Cricinfo all-time NZ XI.

Here are the list of nominees:

Openers
Stewie Dempster, Glenn Turner, Graham Dowling, John Wright, Bruce Edgar, Mark Richardson, Bert Sutcliffe

Middle order
John R Reid, Bert Sutcliffe, John F Reid, Martin Donnelly, Bev Congdon, Martin Crowe, Andrew Jones, Stephen Fleming, Nathan Astle, Craig McMillan

Allrounders
John R Reid, Bruce Taylor, Chris Cairns, Jacob Oram

Wicketkeepers
Ken Wadsworth, Ian Smith, Ken James, Adam Parore, Brendon McCullum

Fast bowlers
Jack Cowie, Dick Motz, Richard Collinge, Richard Hadlee, Ewen Chatfield, Danny Morrison, Chris Martin, Shane Bond

Spinners
Hedley Howarth, John Bracewell, Stephen Boock, Tom Burtt, Daniel Vettori


Selection panel XI:
Stewie Dempster
Glenn Turner
Martin Donnelly
Martin Crowe
Bert Sutcliffe
John Reid
Ian Smith
Richard Hadlee
Daniel Vettori
Shane Bond
Jack Cowie

Readers XI:
John Wright
Glenn Turner
Stephen Fleming
Martin Crowe
Bert Sutcliffe
Chris Cairns
Brendon McCullum
Richard Hadlee
Daniel Vettori
Shane Bond
Jack Cowie

Thoughts?



gc.

Chris Cairns is/was horribly overrated.

Another player severely hampered by injury, ala Freddy Flintoff etc. The fact is that Cairns spent around 50% of his playing career on the sidelines, and whenever he actually managed to string together some consistent time on the pitch, he was a genuinely world class player.



gc.

how was Richard Hadlee nt an all rounder

Definately would have had Parore or Smith over mccullum.

cause his batting average was crap.

As the first player to reach 400 Test wickets, Hadlee was always assured of immortality, but in addition to his matchless skills with the ball, he was also a hard-hitting batsman of unquestioned skill, and he is acknowledged as one of the four great allrounders of the 1980s, along with Ian Botham, Imran Khan and Kapil Dev.

Mat Inns NO Runs HS Ave BF SR 100 50 6s Ct St
Tests 86 134 19 3124 151* 27.16 2 15 33 39 0



http://www.cricinfo.com/newzealand/content/player/37224.html#statistics

Bruce Taylor

Mat Inns NO Runs HS Ave BF SR 100 50 4s 6s Ct St
Tests 30 50 6 898 124 20.40 2 2 13 10 0

Because we don't need to pick Hadlee as an all-rounder? He's the PERFECT #8 or #9. Imagine if you had that side 500/7 after getting dusted around the park by Crowe and Sutcliffe all day... THEN you had to try and oust Hadlee and Vettori! Danny boy would keep Paddles in check - 750+ IMO.



gc.

Unfortunately it's keeper/batsman that is probably our biggest weakness. All of them had their strengths and weaknesses, but none of them are objectively that great.



gc.

Two awful comments in a row, wanna try for a third?


It's easy to dismiss Cairns as being overrated when you come from a country that holds Kallis up as a benchmark for a world class all rounder. Truth is though, stats aside, Cairns was a genuinely destructive player, with bat or ball and he singlehandedly won NZ our first ever ICC trophy so he was always going to be remembered fondly.

From about 99-03, he was unstoppable. He had a long slow start to his career which has forever dampened his stats but when he finally came of age, people finally stopped comparing him to his father and started comparing his father to him.

So in other words Mr South African. In the valley of the blind, the one eyed man is king.

Parore was a brilliant wicketkeeper, the best in the world for most of his career. Frustration with him steems from his underachieving with the bat (even tho his av was pretrty good) his habit of running out other players....and the general impression he was a bit of an asshat dislked by a number of the team. Not great team harmony from such a central figure

However having said that b/c of his glovework he is easily selected as our number one imo. I can barely remember him dropping a catch his whole career. McCullum drops a howler every summer it seems. As Smith only scored runs on flat tracks when he could trust the bounce enough to slash it sqaure. Great team man though

As for the teams its so hard to comment having not seen Dempster Cowie etc

One thing though....The Readers XI having Wright innfront of Richardson is a discrace

Read an interesting/sad interview on Dick Motz a year or so ago, how one of the worlds best fast bowlers of his era was seeing out his days alone and skint in a squalid 1 bedroom state flat drinking and chain smoking rollies :/