Given it’s the time of year for messages to the North Pole under the heading “Dear Santa”, maybe the Black Caps’ list should start with the urgent need for an off-field boss.

With the 32-run win over Pakistan, the first in more than a year, the team are on the cusp of returning to a semblance of success on the stage all good sides are measured - test matches.

The return of Shane Bond’s venom, the wilyness of Chris Martin, the crisp strokes of Ross Taylor and the all-round cunning of Daniel Vettori mean the team have incumbent talent. Vettori was delighted with the victory and with good reason.

But, even though the win was a good one, with character and doggedness, let’s wait before we give ourselves totally over to the illusion of a rosy future.

There are severe deficiencies, particularly in the batting. Can Daniel Flynn make it as a No3, averaging 21.50 in the position since his promising start of 95 against the West Indies a year ago?

Will New Zealand be able to return to an era where Flynn doesn’t have to think about striding out to bat when the ball is still brand new - having only touched the pitch, the stumps or the edge of a bat and a member of the slip cordon’s hands - due to a lapse in an opener’s concentration? Is Jesse Ryder, a man blessed with sensational hand-eye co-ordination, capable of a prolonged career or will a lack of fitness or discipline get the better of him?

There was enough in the dismissals of batsmen like Flynn, Grant Elliott, Peter Fulton, and even Taylor and Vettori himself to suggest that more help would not go amiss.

In Vettori’s era as skipper, with coaches John Bracewell and Andy Moles, there have been 22 tests with five wins - three against Bangladesh, one against England and yesterday’s Read more…

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What is the difference between Daniel Vettori and Brian Tamaki? The Black Caps do not bow when they approach Vettori . . . yet.

Whether it is by circumstance or Machiavellian design, the left-arm spinner has acquired enough power to dim the environmentally friendly and energy-efficient lights over Seddon Park.

He’s now a selector, the stand-in coach, the captain, a leading bowler and one of our best batsmen.

With former coach Andy Moles dispatched, Vettori’s grip on the reins is complete.

Even Brendon McCullum’s voice in the dressing rooms has been muted by his public demotion from the vice-captaincy.

The cricket community and the media seemed to be in unison over Moles’ departure.

No-one, it appeared, was willing to suggest a mutiny had taken place or player power was getting out of hand.

Less than a year into his three-year contract, former Warwickshire opener Moles walked the plank with barely a squeak - no doubt silenced, to an extent, by the size of his pay-out.

Before splashdown he meekly complained about not being given the time to improve, and he rejected the perception he was ill-equipped to take the national side forward.

Given he got the job only when several higher-profile candidates withdrew, criticism was directed at New Zealand Cricket for rushing into the appointment.

Moles’ fate had been sealed by a poor report card on which the country’s leading players questioned whether he was up to the task.

Some of the same players flexed their muscle earlier in the year, when they delayed signing their national contracts until they had clarity around whether the inbound Australian tour Read more…

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Balance - It is the one constant whenever Jacob Oram’s worth in the New Zealand test side was questioned.

Over the past couple of seasons in particular, when injuries and a seemingly terminal loss of form combined to reduce Oram to passenger status, Daniel Vettori was quick to point to the “balance” the big left-hander brought to the team.

At his best, he was the ultimate two-for-the-price-of-one cricketer, the rightful heir to the throne vacated by Chris Cairns, capable of scoring test centuries against the best attacks in the world, while troubling good batsmen with his height and ability to hit the seam.

At his least effective, he was still a threat in the middle order and an economical stock bowler who could keep opposition line-ups in check.

While there are myriad options to replacing Oram, there are five that would seem more attractive than most.

OPTION 1 Select James Franklin as a like-for-like straight swap.

Pros: He wants the job, telling his local paper: “I’m hoping [the selectors] think I’m the guy for that. I think I can do a job there for New Zealand. I’ve done it for years for Wellington, batting at No6 and bowling, so it’s nothing different for me.”

At his best, Franklin would offer the sort of balance a fit Jacob Oram provided, with his cultured left-handed batting and left-arm swing variety with the ball. If you watched him in the nets and knew nothing of his test record, who would think that he was a world-class player rather than a fringe selection.

