Rock bottom in South Africa

Boy, was that a forgettable tour! A second 2-0 test series loss to Graeme Smith's men in as many years was hard enough to swallow, but the inability of the batters to put together 200 even once, plus another injury to Shane Bond made it all positively indigestible. This one ranks right up there with the tour to Australia in 1993-94 as the worst I've seen in my fifteen years of watching New Zealand cricket.

The brightest part of the test series was the very first day; Shane Bond, playing his first test against the Proteas, and Chris Martin combining to skittle out the South Africans for a low score and providing the batsmen with a real chance to set the game up. It was a steep slope downhill from there; the situation with the openers and the middle order was not an unfamiliar one, but this time the lower-middle order of McCullum, Oram and Vettori couldn't pull of the customary rescue act which was the preserve of the Cairns-Parore-Nash trio in the past. Oram of course was unavailable for the second With a fully fit side we could have run them close, but somehow I don't think we'll be in a hurry to tour the place for some time. My summary of the test series:

LOWS: (Too many)
1. Shane Bond. Will he now restrict himself to ODIs just as Geoff Allott did in his final year?
2. Allowing Hashim Amla 2 centuries. Granted, the guy has improved a lot from the awful player he was against England in 2004. But why are we helping to pave his recovery trail?
3. Michael Papps failing to reach double figures on his much awaited return. This one looks like a bad investement.
4. The sameness of the script; Ntini and Dale Steyn were the X factors in 2006. The batters still looked as if they ahd no idea of what to expect. They seem to be doing to us what Wasim and Waqar did in the 1990s.
5. Ross Taylor continuing to get himself out in infuriating ways. Still, it was his first test series so he deserves some leeway.
6. Daniel Vettori still unable to find success against a team not renowned for its prowess against spin.
7. That blow to Craig Cumming. It was perversely fitting that the most defiant NZ innings of the series should end in an injury.
8. John Bracewell STILL holding on to the coaching job. Just what has he done to a test team that drew consecutive series in the subcontinent fout years ago?

HIGHS:
1. Graeme Smith joining Jacques Kallis as Chris Martin's bunny. Smith must be pretty pleased this went largely unnoticed through the series.
2. Mark Gillespie's five wicket haul, though it was expensive. Here's hoping he doesn't become overdependent on blatantly seaming conditions as Oram and Tuffey did.

The only positive way (for a supporter) to look at our current test situation is to admit we're rebuilding and the results will take a while to come. We've lost quite a few battlers who carried the top order through the first half of this century - Mark Richardson, Nathan Astle, Craig McMillan - and continue to struggle to assemble a fit bowling lineup. The return of Shane Bond is both essential and improbable (for some time anyway), but we have got by without him in the past. If we get back Kyle Mills and James Franklin, we have an attack with a reasonable set of options on paper at least. The same goes for the return of Peter Fulton and Jamie How, who still can be moulded into solid test players. But overall the series was definitely a rude awakening for a test side that's been in decline for a while now. Here's hoping things have drastically improved by the time the Poms come over early next year.