KEY POINTS:
There were positives to take from the Black Caps performance in the Champions Trophy, like the bowling at the top of the innings, Jeetan Patel and the batting of Fleming and the lower middle order.
However, the major negative - the top order - was so negative that it unfortunately needs to be dwelled upon. It was so drastic that it also needs to be acted upon.
Take it from me, playing for your place all the time is not nice but, if you want to keep your place, you've got to perform. Teams and individuals need continuity of selection but teams and individuals also must place performance ahead of anything else.
It is now time for the New Zealand top order and team management to accept that capabilities play second fiddle to realities.
However, having said all that, we know what Lou Vincent, Nathan Astle and Hamish Marshall are capable of and, to a lesser extent, Peter Fulton. While there may be changes in the top order, they should be just that - changes, not wholesale discards.
Players who lose form - and that's what we have here, not a lessening of talent - should not be jettisoned and forgotten. Memories of past success should grant them tolerance through poor trots. The tolerance of the ins and outs of Nathan Astle's form are justified because when he's in, he scores big and often. He averaged around 80 since regaining his place last season.
However, a team can really only carry one inconsistent match winner and if there is inconsistency around them, their misses are magnified.
Vincent, as the aggressor at the top of the innings, needs confidence. That confidence is gained by a degree of selection security but that licence to flail is not a licence to fail. He has played some fantastic knocks at times and a World Cup like Mark Greatbatch's in 1992 is not out of the question for him this April. But he must find a means of coming off more than once every so often.
Hamish Marshall provides an excellent complement to the boundary hitters in the middle order. Someone to turn the strike over regularly is invaluable but not if that skill is a past memory.
Wholesale change is not good but sooner is better than later in this case. If one or more of the incumbents go then players like Mathew Sinclair, Ross Taylor, Michael Papps and Jamie How may be given a go. I would rather see players from the wider squad tried than dismantling the strategic advantage that is our lower middle order.
It will take a squad of about 15 to win the World Cup but, most of all, it will take faith in that squad. If incumbents do make way, it is important they are not thrown out of the squad, just asked to regain form. Then we can select on form, instead of just praying for a form reversal.
- HERALD ON SUNDAY
