyond naïve and should maybe consider getting real, but the ECB are clearly lacking the balls to come out and tell it like it really is. "We've overlooked all your crap, used you and your blatantly obvious, extraordinary talent for as long as we could, squeezed you like a lemon, and now that neither the team nor staff nor us armchair poopers can be bothered to put up with you anymore ‒ there's the door.", and maybe accompany that statement with a list of all the beautiful things Kevin Pietersen has put them through in the past eight years.

Wherever Kevin Pietersen went, controversy has been following him around. Fortunately, I'm not as blinkered to think that people haven't treated him wrongly during his career too (Swann's remarks, for example), but hearing him complain about the last couple of days having been demoralising for him and his family makes me cringe, because ‒ who caused this again? He called for coaches to be sacked, he put his signature under a central contract and retired from one-day cricket anyway knowing what the rules were, he listens to his celebrity friends more than to common sense, he couldn't get enough fame and glory and money and kept on demanding more, while completely overlooking that people like Andy Flower (or just recently Matt Prior) kept on bending over backwards to accommodate him and his Everest-sized ego, and he decided to burn the last of the already wonky bridges on August 6 at Headingley.

Love him or hate him, but staying true to himself, staying true to Kevin Pietersen always doing what's best for Kevin Pietersen, he should've wished for a different (preliminary) end to his England career than this soap opera. He should've wished to leave with a bang, a bang like his Leeds innings, a bang like clawing back the Test series against South Africa of all countries and holding on to the #1 spot ‒ a bang befitting of his talent and his larger-than-life persona.

west indies 8 new zealand 1.

Before tropical storm 'Ernesto' could hit Sabina Park, the West Indies managed to wrap up the second Test and the series, and even though one could argue that New Zealand still haven't really arrived in the Caribbean, Darren Sammy and his team will be very content with finishing off the tour 8-1. (And I'm still not totally convinced that that one loss wasn't the result of the West Indies taking pity on the Blackcaps, because that's how they roll. And who wouldn't take pity on an out of place NZ captain who is the size of Chris Gayle's breakfast?)

While I understand that this tour was clearly doomed from the start with New Zealand Cricket letting John Wright hang out to dry by refusing to release funds to prepare the team properly for this series (or as Jeremy Coney said "they sold him out"), the team's performances throughout these five very painful weeks have been inexcusable, not helped by their attitude, a dangerous mixture of helplessness and "we beat Australia and almost beat South Africa" arrogance, obviously underestimating the West Indies. Yes, there has been the occasional ray of light ‒ namely Trent Boult, and the way Martin Guptill and Tim Southee managed to pull themselves together ‒ but beyond that, it was nothing short of embarrassing, and an insult to John Wright, who deserved a better send-off from his players than being humiliated like this.

~

Captain Craptastic was certainly on to something when he said that only centuries and not 40s, 50s, 60s will win you Test matches, but when your six specialist batsmen all contributed between 40 and 60, you could have a more than decent score on the board, especially when your bowlers chip in with a further 69 runs between them, as they did in the first innings in Kingston. Instead the specialist batsmen bar Guptill threw their wickets away, time and time again, and Ross Taylor and Kane Williamson in particular should offer to carry their team-mates home as a way of apologizing for their hapless and abysmal performances.

Complaining about Taylor (and Brendon McCullum, for that matter) has become a bit of a hobby for me, but it's not like I don't have my reasons. How can the captain bat like an absolute donkey in the first Test, call himself out on it in his post-match interview, give us the "100s win Tests" speech ‒ and then come up with that at Sabina Park, the same pathetic way of dismissal in both innings (1 and 2)? It's a massive cliché, but shouldn't the captain lead by example? If a batsman loses his wicket to a stunning delivery he couldn't do much about, then so be it, but that right there was a lack of application, a lack of patience ‒ a lack of everything, really.

