Beaten Tall Blacks must move on quickly
and dangerous late swing. A veteran of the West Indies side, Roach will back himself to succeed in New Zealand conditions, having been the team’s leading wicket taker in the English tests, capturing 11 at 29.81. His quality was evident, taking career-best figures of 10-146 for the match against Australia at Port of Spain in 2012, but the game ended in a draw.
Devendra Bishoo
Age: 32. Record: 28 tests, 102 wickets at 36.01.
Legspinner Bishoo was the side’s standout bowler in last month’s away series victory over Zimbabwe, nabbing a team-best 13 wickets in the two tests. Bishoo spun the West Indies to a rare away win in the first test in Bulawayo, snaring 9-184 for the match. Did his best Shane Warne impression, delivering what some dubbed the ‘‘ball of the 21st century’’ to bowl former Australian wicketkeeper Brad Haddin during a test in Dominica in 2015, where it pitched on leg and turned sharply past him crashing into the top of his off stump.
❚ The West Indies open their tour with a three-day match against New Zealand A, starting at Lincoln today. Welcome to regular, high-level international basketball, New Zealand.
Any thought of the Tall Blacks strolling through World Cup qualifying in the Asia zone were quickly extinguished on Thursday night in Wellington as South Korea beat New Zealand 86-80.
Tall Blacks coach Paul Henare said he got the sense people thought these games against Korea, as well as Hong Kong and China, in group A of qualifying would be easy, but Thursday night’s game showed they were wide of the mark.
‘‘I think in general people just thought we would come in and roll Korea because the knowledge of worldwide basketball is not great in this country and I think the way they played proved they’re a helluva team. They shoot the ball at a great clip and they play to their strengths really well.’’
Korea shot 50 per cent overall as well as from three-pointers as New Zealand’s defence let them down the most.
‘‘We got beat by a very good team,’’ Henare said.
‘‘We spoke about certain things, we knew what we were going to face, a very good, well-drilled team that executes all the way down the stretch. Towards the end we were able to put points on the board finally, but the last three or four defensive possessions we gave up buckets.’’
His side haven’t got long to dwell on the loss, with a game against Hong Kong on Sunday night. They fly out last night for that, with Henare saying the 24 hours after the Korea game would be the most important as to how they shaped up physically for that game.
‘‘We’re going to spend the day here [Wellington] getting the minds and bodies right and it’s a quick turnaround before we play again.’’
While the loss against Korea doesn’t hurt New Zealand’s chances of making the next round of qualifying too much - three of the four teams make it through too many more losses will start to count against them given points are carried through to the second round.