Black Caps can now move on, Ryder-less

SO THAT’S it, then. Jesse Ryder will not be playing at the World Cup. There’s probably no-one more relieved than Ryder himself.

If there was anything positive to emerge from Ryder’s latest selfsabotage, it’s that the Black Caps can move on without him and he can return to domestic cricket and Twenty20 slogathons, assuming the Melbourne Renegades still want him next month.

Not many people know Ryder well but those who do saw his Friday drinking and Saturday noshow at Dunedin airport coming a mile off.

He was five days out from leaving for Dubai with New Zealand A in a trial run for selection in the World Cup 30.

The spotlight was intensifying. He gave a half-hearted press conference in Hamilton three weeks ago which hardly suggested a man desperate to play on the biggest stage of all.

The pattern is now clear. When things get intense, Ryder heads to the bar and goes missing. He has his demons to conquer, and the fishbowl of the next four months would have been the worst possible place to do it.

By the way, what was Otago Cricket thinking having a social golf day mid-season?

Its chief executive Ross Dykes is a good man and sees the good in Ryder, too, but he must realise Ryder needs a better support network on hand, not just a mental skills coach, if he continues to employ the troubled batsman.

Ryder also has to want to allow people to help him if he can ever return to the Black Caps. He’s gone through two managers since February.

New Zealand Cricket has egg on its face, too.

Coach Mike Hesson and captain Brendon McCullum looked reporters squarely in the eye and made it clear Ryder was not ready for an international return.

He had to prove he was a team man, adhere to protocols and not provide a distraction or unwanted headlines.

Most of all he had to show them he was desperate to play for his country again. It was a hardline but not unreasonable stance and they stuck to it admirably.

THEN Ryder blasted a rapid century against Ireland, New Zealand’s top order struggled against South Africa and the public bandwagon creaked under the strain of the jumpers.

Suddenly Hesson opened the door further and Ryder was in the NZ A team.

It’s hard to escape the conclusion that pressure from above, perhaps as high as chief executive David White’s office, was applied.

Ryder is NZC’s most marketable and problematic asset, and would have brought the punters in to those endless January ODIs before the big show.

He’s a regular matchwinner at domestic level, but for New Zealand it’s been some time since he showed those qualities. It wasn’t worth the risk.

Now it’s a moot point. Ryder has made things easier for everyone, including himself.