Still, Shane Warne was inconsistent when he started. Astle by contrast had a fine 2010-11 Plunket Shield which saw him narrowly miss one of the 20 national contracts. He took 37 wickets at 29.08 to be second behind Otago pace bowler Neil Wagner on the national averages. He has had nowhere near the same success this season and may have been overtaken on the test selection ladder.
Jeetan Patel (31) could be used as an instant standby for Vettori based on pedigree, but his lack of wickets and concession of runs against Zimbabwe in November may have cost him future chances. Nathan McCullum (31) and Luke Woodcock (29) are still seen as purely limited overs bowlers if statistical evidence is used as a basis.
Former off-spinner Paul Wiseman, who started his 25-test career after Vettori in 1998 and finished in 2005, says spinners continue to lack encouragement in New Zealand. He says part of that problem is the 76-day gap between the two segments of first-class cricket this summer.
"I'd like to see our spinners bowling more [in the longer form] but there's no further four-day cricket until February. The development of pitches more conducive to spin would also help. They don't have to be Bunsens [Bunsen burners - Cockney rhyming slang for raging turners] but if they were reasonable, captains might have more confidence to back their spinners."
Wiseman - a national under-19 co-coach who spends plenty of time in the nursery of the first-class game - does have another solution: "New Zealand spinners have generally found it hard to take wickets in test cricket and it's a big call to develop someone in a test, against Zimbabwe for instance. I'd like to see our top spinners go to India to bowl as many overs as possible. Another idea would be to get young bowlers to travel with the Black Caps to the sub-continent and bowl in the nets for hours so they know what is expected of them and get opportunities to learn."
New Zealand Cricket selection manager Kim Littlejohn says Wiseman's solution is already being considered.
"We'll be looking to place them in sub-continent academies over New Zealand winters for a fortnight to a month, probably from next year. The idea would be to get them experience and toughen them up in the conditions without the expense of too many five-star hotels. We're intending to chat with a few Indian provincial associations about it. The English are already doing it and look at how well their test and first-class game is going at the moment."
Littlejohn says since his appointment in September he has worked on analysing gaps in the system. A spin succession plan is the biggest problem.
"Nethula and Astle would certainly be considered [for tests] from the current first-class scene. McCullum and Woodcock are [deemed] specialised short format cricketers for now, but that's not to say they couldn't adapt. There is not a lot of talent out there, particularly in the wrist spinning department. However, spinners are notorious late developers.
"They're often not ripping the ball when they're 21 or so. It's more in their mid-to-late 20s that they fully develop and get a handle on their craft. We have a group of about eight we're monitoring at the moment including [Auckland leg-spinner] Ish Sodhi, [Northern Districts left-arm orthodox] Mitchell Santner and [Canterbury left-arm orthodox] Theo van Woerkom."
