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Kiwi pride at stake

Mohammad Isam
Even though New Zealand decided yesterday to go quiet on the media front, their message was loud and clear: all we want to do is practice for the fourth one-dayer.
The team ranked three places above Bangladesh in the ICC ODI rankings has faced a
torrid time dealing with the turning ball on the tour. It was no surprise then, to see the New Zealanders lining up trainers chucking left-handed off-spin at their batsmen in the nets ahead of the crucial game.
The Kiwis have conceded 15 of the 18 wickets to fall in the series to the Tigers' spin attack. Only Abdur Razzak has a 50-plus average against the Kiwis but Shakib Al Hasan has a much better average and strike-rate against them and has so far taken six wickets in the two matches of the series. And Sohrawardi Shuvo too came to the party with a stunning 3-14 to win the man-of-the-match award.
With countering the spin affect at the forefront of their plans, the visitors split themselves in groups yesterday at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium with most of the focus going to the nets where three batsmen batted simultaneously.
Unfortunately for them though, there wasn’t much spin happening apart from Nathan McCullum, Daniel Vettori and a few part-timers within the squad. Then there were the coaching staffs trying to replicate a left-arm spinner's arm-action by throwing off-spinning deliveries. It is an old practice to play pitched up spin thrown at the batsmen by trainers from a short
distance (half a pitch's length), but the Kiwis tried it differently with the deliveries thrown from the popping crease.
If that didn't help, the local hospitality as far as the cricket was concerned, was of a really low standard.
Among the local bowlers provided to the visiting team, there was only one left-armer and even he looked like he was forced to bowl that way, his deliveries hardly making it as far as the batsman on several occasions. Clearly, it wasn't a satisfying hit for anybody.
The local authorities ostensibly erred by sending a lot of slow bowlers, particularly left-armers, to the Indian and Sri Lankan nets earlier this year.
The England coaching staff too had demanded at least four left-arm spinners during their trip here in March but it was coolly avoided as they were mostly given right-arm off-spinners for their net sessions.
New Zealand didn't look flustered, but it had to be exasperating as they tried hard to imitate what would happen in the centre in a do-or-die game for them.
Against lower-ranked teams over the years, they have been dominated on most occasions, only conceding two series defeats in 2000-01 against Zimbabwe, stillaprettydecentside then.
But never before have they conceded a series lead against Bangladesh, let alone faced the prospect of losing a series. In 16 matches before the series began, they had dominated their encounters but the last two games have made it 16-3 and they have also been shut out for their lowest score (173 all out) against Bangladesh.Only Vettori and the rest of the New Zealand players could have said how difficult it has been for them in the last two weeks, but they decided to stay clear of making any statements and prepared for probably one of their toughest games in recent memory.