The Vent returns as Tony Veitch and Michael Guerin look at the big talking points from the sporting weekened including the looming punishment of third umpire Nigel Llong following his blunder at the Adelaide Oval.
Nigel Llong will be punished:
Tony: New Zealand were absolutely rogered. That test match last night was amazing but we were rogered.
Michael: It was great fun. The pink ball worked. Night time worked. Customers got to get what they want...watching cricket at night time but we were shafted. We should have drawn against the Aussies at their home ground.
Tony: This is not about the one match but about the whole series here. You look at the series (2-0) and you think absolute failure. But it wasn't.
Michael: The failure was not playing two proper lead-up games before the 'Gabba.
Tony: yeah but that's Australia Cricket who again rogered us by putting us on in Canberra and Sydney on a dud pitch.
Michael: And none of that would have mattered if the right decision was made by Nigel Llong. Quite simply, Nigel Llong is a professional, that's his job, he shouldn't be in the booth for another 10,20,30 tests.
Tony: From what I'm hearing he will be punished for that and he should be punished. He should be stood down. He didn't follow the protocol.
Day-night test in NZ?
Tony: New Zealand Cricket looking at Napier, Hamilton or Auckland next year against Bangladesh. Will it work?
Michael: I think it will. It's just a better timeslot for normal people. No one wants to go to cricket at 10am. 3-day test it was beautiful and Friday, Saturday, Sunday nights what perfect three nights to have test cricket on.
Guptill's future:
Tony: They've got to give him the Sri Lanka series because then we're going backwards to the way New Zealand teams used to be, which is dumping guys in and out after every series.
Michael: We were saying the same thing last year, lead-up to the World Cup he was dreadful...he was the leading run-scorer at the World Cup. He'll be fine. Do we have a better opening batsman in this country than Martin Guptill?
Tony: No, we don't.