KEY POINTS:
The loss of Jacob Oram is a huge body blow to the Black Caps ahead of the one-dayers.
The thrashing in the Twenty20 was just a small elbow to the face in comparison as, once again, it is left to the one-day side to restore some credibility to
New Zealand cricket.
The Twenty20 loss slowed that restoration somewhat - but what has really jeopardised it is Oram's continued hamstring problems. He is a match winner and the reason the Black Caps are so much more effective in ODIs than test matches is because they possess match winners in the shorter form. Oram, Brendan McCullum, Ross Taylor and Scott Styris provide balance and power to a substantial proportion of the Black Caps' ODI batting line-up. Oram provides the hitting power required deep in an innings.
Batting wins ODIs. I believe that the responsibility for winning test matches is with the bowlers and the batsmen must ensure they have enough runs to work with. Batting ensures you don't lose tests but, to win, you need enough penetration to bowl a side out. New Zealand do not currently do this enough.
It's a different dynamic in ODIs. For the most part, bowlers defend and batsmen attack. With Oram gone, more onus will fall upon McCullum, Taylor and Styris.
Luckily, however, often a one-day game can be won through some individual brilliance. There were some outstanding individual efforts by McCullum and Taylor at differing stages during the test series but, as the results showed, success in test matches requires greater team contribution and consistency over five days.
While I'm confident that, even without Oram, the team has the batting strength to win, Oram will still leave a hole in the bowling.
At its most simplistic, one-day cricket is a game determined by who scores the most runs rather than who bowls the opposition out. However, as evidenced by Shane Bond in the Australian Tri-series of 2001, there is little substitute for taking wickets when it comes to restricting the opposition.
Bond was an attacking bowler who has proven to be irreplaceable but the nature of limited over cricket makes the senior bowlers in this current team a lot more penetrative than they are in the test form.
Over time, Kyle Mills has shown he's not a test-match wicket taker but his super consistency and shape with the white ball has made him quite the ODI opening bowler - good enough to find himself ranked in the ICC top 10.
Daniel Vettori is more likely to take wickets when players are attacking him. His variation in pace can be defended but lulls the stroke-playing batsman into errors.
Oram, however, was the glue in the middle. He's been innocuous of late in test matches and, unlike Mills and Vettori, he does not become a wicket-taker the minute strike rate comes into the equation.
But he is the go-to man when things get a little ragged.
