Stead wary of threat from Stokes’ England
A new coach and a new captain will make England more of a threat, says Gary Stead.
The Black Caps coach, dealing with the possible major blow of a serious injury for key middleorder bat Henry Nicholls ahead of the upcoming three-test series, said he’s not expecting the hosts to be the team in disarray they’ve been over the past 12 months.
New Zealand’s opponents will have a new test leader in allrounder
Ben Stokes, while it remains unknown if England will have appointed a new coach by the time the first test begins at Lord’s on June 2.
However, Stead rejected any notion that England – winless in their last nine test matches – will be vulnerable next month.
‘‘Probably the opposite,’’ Stead said. ‘‘I see them being more of a threat, to be honest.
‘‘Whenever that happens, you usually see a bit of an immediate lift around the performance of the team who want to prove things, I guess, to the new leaders of the group.
‘‘I expect Ben Stokes will add a little bit of steel to their group and I think they’ll be a real challenge.’’
Stead’s main current concern will be the availability of Nicholls, who was due to have an MRI scan on his injured right calf yesterday, with results known today.
Should the experienced lefthander, who averages 40.38 from 46 tests, be ruled out of the initial part of the tour or all three tests, Daryl Mitchell looms as the logical batting replacement while Rachin Ravindra could be utilised as an allrounder with his left-arm spin.
Some of the New Zealand-based squad of 20 have suffered from Covid-19 in recent months, which has slightly hindered the tour buildup.
There are five members of the Black Caps squad playing in the IPL – captain Kane Williamson, Tim Southee, Trent Boult, Devon Conway and Mitchell – and Stead said they may be slotted into the two scheduled four-day warmup games before the first test at various times depending on availability.
‘‘The warmup games are not pure first-class games, you can play more than 11 [players] during the games. If guys come a little bit later, they may be able to play day three, day four.’’
The Black Caps will likely need a clean sweep of the three tests to stay in contention to defend their World Test Championship crown, something Stead described as ‘‘no different to what we would normally approach’’.
‘‘It’s about going out and trying to win every game of cricket and if things go our way then we’ll give ourselves that chance.’’
New Zealand Cricket yesterday also announced an extended coaching group for their winter tours, which extends a couple of months after the England series in Ireland (three ODIs and three T20Is), Scotland (two T20Is, one ODI), the Netherlands (two T20Is) and the West Indies (three T20Is, three ODIs).
Dion Ebrahim, Dean Brownlie, Graeme Aldridge and Luke Wright will all feature, as player and support staff wellbeing continues to be prioritised.
Former Zimbabwe international Ebrahim, who took over at the Otago Volts prior to last season, will join Stead, Shane Jurgensen (bowling) and Luke Ronchi (batting) for the test tour of England.
Jurgensen will then lead the tour to Ireland with support from Ronchi and former England international Wright.
Jurgensen and Ronchi will depart for home post-Ireland, with Stead returning and joined by Aldridge (bowling) and Brownlie (batting) for Scotland, the Netherlands and the West Indies, with Wright also assisting for the first two of those.
’’Like we do with the players, spreading the workload out and making sure at certain times of the year we have fresh staff as well as fresh players,’’ Stead said.