NEW ZEALAND TOUR OF AUSTRALIA, 2019-20 New Zealand's love for the shadow - The uncomfortable truth Bharat Sundaresan Share Tweet

Kane Williamson & Co. produced the worst collective performance ever recorded by a New Zealand team in a three-match Test series ©AFP

Do New Zealand play their best Test cricket only when nobody's watching? At the outset, it might seem like quite a radical, even ludicrous, statement. You might even want to scoff at it. But hang on. There might be some uncomfortable truth to it. Let's just look at some facts and figures first.

To start with, every neutral fan's favourite team in the world have not just been humbled and whitewashed over the last four weeks or so, they have been completely shredded to bits. While losing all three Tests within four days, they weren't just poor or disappointing. They were appalling. The post-mortem of the disaster reveals some grave and gory details about just how bad New Zealand's abject surrender was. Now for the numbers.

Kane Williamson & Co. have after all just produced the worst collective performance ever recorded by a New Zealand team in a three-match Test series. The 1117 runs they scored together across six innings might be the fifth-lowest behind the 956 at home against the West Indies in 2006, 1039 in England in 1969, 1083 in England in 1931 and 1103 in Pakistan in 1955. But all those other series either had matches that were badly affected by weather, even washed out, and/or included a draw. Unlike this time, where across Perth, Melbourne and Sydney, they were bowled out each time on both occasions.

In contrast, this was the seventh fewest number of deliveries (2341 in all) an Australian bowling attack had needed to bundle out their opposition, home and away, in the 140+ years they've been playing Test cricket. It really was that easy. It was their lowest count since they destroyed Pakistan in the UAE in 2002. Like with New Zealand this time around, the Glenn McGrath-led bowling attack was only made to use the second new-ball once in that series. Just for the record, it was a young Pakistani batting line-up in a state of flux and McGrath was partnering with Shane Warne, Jason Gillespie and Brett Lee. And the other aforementioned series came during a time New Zealand were still considered a minnow in the Test world - at least in terms of results.

The Kiwis though had crossed the ditch and arrived in Perth back in mid-December as the No. 2 ranked Test team in the world to face a team who by the way were ranked No. 5. And we aren't talking in terms of the still slapdash-sounding World Test Championship points but based on the traditional points system that teams have been graded on in the oldest format. So how did they climb up the ladder without not many but the most hardcore of Test cricket fans noticing their rise?

To start with, they had lost only one series - to South Africa at home in early 2017 - in over three years. They'd also won 8 out of the 10 series they'd played in, 7 of which had come at home, including two against England. They'd also managed to breach Pakistan's fortress in the UAE by winning 2-1 and even drawn a series in Sri Lanka with a victory in Colombo. Though this isn't to take anything away from their achievement, their ascent during a period when they didn't face Australia or India, home or away, and didn't have to tour South Africa. The three teams basically, who they simply haven't managed to compete against or even push to any great extent in recent years. The numbers again are rather glaring.

Since 2010 (including current the rout Down Under), the Kiwis have faced their three bugbear opponents in 32 Tests and won only twice - one each against India and Australia and none against the South Africans - while losing 21 times, both home and away. While Test cricket in general does have rather skewed head-to-heads when it comes to teams' records away from their backyard, New Zealand's record are nothing short of staggering, especially as a team that travelled across the Tasman ranked one spot from the top. For a team so reliant on their resilience and grit, they also tend to suffer some of their worst collapses - as we've seen here in Australia - as a batting unit when having to face their scourges. Is it just a case then of a team suffering from a brain-freeze when put on the bigger stage in terms of visibility from a cricketing sense that they often fail to even look competitive? To their credit, they have unlike India and Australia - before they did so in 2019 - managed to draw a series in England during that period.

Neil Wagner ended up recording the second-most number of deliveries in a three-match series Down Under for New Zealand behind Richard Hadlee ©AFP

It would only have been the very optimistic who'd have given the Kiwis a chance to not lose the series, forget win, against Tim Paine's bowling arsenal in particular. They were up against a home team buoyed by the return of their star players and also greatly reinforced by the emergence of a new batting sensation. Not to forget a bowling attack that as a collective is by far the best in the world, especially on Australian soil. But the least you'd have expected from a team with New Zealand's credentials was to at least show up for the contest at some stage. The deja vu feel to their inept batting displays, right up to the one at the SCG on Monday (January 6) though only amplified their complete lack of fight, and at times their calibre.

It wasn't easy, or even fair perhaps, that they had to start their tour with a pink-ball Test in Perth, having finished playing a Test against England at home with a conventional red-ball a week earlier. They weren't the first opposition team either to be caught napping by a fired-up Aussie pace attack and a wily Nathan Lyon on a bouncy yet up-and-down Perth pitch, that too with just two nets sessions as practice. But they then had 10 days between then and their return to Boxing Day after a 32-year hiatus to make up for that early loss. It didn't help that they lost one day of their two-day practice game in Melbourne either. There were also the injuries - from missing Trent Boult in Perth and losing Lockie Ferguson early doors on his debut to having six of their main players being ruled out of the final Test.

The bowlers were honest - bowling on 11 out of the 12 days - and kept running in regardless of the situation right up to their final delivery on what turned out to be the final afternoon of the series. Neil Wagner ended up recording the second-most number of deliveries in a three-match series Down Under for New Zealand behind Richard Hadlee. But in the end as the Aussies kept comfortably going past 400, you couldn't help but wonder how sustainable the Kiwi model of bowling long spells and playing the long game was, especially in a summer where they have three high-profile series to contend with. It was no surprise that they chose to go without the services of Tim Southee in Sydney, considering the workload he's managed already.

The collapse in the first innings at the MCG if anything exposed how out of depth they were against an opposition of this quality in conditions of this nature. Of all 6 of their batting surrenders, that was probably the most disheartening, considering it transpired on a pitch which didn't seem to have any demons on it, and on which Australia had piled on 467 without one of David Warner, Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne getting a century. It also came in front of a packed MCG crowd that was primarily Kiwi and completely behind the visitors. This was their chance to headline the centre-stage event in the Test cricket calendar, and they froze, not for the first time. By filling up the MCG with record numbers, the Kiwis showed that they could bring a lot of people in to watch them play. But like we've seen, they just didn't seem good enough to play their best cricket with all eyes on them.

Does that mean they're better off playing in the shadows? Maybe not, even if it does seem to bring out the best in them.

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