New Zealand will look to get back to form to stop an impressive England side
in its track when the first one dayer of the five match England New Zealand cricket series gets underway this Saturday in Wellington. New Zealand
have lost momentum since their impressive 20-20 third place finish and with
an England side growing in form and confidence rapidly, the Black Caps need
to pull out all their resources in reserve if they are to mount a challenge
this weekend.
Click for Live Score Card of New Zealand vs England ODI
New Zealand continued a bad run of form against top sides when they crashed
to their second T-20 defeat against England in the space of two days. While
New Zealand's batting has been decent throughout, their bowling has let them
down and in truth, they do look a bit ragged without the services of premium
fast bowler Shane Bond. Bond has been suspended indefinitely by the New Zealand cricket board for his involvement in the IPL in India. While this move may
be deemed correct on administrative ground, New Zealand cricket is indeed much
poorer without him and a lack of suitable replacements has left the young attack
a bit raw. Their batting is also a concern after the retirement of old warhorses
Stephen Fleming, Nathan Astle and Craig McMillan and skipper Daniel Vettori
will be hoping that upcoming batsman Jamie How and Ross Taylor will be able
to use the willow to good effect against an England attack, that in all fairness
does seem a bit one paced.
England have managed up decently throughout the past one year without the services
of premium all rounder Andrew Flintoff and the emergence of young utility
players in Dimitri Mascarenhas and Stuart Broad has helped them
achieve decent success abroad. England come into this clash with a high level
of confidence after winning their two twenty twenty matches with great pomp.
While the first one was decided by a late bash from Mascarenhas, a streaky fifty
from skipper Paul Collingwood helped England win the second one dayer.
While the return to form of star batsman Kevin Pietersen is a big boost for
the English, the biggest find for England so far has been young wicketkeeper
Phil Mustard. Mustard has shown experience way beyond his years and the England
cricket board will be hoping to finally find an able replacement to fill in
the boots of Alex Stewart behind the stumps. England have won their last two
away serieses against Australia and Sri Lanka and will be hoping to lay a strong
foundation for a third series triumph with a victory in the first one dayer
to be played on the 9th of February 2008 in Wellington.
Don't miss a single moment of this exciting one day series with us here, your
one stop destination for all cricket news, views and updates. Keep in tune with
the England cricket scores with our RSS and Flash based scorecards which give
you live England cricket updates in a jiffy. Listen to the opinions of cricketing
gurus on the current state of England cricket with our unofficial live cricket
commentary portal which streams in England cricket audio updates in a fraction
of bandwidth in comparison to live online cricket streaming services. So sit
back and watch top class live England cricket here, the premium cricket portal
|
