Zimbabwe gets ready for triangular series
ZIMBABWE's busy England tour continues with the ongoing four-day Vodafone Challenge Series match against Gloucestershire at Gloucester
Itayi Viriri
18-Jun-2000
ZIMBABWE's busy England tour continues with the ongoing four-day
Vodafone Challenge Series match against Gloucestershire at
Gloucester.
The match comes as a perfect warm up for the forthcoming
triangular series that will also include England and the West
Indies. The Gloucester match comes hard on the heels of
Zimbabwe's credible performance against the West Indies in a
drawn three-day match, raising hope that at least there is light
at the end of the tunnel.
Zimbabwe's performances in the matches they have played after the
two Test series against England, have shown vast improvement and
Andy Flower and his side lookset to play better cricket in the
triangular series.
Murray Goodwin is now in fine form after hitting successive
centuries in the second Test and the match against the Windies
and all he needs now is partners who will be able to hold the
innings together with him and Zimbabwe might come back from the
tour with something to show for their three month excursion. He
might get that support from the other batsmen also regaining some
good form, such as allrounder, Guy Whittall, skipper, Andy Flower
and the dependable Neil Johnson.
The Trent Bridge Test also showed that the Zimbabwean selectors
should not hesitate to throw young talent in the fray with the
performance of Test debutant, Mluleki Nkala. Nkala was named in
the one-day squad for the series. The 19-year-old seamer took
five wickets in that Test repaying skipper, Andy Flower's faith
in throwing him into the starting side. Coach Andy Pycroft, also
the convenor of selectors, may be forced to introduce more young
players as some of the established players have lost form and in
particular, opener Grant Flower, and former captain, Alistair
Campbell. Flower's form is now a cause for concern with his
series of below par performances with the bat, dating back to
late last year. In the second Test, he came up with a duck, in
the first innings before scoring 12 in the second. In fact,
brother, Andy should consider dropping him further down the order
or perhaps giving him time off. Strange enough for Campbell, his
performances in warm up matches have been good with the
ex-skipper scoring some centuries, only to fizzle out in the
Tests.
However, the overall performance of the side has vastly improved
with the bowlers complementing the batting performance of
Goodwin, Johnson and Andy Flower.
Many local cricket fans will be hoping that this current form
continues into July, and only then can Zimbabwe acquit itself
well when it faces hosts, England and the West Indies in the
series starting on July 6.