Black Caps turn to Bond
Shane Bond is relishing being back in the Black Caps environment and is hoping the knowledge he has gained from coaching for Mumbai Indians in the IPL will be of use over the next three weeks.
When head coach Gary Stead took charge of the team in 2018, he signalled he would look to bring specialist help on board for major Twenty20 tournaments and in adding Bond, who he’s worked with extensively in the past, for this month’s T20 World Cup, he’s done just that.
The former speedster has learned plenty about the art of spin from his time in the Indian Premier League and is mostly focused on that.
However, he is keen to help in whatever way he can – as was Stephen Fleming, who joined the team for a few days last week after winning the IPL with Chennai Super Kings.
Both Bond and Fleming also have plenty of recent experience preparing for the venues in the United Arab Emirates the Black Caps are set to play at, with Sharjah – the site of their opener against Pakistan (first ball, 3am Wednesday NZ time) – the one attracting the most attention.
‘‘Generally in T20 cricket, you want to get a decent start, but it’s about wickets in hand at the back end to accelerate through the last six or seven overs,’’ Bond said.
‘‘In Sharjah for the back half of the IPL, and even in the game yesterday [between Ireland and Namibia], the bulk of the run scoring is done up front and so it’s a very different tactical way to go.
‘‘You’re almost trying to defend the power play, because as the ball gets older, it can be very, very tough to score, so rather than looking at 10 or 12 an over in the last five overs, you might be looking at seven or eight an over, and if you can grind it out to 150, then you’ve got a competitive score.
‘‘How you use your batting lineup and the bowling makeup and the types of bowlers you use there are important as well. All those things were up for discussion in our meetings.’’
Scoring plenty of runs in the power play on pitches that were slow and kept low was crucial at Sharjah in the IPL, with nine of the 10 teams that scored more runs in the first overs going on to win.
Namibia went against that trend in upsetting Ireland, however, and are now in the Black Caps’ group, alongside Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, and fellow ICC associate member Scotland.
Bangladesh and Sri Lanka qualified for the other group, which now consists of six testplaying nations, so things have arguably worked out well for the Black Caps.
But as Bond noted, there’s no chance of them under-estimating Scotland, who they face in Abu Dhabi in their third match, or Namibia, who they face back in Sharjah in their fourth.