This always happens: the team joins up for a tour and we are worked really hard up until a couple of days out from the first big game. And it’s been no different here. The amount of time we have been on our feet training in this last week has been more than, I would say, normal and the by-product is that there is a tired set of boys. The bowling coach wants his piece, the fielding and batting work need doing and our physical trainer wants his piece too. The schedule has been tough and it’s not about to get any easier over the next few days.

In the last two days we have played Bangladesh and Ireland in warm-up games. It was Bangladesh down here at Wormsley, where we’ve been training and then up to Derby to the County Ground to play Ireland. Both were good games for different reasons.

The Bangla game was a tight one. We let them get away to a pretty handy start with the bat through some not-so-good bowling, myself guilty of some very good and some very bad; which was also the problem in the Ireland game, but I’ll get to that soon. We pulled it back really nicely through the middle with Dan [Vettori], Nathan, [McCullum] Butts [Butler] and then didn’t do too bad at the death as well.

Continue reading "Warm-ups, aches, and a no-ball"

It’s Friday night and I’m knackered. After playing on Tuesday for Leicestershire against Nottingham, travelling here to just outside of Oxford to join the training camp for the World Twenty20 and training hard the last couple of days, the last thing I could think of is a Friday night out on the juice; well not quite, I could actually go a couple, but they won’t be good for me, so I’ll give them a miss.

Tuesday’s match result did not matter for us in terms of progressing in the FPT competition. We were already out of contention for the semis. Of course we were out there to win, and to do our best to win but it was also a chance to change the team up a little and give a couple of guys a game in either different positions or just be playing. This was my first game back after getting hit in the ribs 10 days ago. I had had a really good bowl in the nets the previous day, which was my first bowl back, and I was surprised at how good I felt and how pain free I was while bowling; that doesn’t happen very often!! Straightaway I felt good at the crease and had that sometimes illusive rhythm. I passed myself fit for next day’s game and was really looking forward to getting back out and playing.

Continue reading "An impressive start heading into World Twenty20"

	The rhythm was back while bowling in the first innings against Gloucestershire © Getty Images

I’ve got a bit of time on my hands at the moment. Playing for Leicestershire in the most recent Championship match (four-day) I got hit in the ribs while batting in the second innings. I’ll come to that in a bit.

So, so far over here I haven’t done as well as I’d have hoped. In my first couple of matches my action wasn’t really there and had to do some work on it during a training session that I managed to squeeze in before this Championship match. I had a good little bowl out in the middle in training, slowed everything down and just concentrated on a strong load-up and release. My run-up rhythm came quickly and then all of a sudden I was hitting the catcher’s glove hard from a nice length. It had come back to me and I had learnt some more about where my action needs to be and how to get it there when it falls over.

We turned up to the ground in Bristol, where Gloucestershire are based, to a pleasant surprise. I had been told of the cold and somewhat dank changing rooms that were on offer there; we were very happy to get use of the new changing rooms. They were fantastic, comfortable and easily a large enough area for an international team; a couple of very good baths for either hot or cold baths. Nice work Glos!

Continue reading "Rib injuries, and a loss in the Championship"

Well, it’s cold here right now. I’m at home in England, on the couch about to pack and drive to Bristol for the start of tomorrow’s Championship match vs Gloucestershire. I’ve been over here for two weeks now after a few extra days back in New Zealand waiting on my passport to come back with a visa entry stamp in it to come and play for Leicestershire.

I must, again, thank the good guys at Post Haste for helping me out a whole heap. My passport had to go to Canberra, Australia, to get the visa. I knew that as soon as it came back into NZ on its way back to me the ‘track and trace’ number that I could watch online would be activated. So as soon as it landed and was in the Post Haste system, I was on to them to get it to me ASAP. The last week I was back in NZ I was never far from a computer so that I could check to see if it had got back to Auckland on its way back to me in Wellington. I had also been changing my flights, almost every day, hoping the passport would turn up. So, at 3.45pm, a couple of Tuesdays ago, I saw, online, my passport had reached Auckland. If I was to get out that day I would need to:

a) somehow pick it up in Auckland as it wasn’t going to make it to Wellington in time
b) change my flight and hope that there was a seat available.

So that was one nervous, stressful and in the end a successful afternoon. Flights changed, that was the easy bit. Picking up the passport that was going to take some magic, and somehow the planets aligned and it worked out! Again, Post Haste, Jimmy Sales, Phil and the others who helped out, an massive thank you from me and of course my wife.

Continue reading "Joining the lads at Leicestershire"