New Zealand in Zimbabwe

With this thread we cover all the series taking place this month, all 10 test playing nations in action! for the first time since the WC we will see NZL in action, it's Taylor v Taylor, two teams who will be keen to do well, ZIM are getting good exposure here which is great for their cricket, while NZL have a good season coming up with the start of this series. 

Zimbabwe getting crushed, a 10 wicket win on the cards for NZL!

Edited by sam_ahmed - 15 October 2011 at 3:25pm

I hope so mystery, we need better competition from Zimbabwe and Bangladesh, and we need it now.

It's only T20 , Zim will push NZ in the 50 over series. No idea how the test will pan out though - it could be a close one.

I get the impression Sam that the quota on white players might be something like 4. Out of no where at times they drop a white player and bring in a black player. It's just a hunch I have, but I reckon Mugabe and his faceless men still have a lot of influence on Zim cricket - even if the selectors and coaches are former, white cricketers...

Edited by Mikey - 18 October 2011 at 4:09am

Brendon McCullum is in awesome form and obviously has no trouble against these Zim bowlers. In fact only 2 batsmen have had a proper bat for NZ so far I think hahah. I back NZ to win the series, I reckon Zim might snatch a game. Zim get better as the format length increases - they looks best in tests I think.

Besides relatively poor footwork, Brendon Taylor has world class written all over him. I dare say he is the best batsman to come out of Zimbabwe since Andy Flower retired.

Where has Vitori gone?? he did so well still not seen him play in any of the matches so far.

I think the best chance for Zim to win is to chase otherwise i dont see them winning any match.

Meth is not that quick, he's just military medium pace from what I can tell. Perhaps he bowls a decent heavy ball.

Can't see them picking Jarvis, Lamb, Cremer, Price and Taylor all in the same side - I really do think there is a quasi-quota system in place.

Taylor is really carrying the side here. To get back to back centuries against a 'test' side is a top performance, albeit the NZ opening bowling pair has 1 ODI between them , and Taylor is after all playing at home.

Where has Masakadza gone!? No contributions from him in the first 2 ODIs have hurt Zim and Sibanda has not made runs in this series which is disappointing, nor has Taibu.

Zimbabwe's bowling is very far away from being world-class, even someone like Price is good but not a strike bowler. To me one of the most disappointing things about Zimbabwe is their fielding. They used to pride themselves on their fielding. Perhaps in the other 2 disciplines they were never up there, but in the fielding they were always 2nd to South Africa for me during the 90s (I'd put Australia 3rd or equal 2nd). Now their fielding is at times Pakistan-esue, with due respect to Pakistan.

NZ's top order is in awesome form, but the middle order is untested and I think brittle if they can break through the opening 3 batsmen - which at the moment Zimbabwe can't do. They need a strike bowler, like Jarvis or Vitori.

Blignaut is not the same player that he used to be. He was seriously sharp going back 8 years ago, certainly clocked 140kph+ on a regular basis. Last time I saw him he struggled to hit 130kph. I suppose Sean Ervine would be an excellent addition to the middle order and can bowl tight medium pace - but again, he is not a strike bowler. ZImbabwe have always struggled with bowlers, having relied on Streak and a decent spinner (Paul Strang, Price,Murphy, etc) throughout their test history.

THis is indeed in superb touch, Brendan Taylor that is.  2 tons and another splendid half century.  Fantastic win for them - they're not my #1 team but i'm very happy with the way they have been progressing lately.  It's very good to see.

Wow!!! superb chase by Zim

Absolutely fantastic run chase, Waller played a gem of an innings and Taylor, that man did it again for Zimbabwe, what a performance, a mammoth 329 chased down, well done Zimbabwe, soooooooo happy for them!!!