Cricket: No holiday for West Indies

There was a time when a test match win over the West Indies would be almost deserving of a national holiday.

In between some of the most violent thumping known to the game, New Zealand managed to snatch a much- celebrated triumph over Denis Atkinson's troops in 1956, a rare victory over Garfield Sobers' men in 1969, and a pair of scarcely believable wins in 1980 and 1987.

But it was a measure of New Zealand's 10-wicket success at the Basin Reserve yesterday that skipper Stephen Fleming chose to speak afterwards of his team's shortcomings rather than the satisfaction of claiming the country's 60th test win.

This was a sad day for West Indies cricket, a time when no manner of positive thinking or optimism could overshadow the horrible reality for the touring squad that many of the players are out of their depth and the rest are out of form.

Resuming yesterday at 118 for four with a lead of 62, the tourists managed to keep the lunch caterers in business before being rolled for 215, a feeble effort against a New Zealand attack that was missing strike bowler Shane Bond.

Dwayne Bravo and Denesh Ramdin were out before the lunchtime gong, and although Shiv Chanderpaul and Rawl Lewis fought bravely to keep the New Zealanders at bay, they could only contribute towards a second innings lead of 35.

New Zealand opener Hamish Marshall then managed his best score of the series, ending 23 not out as he and Jamie How completed the formalities.

It was the first time that New Zealand have won five tests in succession, a sequence that dates back to last summer and comprises successes over Sri Lanka at Wellington, Zimbabwe at Harare and Bulawayo, and the West Indies at Auckland and Wellington.

On the other hand, the West Indies managed to become the first team outside Bangladesh and Zimbabwe to lose eight consecutive tests in 85 years, since England were taken apart by Warwick Armstrong's Australians between 1920 and 1921.

It was for that reason that Fleming, who took his own personal tally of wins to 27 as New Zealand captain, cautioned against reading too much into his side's landslide success, saying it wouldn't be until next month's series in South Africa that the combination would be truly measured.

"We've found there's a brand of cricket being played by a couple of countries in the world that doesn't give you any second chances," Fleming said afterwards.

"At the moment, we're in a bunch with the West Indies where you do get second chances, where there's mistakes being made in the field, bowling, batting, in every facet.

"If you want to climb up the ladder and get to No 1 and 2, you have to cancel out those sort of errors."

New Zealand will head to South Africa soon after the end of the West Indies series, but Fleming said the team were still concentrating on the third and final test in Napier, starting on Saturday, and couldn't afford to take their eye off the ball.

"Napier's another chance to improve," he said. "We haven't got one eye on South Africa, we're giving all our attention to the third test, but if we can keep improving in each area we'll go to the Republic in good shape.

"There's a lot of pressure coming from team management, from [coach] John Bracewell, about the areas we need to improve on and that's keeping things pretty testy in the dressing room.

"We all know that if we slip back and don't play as well, we'll be behind where we want to be in South Africa."

West Indies coach Bennett King was left singing a familiar refrain.

"This side is capable of much better," he said. "We don't believe it's a skill issue, we think it's an application issue. We've just got to be stronger as cricketers and people."