Cricket: For goodness sake, whack it

A spin bowler such as Tarun Nethula could be more than useful against the West Indies. Photo / Andrew Cornaga

Why did Tarun Nethula not play in this test? Maybe he didn't impress in the warm-up game and perhaps team management felt this wicket may get up and down later in the game and thus suit the quicker bowlers.

That could still happen but we have seen, especially at the end of third day's play, yet another day of innocuous Black Cap bowling in dry-wicket test match conditions.

This test could yet turn on its head and who knows what sort of final innings lead could prove challenging? Dry, barren wickets in warm climates do tend to break up late in the game. But I'd say the Black Caps are fighting for a draw.

Another spinner has to bowl in tandem with Vettori and, with all due respect to the useful Kane Williamson, that spinner has to be a genuine threat. If Nethula is not deemed good enough, then my plea to the youth development staff in New Zealand is to find us a big turning spin bowler - and quickly. We aren't going to reverse-swing sides out when we can only do it at 130kph and so right now our attack is only a threat in helpful, seamer-friendly conditions - generally not the norm in world cricket.

This "patience" approach that the Black Caps are trying to employ just is not working. Rarely do they score enough runs to pressure the opposition into panic if they are being contained anyway.

I don't believe the patience approach is working with the batting either. We hear it time and time again out of the mouths of John Wright and the players themselves that they must show patience. Well, they aren't achieving that goal. I don't believe it's through a lack of trying; I just believe they aren't good enough to do it.

In the crucial first innings of this game it was more of the same. They tried to grind away and bat for time but what ended up happening was a block-bash approach to batting that only ever gets the team through to 300. So finally I'm throwing my hands in the air and saying 'bugger it...whack it'. When I watch our cricket team bat, all I see is uneasiness. They bat with the desire to be positive, seasoned with the mandate of patience and fear of an irresponsible dismissal. So, time for a new mandate - whack it.

Yes, be selective and controlled about it but that controlled aggression will only come with practice and commitment to a more dynamic batting strategy.

Let's face it, in this country all our cricketers want to gravitate towards performance in T20 anyway. It hasn't hurt Chris Gayle's test cricket, by the looks of it. So let's just get better at belting it in all forms.

If you think this sounds hypocritical and a bit rich from me, well, times have changed and so have personnel in the Black Caps. This is a freedom that might work for our present crop.

It's time for more aggression in New Zealand test cricket with both bat and ball.