Cricket: Nervy Bond looking for tour rhythm

Shane Bond is gradually building his strength and pace back. Picture / Fotopress

SYDNEY - Shane Bond still feels the odd twinge when he steams in to deliver a cricket ball like a thunderbolt.

Fortunately, though, it is nothing to do with his troublesome back.

Instead the Black Caps speedster has self-diagnosed a twinge, or pang, of self-doubt when he winds up at the end of a long run - hardly surprising given his history of career-threatening back complaints.

"When I got myself fit and conditioned enough and started bowling it was the mental side that kicked in because every time you went to the nets you were wondering if today was the day it would go ping," he said after the New Zealand Academy side trained in Brisbane yesterday.

"That took a long time to get over it. Even now when I bowl you always wonder with the first few balls of any spell, you're a little bit worried about things."

Bond, a senior member on the academy tour of Australia, gets a chance to roll the arm over in a "competitive" setting tomorrow - Brisbane's inclement weather permitting.

The academy were meant to play a warm-up match against their Queensland counterparts on Sunday but severe flooding left the wicket under water.

A combination of Twenty/20, one-day and three-day games over the next fortnight against the Australia Institute of Sport and India's Karnataka State Cricket Association represents another step in his rehabilitation, and preparation for August's controversial tour of Zimbabwe.

Bond, who had two rods inserted into his vertebrae last August, is gradually building his strength and pace back near to that of the 2003 World Cup when he ripped through Australia to take a career-best 6-23.

 

He made a tentative return for Canterbury at the tail end of this year's domestic summer programme and is looking forward to getting out of the nets for the first time since arriving in Queensland on June 27.

"It's a matter of hitting the timing and rhythm and that's the goal of this tour."

Academy manager Dayle Hadlee understood Bond's anxiety: "It takes a while. He needs to get some games under his belt for that to fade away into the background."

After watching him let rip indoors Hadlee is convinced the Bond of old is nearly back to his best.

"Shane's well and truly on line with his preparations," he said.

"He's been bowling well in the nets and he's prepared extremely well physically.

"We're confident this will be a major stepping stone for him to be ready for Zimbabwe."

The academy tour is also important for allrounder Jacob Oram and opening batsman Michael Papps, who, like Bond, are on comeback trail from injury.

Oram, who was sidelined with a back stress injury in January, will principally play as a batsman, although he may log more overs of medium pace as the tour progresses.

"We're expecting he'll bowl some overs but he'll be eased into it," Hadlee said. "At the moment he's only bowling off a couple of paces. He's working on his technique through the crease and just trying to eliminate some errors that crept in prior to his injury."

Papps, who has not played top flight cricket since copping a Brett Lee bouncer in the trans-Tasman one-day series in February, will play throughout the nine-game schedule.

Hadlee said Papps, who also has also been hampered by a broken finger, appeared to have shed any lingering mental demons after being hit twice by Lee at Eden Park before retiring hurt.

"He's facing Shane Bond in the nets and some other young enthusiastic fast bowlers we've taken over and he's looking comfortable," Hadlee said.

- NZPA