~

Despite all my justified rage about Taylor, McCullum & Co., nothing can compete with how disappointed I am with Kane Williamson's performances throughout the series, but especially during the Test matches. After his Wellington heroics, I had this West Indies tour earmarked as his opportunity to score consistently and to score big, to cement his place in the Blackcaps side(s) as a reliable and stylish run-scorer, and not only make a proper name for himself but actually grow as an international batsman. And I know I wasn't alone in that.

He certainly hasn't had the easiest of series, with having to play all three formats (which I will never support, regardless of how successful he may be in T20), being stuck with the captaincy in an ill-prepared and malfunctioning team, having to deal with numerous injuries and frankly ridiculous squad picks and the Wright situation hanging over their heads. But as soon as it was Test match time and Taylor had taken back over the reigns, I expected him, a player who is so keen to play Test cricket, to do his thing, to show off his classy batting technique, to score runs.

Instead, he showed the world that he's got no spine whatsoever by using a nightwatchman twice, and then threw his wickets away in a mortifying and incompetent manner, unbecoming of him and his immense talent. He managed to produce the exact same hideous dismissal in both innings in Kingston (1 and 2, once more, happy cringing) by trying to drive deliveries through the covers that were so wide, they wouldn't even have hit a third set of stumps.

When he first popped up on the scene, people were impressed by his undoubtable talent, enviable cricket brain and desirable work ethic, and he managed to surf on the "prolific talent with a century on debut" wave for quite some time, when he didn't immediately follow up his first Test exploits with equally formidable performances. I presume he will be able to survive until the India tour on the back of his innings at the Basin, but he is in desperate need of not only stringing some performances together but showing the cricket world and probably first and foremost himself that he's not just another boy with too much talent and too little heart.

~

Looking at the squad, recent performances and the India series looming, you'd think that some decisions need to be made, but how? The pond to fish from is rather small, and neither of the current batsmen is genuinely lacking in quality anyway, they're lacking in attitude, patience and application. With Daniel Vettori almost certainly missing the Test series against India ‒ spinners don't really grow on trees anywhere in the world, let alone in New Zealand, and Williamson and his action shouldn't have to shoulder the responsibility of being the prime spinner in the subcontinent, even less so when he's struggling with his batting. So, Patel? N McCullum? B Martin? Or Williamson and Guptill, and to hell with the consequences?

And what about the ~fast bowlers? Had Mark Gillespie not been injured, the two by far best bowlers in the Caribbean, Boult and Southee, wouldn't even have been in the squad for the Test series against the West Indies, let alone in the playing XI. Surely there's something wrong there? As for Wagner, while you can't fault his effort and attitude, I'm not so sure that his performances warranted all the drama just yet. He's bowled medium pace at best, and appeared to be unable to hit the seam, which made it impossible for his team-mates to shine the ball, because he hit whichever side of the ball at random. That might be good enough for domestic cricket (with all due respect to the Plunket Shield), but it won't cut it in international cricket. For mine, only Boult and Southee are automatic picks for India, and everyone else, regardless of whether the Blackcaps play three or four seamers, would have to fight for it.

~

Thankfully, Ross Taylor has used his post-match interview at Sabina Park for some Taylorisms à la "winning is a habit", but also managed to warn us about the short turn-around already, which might've been his way of telling us poor, dumb Blackcaps supporters that they're going to get thrashed again anyway, and we'll just have to deal with it. No preparation, no warm-up matches, no nothing for the tour to India, a new coach in Mike Hesson who has his work more than cut out for him ‒ and an uninspiring, uninspired captain who is so insecure about his standing in the team and Hesson's relationship with Brendon McCullum, he had to interrogate him about it during his job interview.  Yeah, this India series is going to be great.

black caps. or the gift that just keeps on giving.

Admittedly, after the Black Caps' recent performances in the Caribbean, I felt so very tempted to compose an entry full of links to my blog posts from March (see sidebar), maybe replace a few names or two here and there with their West Indian counterparts, and end the link festival with a string of curses and a couple of "I told you so" - but that would be tedious, right?

