View Full Version : NZ avoid follow on and declare straight away
Fat Red
12 Nov 2001, 11:18
Interesting...what sort of target will Oz set?
GOALden Hawk
12 Nov 2001, 12:32
After what happened in England when Gilly made that generous declaration I would think the Aussies may be a bit more cautious...especially given the series is not wrapped up.
They are going the tonk however...2/63 off 11 overs. Reckon they will declare pretty soon...5 an over is a fair chase.
joshhem
12 Nov 2001, 12:37
This is very interesting....
Satay Mat
12 Nov 2001, 12:42
Aussies declared...Kiwis need 284 to win @ 4.81 per oval
Satay Mat
Satay Mat
12 Nov 2001, 12:43
or indeed over
:)
SM
Satay Mat
12 Nov 2001, 12:44
or maybe 4.98 per over once the change of innings has occured....will keep you informed of any further changes to my arithmatic !
SM
1/55
Be pretty hard for the Kiwi's from here on in, but it's possible.
How Good's McGrath. Kiwi's having a go and his economy rate is still only 1.73. He always comes up with the goods.
I think the Kiwi's will get this though. Only 1 down and only 5.6 an over required.
1/89 still need 195 off 34.5 overs
joshhem
12 Nov 2001, 17:26
What a great game. Congrats to both captains...
GOALden Hawk
13 Nov 2001, 08:54
Sorry not to join in the spirit of it been great for cricket and all but I thought Steve Waugh was far too generous in his declaration. Here we are, the series tied 0-0, having dominated the entire test match bar one session....and we nearly threw the whole thing away.
Everyone knew the pitch was a complete road, yet NZ needed less than 5 an over to win! 10 wickets in less than 60 overs was a difficult task, 270 runs was not.
Sure it was exciting (well what we actually got to see....Fuking Channel 9 :mad: ) but what if Cairns had of stayed in and NZ had won. All of a sudden we are 1-0 down with only 2 tests to play. It then rains in Hobart and the best we can do is draw the series...and we lose a point on the World Championship Table.
If we were 2-0 up and it was the 3rd test I could live with it, but it was bad enough losing to the Poms like that in England...to lose to NZ to go down 1-0 would have been a disgrace.
Jars458
13 Nov 2001, 09:29
Originally posted by GOALden Hawk
Sorry not to join in the spirit of it been great for cricket and all but I thought Steve Waugh was far too generous in his declaration. Here we are, the series tied 0-0, having dominated the entire test match bar one session....and we nearly threw the whole thing away.
.
But compare this comment to your earlier comment
"They are going the tonk however...2/63 off 11 overs. Reckon they will declare pretty soon...5 an over is a fair chase"
I think you have changed your mind GH?????
Channel Nine showed all of it here in Adelaide
I missed all the good stuff in the car on the way home.
Victor Trumper
13 Nov 2001, 09:55
I agree with golden hawk's comments. We nearly threw away a Test series. I think that Fleming out smarted Steve Waugh, sucked him in big time.
Having watched Fleming captain his team umpteen times I can only remember him declaring twice when behind on the first innings
Hobart 97, when New Zealand's number 10 and 11 had to bat for twenty minutes at the end to save the test,
And yesterday. When you are 0-5 as a captain vs Australia obviously you would be more aggressive to steal a test win against your arch rival.
His captaincy again has looked top shelf in Australia, if only he had the weapons to implement his plans.
As for Steve Waugh, I'm more critical of his first declaration than his second. In letting the Australian first innings drag on when he should have declared, the only realistic way Australia was going to win the test was orchestrating a finish that gave New Zealand a sniff of victory.
His procrastination then allowed Fleming to out manoeuvre him on the last day and put the Australians in a rather uncomfortable position.
GOALden Hawk
13 Nov 2001, 11:04
Originally posted by Jars458
But compare this comment to your earlier comment
"They are going the tonk however...2/63 off 11 overs. Reckon they will declare pretty soon...5 an over is a fair chase"
I think you have changed your mind GH?????
Channel Nine showed all of it here in Adelaide
I missed all the good stuff in the car on the way home.
What was the required run rate at the beginning of the chase? I think it was less than 5. I have no problem with the captains 'generating' a result....but Steve Waugh had the power to do it on our terms, not New Zealand's.
Last time something similar to this occured was in South Africa when Cronje and Hussein both declared at 0/0 to make a game out of it. At the time everyone applauded the decision - yet we all know the truth behind it now. I too thought it was good at the time, but I couldn't work out why Cronje had been so generous in the total the Poms needed.
