By RICHARD BOOCK
HAMILTON - And with one bound they were gone, like a group of superhuman comic-book heroes on a travelling crusade to free the world of boring cricket.
Having swept aside all before them on a two-month-long march through New Zealand, Australia's champion cricketers left for home last night, safe in the knowledge that their challenge to the record mark for consecutive wins was still alive, and that their message to the rest of the world was finally getting through.
The tourists required only an hour to win the third test by six wickets yesterday morning after Justin Langer continued his astonishing innings, posting his seventh test century and finishing unbeaten on 122 (off 122 balls) when the target of 210 was reached.
Langer, who has now scored 1000 test runs since the tour of Sri Lanka last year, lost his overnight partner, Steve Waugh, to a wrist injury midway through proceedings and Damien Martyn to another questionable leg-before decision, but was otherwise untroubled in leading his country to their 10th consecutive win.
The West Indies side of 1983-85 strung together a world-record 11 consecutive wins and Waugh's Australians will have a chance to equal that mark when they square off against their Caribbean rivals at Brisbane in the first test of next summer's programme.
The third transtasman test followed the pattern of the previous two in ending prematurely, reflecting the contemporary trend towards playing attacking cricket, rather than the many grim draws which highlighted the fossilised version of the game.
Waugh, who is awaiting the result of x-rays of his injured wrist, said he believed the standard of test batting had declined ("blokes aren't digging in like they used to") but suggested the aggressive, attacking and high-risk cricket being played today could only be good for the game.
"It's great for cricket because people love watching it," he said yesterday. "There's going to be a result and that's important because I think test cricket is in danger of dying if there's too many draws and you're not playing an entertaining style.
"A lot of countries are suffering from that. This is the way to go, it's the future."
His view was shared by New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming, who said afterwards that there were several positive elements his side could take out of the series, not least the style of cricket they were attempting to play.
New Zealand were beaten by margins of 62 runs, six wickets and six wickets again in the three tests and although not being able to capitalise on the few opportunities they created, always adopted a positive approach and were dangerous on the counterattack.
Fleming said it was important New Zealand continued to develop their game and took note of the playing style and philosophy of the Australians, who he described as the best side he had played against in 51 tests.
"We may not have had the same success in the latter half of the season but I think the way we're going with our brand of cricket is quite exciting, and that's something I want to make sure continues.
"We're still a team which offers a lot potentially, but which doesn't always deliver. It's something we're working very hard on, we're gradually improving and as we progress I think we'll deliver a lot more.
"But at the moment we're still wearing that 'potentially quite good' label."
Cricket: Aussies closing in on record
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