But then again, don't tedious performances deserve tedious blogs as reward punishment? Yes, Martin Guptill finally scored some runs at the top of the order (before throwing his wickets away), Brendon McCullum finally managed to not bat like a complete dick (though only in the second innings), and you can't fault Neil Wagner's and Kruger van Wyk's efforts (though in vain); but beyond that, this entire Test match was a celebration of poor attitude, poor fielding, poor bowling and poor batting, clearly not helped by wrong tactics and wrong selection. How was a batting line-up this shaky paired up with two more or less hit-and-miss bowlers, good ol' Chris Martin and a struggling Vettori going to deal with Hurricane Gayle?

We know Mr Hobart will always feature in the playing XI, whether he deserves it or not, simply because he's Mr Hobart, and Chris Martin has been New Zealand's only reliable wicket-taker for quite some time now, so he naturally can't be left out. Given the well-known and well-publicized condition of the wicket, should Neil Wagner have made his debut on a pitch this uncooperative? Maybe not. But given the build-up and the four years and the ICC enquiry, those in charge probably felt like he had to play, regardless of whether this was going to end well or not. If Trent Boult had been fit, he definitely wouldn't have played for the reasons above, even though he and the perfectly healthy, on-the-up-again Tim Southee were the only bowlers who looked like troubling Chris Gayle in the one-day series.

Had BJ Watling been fit, he may have come into the team, but at the expense of Kruger van Wyk instead of Dean Brownlie or Daniel Flynn. Only in New Zealand would an opening batsman be forced to be the keeper-batsman down at #6 while the middle-order batsman is forced to open. Dean Brownlie has been hopelessly out of form for a rather long while now, and he honestly doesn't add too much at the moment, neither with bat nor ball nor in the field. That alone - apart from the state of the wicket - would've been reason enough to select Tarun Nethula instead of Brownlie, because he could've given Daniel Vettori a much needed hand and would've probably scored as many runs as Brownlie too, if not more. Personally, I'm not one to get overly excited over someone just because he can bowl a bit of legspin, so I would've gone with Tim Southee, meaning four seamers and Vettori, to at least give New Zealand the semblance of a chance to bowl the opposition out.

New Zealand clearly can't afford to leave out Daniel Vettori, the batsman. But what are they going to do about Daniel Vettori, the bowler? New spinning blood is scarce, I know, but can they afford to play a spin bowler that makes Gayle's grandpa spin look effective? Especially when Daniel Vettori, the batsman, hasn't even been scoring that many runs either?

The responsibility of bowling some half-decent spin shouldn't also be laid on Kane Williamson, even less so when it's only a matter of time before his action will be looked at by the ICC. He's certainly got talent as a spinner, and the Black Caps could do a lot worse in the part-time department than him, but you do have to ask yourself why nobody has worked on fixing his action before, which is - while adorable to watch and quite effective - absolutely ridiculous.

Which leads me to my next problem. Kane Williamson and his personal nightwatchman, Neil Wagner. We know I believe he can do no wrong, but him using a nightwatchman twice really disappointed me. Not only do I expect more from him, especially after he dealt with Steyn & Co. so well, and simply hold him to a much higher standard than most other batsmen (in NZ anyway, but also in world cricket), but it also visibly unsettled both Martin Guptill and Ross Taylor. It shouldn't have been Neil Wagner's job to try and shepherd Guptill through to a century, and it certainly shouldn't have been his job to warm the crease for the captain-to-be. You could see Kemar Roach licking his lips when Williamson finally came out to bat; he might as well hold up a sign the next time "I'm crapping myself, guys!", it'd be equally as effective. If I were him, I would've been ashamed to see Wagner not only survive to the next day, but actually bat through to lunch, whereas I, as the future of New Zealand cricket, not only chickened out twice like a little wuss, but also managed to contribute pretty much nothing to the score.