Don't get me wrong - only a fool would accuse Steve Waugh of match fixing. But why declare in a position that clearly favours New Zealand over us? Quite frankly I don't give a rats about it 'being good for cricket', all I care about is the best possible result for Australia.
And as for fuking Channel 9....bloody useless. Rushed home when I saw it would be a close finish..only to find ACA on!!! Cracked the sads and put on the ABC, 9 finally returned to the cricket at around 6:55 with 5 or 6 overs remaining.
They then stayed with the cricket before crossing to the tennis. Ken Sutcliffe proceded to crap on for 5 minutes while Hewitt and Grosjean were playing in the background. I assumed they were warming up, until they came back from an ad and said "Welcome to the 2nd set!!"
They had better lift their game before the footy starts.
Originally posted by GOALden Hawk
Don't get me wrong - only a fool would accuse Steve Waugh of match fixing. But why declare in a position that clearly favours New Zealand over us? Quite frankly I don't give a rats about it 'being good for cricket', all I care about is the best possible result for Australia.
Setting 284 to win off 57 overs with McGrath, Lee, Gillespie and Warne on the last day of the test (admittedly a day four wicket) and you think this clearly favours New Zealand?
The best possible result for Australia was a win, and this could only happen by bowling New Zealand out, requiring as many overs as possible for the Australian attack.
New Zealand needed 284 runs in less than two sessions. That's a lot of runs to win on the last innings, or a long time to survive, depending on the approach of the batsman.
Some times the glass is half full for both teams rather than half empty.
GoEagles
13 Nov 2001, 12:05
Fleming did a very good job as captain, definately got the edge over Steve Waugh in this test. Unfortunately I missed the last 2 hours of the game because I had Uni, but it sounds like it was very exciting and it went right down to the wire.
Should the Aussies change their team for the 2nd test?
Fat Red
13 Nov 2001, 12:09
Remember New Zealand had only made that many runs in the first innings, and McGrath and Warne had both not bowled well.
You've got to take Steve Waugh as you find him...and as Peter Roebuck said in today's paper, he doesn't like wasting 5 days of his life:D
I think there would hbave bene no shame in losing the game, in the search for a result.
Also, remember that it's harder in a Test to chase runs because there are no fielding restrictions and the wide rule is different.
The Hippie
13 Nov 2001, 22:55
Originally posted by Player
Setting 284 to win off 57 overs with McGrath, Lee, Gillespie and Warne on the last day of the test (admittedly a day four wicket) and you think this clearly favours New Zealand?
The best possible result for Australia was a win, and this could only happen by bowling New Zealand out, requiring as many overs as possible for the Australian attack.
New Zealand needed 284 runs in less than two sessions. That's a lot of runs to win on the last innings, or a long time to survive, depending on the approach of the batsman.
Some times the glass is half full for both teams rather than half empty.
Good points, Player. He had to give them a reasonable target to chase and still leave enough time to bowl them out, so 284 was about right. He couldn't go to say, 300, NZ would have simply shut up shop, it wouldn't have been realistic.
I don't necessarily agree with your criticism of his first innings delaration, though, it was such a stop start first few days, it would have been hard to make a judgement. Plus the Aussie were scoring at a pretty fast pace, it's easy to look back at it now and say he waited too long, but he wasn't to know how much more time was going to be lost.
I dunno about all this. I've been critical of the Australian team on a few occasions in previous years, but I can see exactly where
Steve Waugh was coming from on this one.
The aim, I think, was to force New Zealand to stay in a contest. Batting on in the first innings was probably an attempt to put us in a position where we could make New Zealand follow on. And that nearly came off. You certainly can't rely on a sporting declaration from Fleming just for the sake of it. For instance he might not do it if the team avoids the follow on with five wickets to spare. In that situation New Zealand might want to get their first innings score close to ours to put pressure on for the second test.
As it was they just survived the follow on, Fleming did the sporting thing by declaring straight away, and Steve Waugh backed his men, as he always does, to engineer an unlikely victory. If it had come off, New Zealand's confidence might have been crushed for the series. It's a gamble worth taking.
What Waugh han't counted on was the sheer G abd D of this NZ outfit. There were times they could have played for the draw, and full credit to them for not taking the easy option. And full credit too for not sending Cairns up the order. When he came in the score was still reachable, but he didn't succumb to a head rush. He built his innings carefully for a final onslaught.
Should be a good series from here. I think we'll win 1-0 or 2-0, but I expect a proper contest now.