Disappointed by his team’s poor showing in the first two ODIs against India, New Zealand coach Gary Stead has said that the biggest challenge for the hosts is to build partnerships at the top of the order.
India thrashed New Zealand by 90 runs in the second ODI at Bay Oval to take a 2-0 lead in the five-match series. Wrist spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal one again joined forces to trouble the opposition batsmen. While Kuldeep finished with 4 for 45, Chahal ended with 2 for 52 as the Black Caps were dismissed for 234 in reply to India's 324 for 4.
"It (performance) has improved slightly but obviously not a polished performance from us," Stead told reporters after the second ODI.
"They batted well and I was thinking it could have been 350 plus. So I am pleased with the back end bowling performance there. In the end, the work Bracewell put in was a promising sign but it wasn't a complete performance by any means."
New Zealand failed to build a partnership at the top with No.8 batsman Doug Bracewell (57) sharing 58 runs with No.10 Lockie Furgusen.
"We haven't build partnership across the top 6-7, which was the strength of what we did so well against Sri Lanka and what we haven't clicked or done here yet. As a batting unit, that is going to be our challenge going into the next three games, to build those partnership," the coach said.
"Our guys know that you can't rely on lower order to win games, its got to be the top order to score the majority of the runs, we haven't done that as yet in the two games. I still have faith in our squad, we are still in someway experimenting, trying to work our what is our best XI is, and it is an ongoing thing, it will slightly change with the conditions as well," he added.
Talking about the Kiwi batsmen’s struggle against the wrist spinners, Stead said: "We didn't have the partnerships, it is not that we can't play spin bowling, it is just that we have taken some options which haven't been the best option at times. Look, I have faith on our guys. We played spin very well against Sri Lanka, so it is not like we can't, it is just that we haven't done it as effectively here."
"The two wrist spinners that they have here are very effective spinners. Our challenge is to find a way to be better. But look we wanted to be with the run-rate, in terms of the target we set ourself, it is the wicket that hurt us so we have to find a way to minimise that specially in the first 30 overs," he explained.
With the 2019 World Cup is around the corner, Stead said they are trying to find the right combination.
"The World Cup is still secondary. We want to win this series first and foremost. We are just still working on what we think is our best 11 and how to balance the team with right number of all-rounders, batsman and bowlers, we are still working on that. But to be perfectly honest is secondary thing for me at the moment, it is still about working out in this series what we need to do to win three on a row now,” he concluded.
(With PTI inputs)
