Black Caps sweep series Oram into Classic yellow
The Black Caps proverbially made hay when the sun shone on Hagley Oval, with captain Kane Williamson describing the fast-paced completion of a nine-wicket victory in the second test with Bangladesh yesterday as the highlight of the summer.
New Zealand turned a possible first innings deficit at the start of what was the final day of Bangladesh’s tour, to a crushing cleansweep-sealing triumph after a washout on Sunday threatened to condemn the contest to a draw.
Instead an impressive bowling effort and influential innings from Henry Nicholls - in the morning plus Tom Latham and Colin de Grandhomme as the shadows lengthened combined to give the players involved in the ChappellHadlee Trophy added time to adapt to white ball cricket.
‘‘I think this was the best day of test cricket for our team throughout the series,’’ said Williamson, pinpointing the bowling unit and the importance of contrasting knocks.
‘‘Ultimately in test cricket you need bowlers to bowl in partnerships and do a job and when it probably wasn’t offering as much as maybe the first innings we were outstanding.
‘‘It’s a tone we want to set throughout the series (summer), South Africa come here (in March) and it’s important we’re good like that again and put them under pressure.’’
Trent Boult, Tim Southee - who took his 200th test wicket - and Neil Wagner claimed three wickets apiece as Bangladesh crumbled for 173 in 52.5 overs.
‘‘That was probably the best part of it. Throughout this series we’ve seen glimpses with the ball and the wickets have been very good so it hasn’t been easy for the bowlers.
‘‘To be able to pass the baton, so guys come in and bowl spells, do a job and pass it over to the next guy so you’re still applying that pressure is what it’s all about.’’
The Black Caps, who improve to fifth on the ICC test ranking, only needed 18.4 overs to make the 109 required as de Grandhomme finished off the chase in Williamson’s usual position at first drop with 31 from 14 balls.
‘‘Getting close to getting offered that half-hour, we thought it was a good option for Colin - who is a very aggressive player and hits the ball a long way - to go out and try to get us as close to that point as possible.
‘‘I suppose it’s nice to finish and not leave anything to chance, coming back tomorrow.’’
Williamson also credited Nicholls, who made a fair proportion of his 98 with the tail to give the Black Caps a 65-run lead.
‘‘Those runs were proven quite valuable,’’ said Williamson, who sensed a quick kill was possible once the Bangladeshis were teetering at 100-5 at tea.
‘‘When you have any side five down, perhaps, and the bowlers are firing, then there’s always potential to take a couple more.’’
Williamson acknowledged t was far from a complete performance given five catches were dropped in the slips cordon.
‘‘It’s quite frustrating. The guys have caught really well, there were stats at some point that the slips catches were some of the highest standard going around international cricket.
‘‘It’s one of those things the guys are practicing hard and they do have every good hands despite what we saw in this game.’’
Bangladesh, meanwhile, spilled seven catches, though lax batting was the major factor in the game not going the distance.
Williamson’s counterpart Tamim Iqbal offered a brutal assessment and accepted responsibility for setting a poor example by holing out at deep square leg.
‘‘I think we all took the lazy option. We were not prepared to do the hard job.
‘‘When this kind of situation comes the team expect the leader to show the way and I didn’t. The way I got out was rubbish.
‘‘A few of the shots we played could have been much better. I take full responsibility. I take full blame for that because I started it.’’ Bittersweet was the word on the lips of both the stage two winner and new overall leader of the New Zealand Cycle Classic.
The first rider up Admiral Hill at the end of Monday’s 147.5-kilometre stage was Sam Crome, but the sour taste in his mouth came when his IsoWhey Sports SwissWellness team-mate Tim Roe ended up losing the tour leader’s yellow jersey. ‘‘It’s bittersweet,’’ Crome said. ‘‘I was able to get a stage win for the team but ultimately we want to win the tour. It is what it is, we’ve just got to come out and fight again these next few days.’’
The yellow jersey went to the New Zealand National Team’s James Oram, 10 seconds ahead of Crome, but even he felt a pang of regret after finishing second to Crome by seven seconds on the stage.
‘‘I’m really happy to come away with the yellow, it makes the bittersweet second place a whole lot more worthwhile.’’
Oram, Crome and JLT Condor’s Steve Lampier jumped off the front of the race on the second-to-last climb up Te Wharau Hill, grabbing a 20-second lead over a strong chasing group of about 25 riders.
Oram and Lampier pushed the pace down the descent and up the final climb to the finish, as Crome sat off them with his team-mate in yellow down the road.
Things got cagey in the chasing pack, with a number of attacks being shut down by Blindz Direct’s Hamish Bond, who put in a mighty shift on the front as he attempted to drag his team leader, Michael Torckler, up to the front three.
Bond crashed on stage one, injuring his shoulder, but said the pain would be manageable for the rest of the tour.
His big effort wasn’t enough though, as the leaders maintained their slender lead. When Crome knew Roe wasn’t going to be able to catch them, about 1km from the finish, he attacked Lampier and Oram to claim the stage.
The onus will now fall on the New Zealand team to defend Oram’s lead in the general classification on Tuesday’s comparatively flat third stage, which Oram felt they were more than capable of doing.
‘‘We’ve got a strong team, so as long as we can get the right kind of breakaway up the road we should be able to bring it back and maybe get Luke [Mudgway] or Hamish [Schreurs] up for a good sprint finish.’’
Oram’s other team-mates, Brad Evans and Hayden McCormick, both finished in the top 10 on the stage and sat within one minute of the overall lead.
Earlier, a four-man break of Luke Mudgway (NZ National Team), Nick Reddish (Oliver’s Real Food Racing), Dylan Newberry (Mobius Future) and Morgan Smith (Trust House) spent most of the stage out in front, gaining a lead of more than four minutes at one point.
They were joined by seven other riders, including Crome, Oram and Lampier, before the Limeworks Hill with about 30km to go.
The IsoWhey-led peloton caught the group at the start of the Te Wharau Hill, but those three riders shot clear again in what would be the winning of the stage.