Monday, 9 May 2005

The Super Series

Just two New Zealanders - Dan Vettori and Brendon McCullum - made the shortlist of 39 players to compete against Australia in October's Super Series. The criteria for selection were:

- players' overall career records in both Test and ODI cricket
- their form in both Test and ODI cricket over the past 12 months
- their overall playing records against Australia and their performances against the world champion team in Australia
- players' positions in the LG ICC Rankings for both Test and ODI cricket
- the distinctive characteristics of the venues in Melbourne and Sydney which will host the games.

I guess at least one of those counted against each of Shane Bond, Jacob Oram and Stephen Fleming, but two is still a pretty pathetic effort. England, India and even crummy South Africa had seven players selected from each.

The complete list of players can be found here.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well...Bond and Oram aren't fit- although I'd dearly love to see the Shane Bond circa 2003 World Cup terrorizing Damien Martyn again - but when was the las ttime he played a test? 12 Months ago?

And sadly Fleming was thorougly exposed by McGrath so recently that you can't really see him being picked ahead of a Lara or Tendulkar. Although he would doubtless be the best captain. But, like Vaughan, he needs more runs to be considered.

Jagadish said...

I'm actually surprised Hamish Marshall wasnt picked. He batted quite well against Australia, home and away, tests and one-dayers.