Test cricket greatly needs a team to prove itself valuable of the much-hyped No. 1 ranking. A little competition at the top makes things interesting, but two top-ranked Test sides being whitewashed within seven months is absolute farcical. Any sport requires a benchmark of excellence. South Africa is the team most capable of having an extended run at the top of the rankings: they, unlike England and India, perform well in all conditions, and had it not been for a strange incapability to win a home series for three years they would already have been No. 1.
A year ago, when New Zealand was in quite miserable form, a loss would have been the expected result. A month ago, with New Zealand riding on their upset of Australia in Hobart and thumping of Zimbabwe in Napier, one might have predicted a more even fight. Now, with South Africa having halted New Zealand's revival by wiping the floor with them in the one-dayers, but having suffered a shock loss against Sri Lanka in Durban last December, bold predictions would not be as forthcoming.
New Zealand faces a problem when it comes to what types of tracks to get ready for the series. The success in Hobart came in seaming conditions, and South Africa has lost on fast bowlers' pitches, in Johannesburg and Durban, newly. But it would take a brave team to prepare a surface that would aid Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel and Vernon Philander. The Dunedin pitch has not a speck of green on it, with dried grass covering the pitch, which may make it get slower as the game goes on.
Athletic Gears
A year ago, when New Zealand was in quite miserable form, a loss would have been the expected result. A month ago, with New Zealand riding on their upset of Australia in Hobart and thumping of Zimbabwe in Napier, one might have predicted a more even fight. Now, with South Africa having halted New Zealand's revival by wiping the floor with them in the one-dayers, but having suffered a shock loss against Sri Lanka in Durban last December, bold predictions would not be as forthcoming.
New Zealand faces a problem when it comes to what types of tracks to get ready for the series. The success in Hobart came in seaming conditions, and South Africa has lost on fast bowlers' pitches, in Johannesburg and Durban, newly. But it would take a brave team to prepare a surface that would aid Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel and Vernon Philander. The Dunedin pitch has not a speck of green on it, with dried grass covering the pitch, which may make it get slower as the game goes on.
Athletic Gears
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