KEY POINTS:
India have a dreadful record in New Zealand, which is hard to reconcile with the quality of the players they bring here.
They open their tour next week with a couple of Twenty20 games, and it will be an eagerly anticipated contest.
India and South Africa are the heavyweights of world cricket right now, but the past records suggest the Indians could find it tough over here.
They have been ambushed to a degree on previous tours, however, playing late in the year when our pitches are still green and batting much more difficult.
I won't say we doctored the conditions, but we have certainly ensured that they were in our favour.
And hey, all is fair in love and war, and of course the reverse applies when we tour India.
Unlike previous visits however, the conditions have dried out more at this time of year and batting is easier which will suit the Indians.
There are a couple of choices here. We can either turn this tour into an Indian batting display for the rest of the world to savour, or else we can ensure the conditions suit our side. For my money, the sprinklers should be on already, and I'm sure they are.
A more complex issue is whether the Black Caps should tour Zimbabwe.
I don't have an easy answer, and no one does. The clear directions need to come from the Government, because it should not be left to Daniel Vettori to run our foreign policy.
The default position for sports people to take is that they are not politicians, and that is a fair one.
The problem is that there will be major ramifications, in the form of multimillion-dollar fines, if New Zealand Cricket breaks from the Future Tours programme that it has signed up to.
Personally, I would take the issue out of the political arena and look at it from a purely playing point of view.
Zimbabwe simply aren't up to the mark as an international cricket country, in terms of both their infrastructure and playing standard and as such, the ICC should have moved to remove them from the Future Tours programme.
Tough on Zimbabwe but it does nothing for the other test playing nations to have to play against an outfit that is simply not up to scratch in every respect.
