Quote Originally Posted by Old Manus View Post
The kiwis need to take advantage of this recent turn of actually being a force in international cricket as I genuinely can't remember the last time they were a serious cup-winning prospect (were they ever?). I'm surprising myself thinking about them like this. How can a country of a few hundred people and their dogs - who all prefer rugby anyway - suddenly spawn a swashbuckling team while England are perennially rubbish?

It's not like these are EXCITING NEW PLAYERS either. Dan Vettori and McCullum have been around for donkey's years, as have the likes of Taylor, Ronchi and Southee. trout's crazy.
Williamson has been our best batsman in recent times, and is fast chopping up records to become fastest New Zealander to reach x number of runs on a somewhat regular basis. Boult is snapping up wickets pretty swiftly, Anderson is picking up wickets while continuing his McCullum-like strategy with the bat, Elliott has returned to the side effectively, Guptill is actually capable of being an opener that doesn't get bowled out first over every single innings. Basically we just have a lot of players at the top of their game lately, there's always someone who will contribute effectively.

Well, unless we're playing Scotland, apparently. xD Watched up 'til McCullum got out and then fell asleep, woke up to find out we struggled to win in the end. Happy that Scotland competed, though!