On top of that, we have a captain who to me was the wrong choice from the start, whom the majority of the team didn't want, whom I would consider to be an irresponsible and overrated batsman, especially in Test cricket, and who also appears to be trying to win a "Dumbest Comment" competition - and ending up occupying places 1 to 10 himself. New Zealand got thrashed in the T20 and ODI series (bar that one win, coincidentally during Kane Williamson's short tenure as stand-in captain), played badly in the warm-up game leading up to the Test series, yet he said he didn't care about warm-ups anyway and was happy with the team's performances. Then he also informed us that Sunil Narine poses no threat in Tests, because "you don't have to play him". Sunil Narine ended up taking just the eight wickets, including a five-fer in the first innings, on a pitch where Daniel Vettori genuinely couldn't buy a wicket.

New Zealand went from 223-2 to 233-4 (or rather 233-5 because of Wagner - or rather 233-6 because of Wagner and Martin), yet the captain of all captains thought they were still on top. Scyld Berry anybody? They were bowled out twice in more or less bloodcurdling circumstances on a pitch that was "difficult to bat on" - West Indies scored just the 522 runs in their first innings, won by nine wickets and Shivnarine Chanderpaul didn't even score. To be honest, they seem to love talking to the media a bit too much. Martin Guptill was particularly outstanding after stumps on Day 4, New Zealand were basically 28-3 (or rather 28-5 because of Wagner and Martin), and he was totally confident they'd manage to salvage a draw, because they had still plenty of batting to come with Taylor and Williamson. Safe to say, that worked out brilliantly. (Honourable mention to Jacob Oram though for saying the West Indies had to watch out. Oh.)

And if all that wasn't enough, their body language and overall attitude left a lot to be desired. A blatantly obvious case of ball tampering by Mr Hobart Doug Bracewell, plus unimaginative, one-dimensional bowling (which lead to me tweeting "black caps, are you england in disguise?" at one point, I'm not even sorry), a performance in the field you'd call 'sloppy' if you were being nice, but which can only be described as disinterested and at times even insulting, dropped dollies, and their usual approach to batting, lacking application and a sense of responsibility, lead by someone whose face indicates that he couldn't care less - no wonder West Indies didn't even have to work that hard to beat this New Zealand side.

Luckily for me (and unlike the majority of NZ media and a lot of supporters), I've gotten over Hobart way back in December already, and I didn't really expect anything from the Black Caps on this tour, so the outcome so far hasn't particularly surprised me. The manner in which they lost the vast majority of their matches though, the fact that it appears that neither team nor coaches are doing much to prevent these frankly embarrassing results, and that it seems like there's no end to this ordeal in sight, well, that's something else entirely.

Somebody just make it stop, please.

Since writing the above, Vettori and Flynn have been ruled out of the second Test. This is going to be fun.

being german.

(Getty Images)

Cricket isn't that big in Germany. I'm sure there are people who have all kinds of fancy numbers at the ready and could tell you exactly how not "that big" cricket really is, but even without those numbers I can safely say that it thankfully still ranks above dry swimming and sitting shot put, but far behind our Volkssport football, cycling, swimming or the ever so popular winter sports. Most active cricketers in this country are either British soldiers stationed here or originally hail from the subcontinent, with cricket automatically being part of their lives despite the omnipresence of football and co.

So with me being neither a British soldier nor of subcontinental origin, how did I end up watching cricket? First of all, I've been a huge rugby (union and league) and Aussie Rules football fan, and cricket is (as far as the Southern Hemisphere is concerned) what's being played when the rugby and footy seasons are over, and I guess I was curious and wanted to check it out for myself. And secondly, and probably more importantly, I refused to accept that I couldn't read, understand and interpret the cricket scores in the Guardian (my English-language newspaper of choice), so I pretty much forced myself to watch some cricket and learn the rules on the way.