Cons: “At his best” is the operative statement. Hands up - outside those who regularly attend Wellington’s first-class fixtures - anybody who has actually seen Franklin at his best? Over the past three seasons he has batted like a lion in first-class cricket, but looks as timid Read more…

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Cricket abounds with theories, some valid, several spurious. A common one in the latter category states that captains have little role to play in limited overs cricket. This edition of the Champions Trophy has shown why such belief is balderdash.

It could be argued that since neither Ricky Ponting nor Daniel Vettori had a tangible role to play in the final, the importance of a captain has been exaggerated. But that is mistaking a one-off performance for leadership, which is what captaincy in cricket is all about.

Ponting had got only a single before an unplayable delivery from Kyle Mills hit his pads right in front of the stumps, while Vettori, sadly, did not even take the field. But who would deny that but for their presence and captaincy over the past couple of weeks, neither Australia nor New Zealand would have reached this far.

The cricketing ethos of Australia and New Zealand are a study in contrast, and how the captains of these two sides shaped the progress of their respective sides in this tournament (and I dare say, right through the past year) makes for one of the more fascinating stories in the contemporary cricket.

Vettori, who took over from the phlegmatic Stephen Fleming, has been able to infuse an ambition that was hitherto unimaginable in New Zealand cricketers. Richard Hadlee, the unrelenting wicket-taker of the 80s, remains an oddity. Hadlee was brilliant, but also a loner, and once he was gone, New Zealand cricket floundered.

For the better part of the last two decades, the Kiwis have been the “jolly good blokes” of international cricket. They have played well, especially at home, but have never Read more…

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It’s early season in South Africa so maybe this Champions Trophy will be won by bowlers.

That’s unlikely - but if it is the case then, with three bowlers, Daniel Vettori, Kyle Mills and Shane Bond, all within the top 10 ranked ODI performers, there’s plenty of reason for hope.

That may be false hope because you cannot win enough ODIs in succession if your top five batsmen are failing. The fact we have 30 world-class overs available and continue to slip in ODI rankings proves there are major problems in our batting.

So why do we boast a top five line-up with more than acceptable records and yet fail to win enough games?

Jesse Ryder, Martin Guptill, Ross Taylor and Grant Elliott all boast averages above 35 with excellent strike rates. In fact they are numerically better or comparable to key players in the 2000 Champions Trophy winning team like Roger Twose, Stephen Fleming, Chris Harris and Craig MacMillan.

Then we have Jacob Oram in the top five ODI all-rounders list but here is when the statistics start to tell the true story.

Two of the most influential ODI players this country has had were Nathan Astle and Chris Cairns.

Their equivalents in the current team are Brendon McCullum and Oram, probably our most highly paid cricketers and thus meant to be world class performers. But they are far from it.

Astle averaged 35 at a 73 strike rate with 16 hundreds; McCullum is 28 at 88 and Read more…

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Daniel Vettori has emerged from a systems shake-up a more powerful figure in New Zealand cricket since, and possibly including, Stephen Fleming.

For the first time since taking over the captaincy following the 2007 World Cup Vettori can claim, some personnel issues aside, that this is his side.

With coach Andy Moles by design a more peripheral figure than John Bracewell, the onus has been placed on Vettori and his senior team-mates to drag New Zealand out of the massive hole they have dug for themselves in test cricket.

At the forefront of this sea change in philosophy has been Roger Mortimer.

Under the direction of Mortimer, who was pivotal in directing the 2004 Olympic campaigns of Sarah Ulmer and Hamish Carter, the onus has been put on players to map out their own career trajectories. Read more…

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To maintain a largely untarnished image, authorities must insist upon players saying where they are at given time

Imagine this scenario: a great sportsman, popular beyond measure, has announced his retirement and has only two matches left before he rides off into a lucrative sunset. His career and reputation are made, but he knows that the earning potential from his last two games, if things go well and his team win the series and with it his sport’s greatest prize, is immeasurable. There is one small problem: he’s injured.

How badly injured, he doesn’t really know. He knows, though, that he is hurting but that he has to play in the last two games. Just has to.

Cortisone, legal, frequently administered and a wonderful masking agent for pain, won’t do the trick because there is a limit to how much of it the body can properly cope with, and he’s already had five injections this year. So he asks around. Takes something, anything, and plays his last two matches.

Far-fetched? Fanciful? Thankfully yes, because cricket historically has not had a problem with drugs, either performance-enhancing ones or those designed to mask injuries. Read more…

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