But this also means that I don't have any special stories to tell about how my grandfather took me to the cricket for the first time or how we all used to come together to sit around the radio, listening to England having Ashes series defeat after Ashes series defeat handed to them, or how it felt when I picked up a bat for the first time or bowled my maiden over of really ugly offspin in the park. There's no allegiance, no nostalgia, no tradition, no "back in the day" component to my following of the game. I stumbled upon it for rather stupid reasons, via other sports and because I wanted to learn more about it, and in the end I came to love it so much more than I could ever have imagined.


Coming from a non-cricketing country means that I can watch the game without any patriotic feelings neither clouding nor brightening up my view, and support a team, for example, because I admire a certain player, not because loyalty tells me to. At the same time this also opens the door for a catalogue of annoying questions à la "Why do you like the Black Caps?", "Why do you not like Swanny?", "If you support England in the Ashes, how come you like Ponting so much?" - because we all know, nobody who isn't actually Kiwi would voluntarily support the Black Caps in all their average glory, let alone publicly admit to it; Swann is the greatest and funniest bloke on earth and also the genius behind a bowling style we now call offspin; and supporting England has to include hating on a legend of our game.


Of course, not everyone in the Test cricket playing nations is a die-hard cricket fan, but overall the access to trivial things such as live broadcasts, newspapers, books, merchandise and live events is so much easier and so much more comfortable - if you're into cricket you will find like-minded people as well as the tools to feed and live out your passion for leather and willow.


It might be a bit of a luxury to be able to just watch cricket for the game's sake, but at the same time I can't help but be envious of those who live in the "right" countries, who can watch cricket on regular TVs (Pay TV nonetheless) and don't have to sit crammed in front of a computer day after day, hoping that Giles Clarke hasn't followed through with his Crusade Against Streaming™ just yet. Those who can watch it live at the most beautiful grounds without having to sell their mothers for it and sacrificing several goats at the altar of the rain gods, who don't have to pay a small fortune for magazine subscriptions that arrive two weeks late anyway, and who in school, at university or at work, among their friends and families, have people whom they can talk shop with.


Following cricket (as well as rugby union and league and Australian Rules football) and keeping up with news, developments and current live games everywhere can turn a time-consuming hobby into an unpaid full-time job. When you find yourself driving up to your allegedly international airport (I've been told planes do fly to destinations outside of Germany from here, but who knows) to get at least the Guardian or the Times in order to have some kind of a fix for your obsession in print, it may well be time to step away from Twitter and StatsGuru and everything in between and get a life.


Despite the time, emotions and even genuine tears I put into following cricket from abroad, I still feel like an outcast among our (online) cricket community at times. When I look around, there are people chatting away about going to Lord's, having been to Newlands or looking forward to going to the G next Southern summer, telling each other anecdotes about that time they fell down the stairs at Trent Bridge, that time they ran into Player X or that time Player Z was rude to their granny - and while being a fan shouldn't be a competition, people quite easily turn it into one, and can get quite condescending towards someone who can't chip in with similar stories.


They can even make you feel like you're not a "real fan" because of geographical challenges. Which raises the question - what is a "real fan" anyway? Is it about dedication or proximity, devotion or live attendance? Me and my shoddy streams and my dependance on mediocre, and at times shockingly ill-informed, coverage on Cricinfo and BBC Radio, we can't quite compete with the majority of cricket fans if hailing from the same country as a more or less successful Test side is the major criterion, no matter how well versed in the sport I believe myself to be.


Of course I'd love to attend as many games as possible (or just one game, for starters), of course I'd love to be able to meet up with cricket aficionados everywhere and feel part of the family and of course I'd love to not be stared at like a creature from outer space just for liking cricket and arranging my social life around it - but at the same time I am proud of my efforts, proud of my knowledge, proud of being so enamoured with this great game. And when nobody's looking, I ask myself whether those of us who live abroad, who accidentally came across cricket and who don't have access to anything might not actually be the biggest fans out there after all.


My supporting of cricket went from an experiment to a hobby to an almost tragic passion, albeit with a few obstacles. But it's worth it, every second of it, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

(originally penned for @aotearoaxi's blog, originally published here.)