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Taylor retires hurt

Taylor retires hurt

01/26/2012 10:27:14 PM

UPDATE: New Zealand captain Ross Taylor's hopes of seeing the side to 450 and beyond in the first Test against Zimbabwe in Napier suffered a setback on Friday morning when he suffered a calf injury.

Taylor was on 122 when he drove a ball and set off for a run only to pull up and limp his way through to the bowler's end.

He immediately walked from the pitch and sought medical aid, and left the field soon after. New Zealand were 365-5 at the time, 10 overs into the second morning's play.

Overnight batsman BJ Watling had advanced to 37 not out and was joined by Doug Bracewell who was dropped after scoring two.


On the first day Taylor believes the team will need a score of 450 minimum to give themselves the best chance of winning the Test.

New Zealand ended the first day on 331-5 with the skipper on 111 not out.

"It's a pretty fast scoring outfield but they set some defensive fields so we'll need to see through this new ball early on tomorrow morning and hopefully, if we're still batting after lunch we'll be around that 400-450 mark," he said.

"The first hour tomorrow will be crucial because we have Douggie [Bracewell] and Timmy [Southee] to come, they like to play their shots and if we can keep them with the older ball it will be good.

"The biggest thing on that wicket and playing Test cricket is your first 20-30 balls and I think more often than not we did that pretty well," he said.

The pitch was different to anything he had experienced at his home ground before, the bounce wasn't as much as he expected but it was still true and there was reward for shots off the back foot.

"I find on New Zealand wickets, and in Australia especially, driving early on I get myself in trouble and today I tried to get myself in with those first 20-30 balls and I felt like I did that," he said.

That meant playing off the back foot and cutting the ball as much as possible and leave the driving until the ball was really full.

It was satisfying as a captain to score the century, that was what batsmen wanted to do and while he had scored a lot of 50s he was conscious his conversion rate wasn't the best. With so much of his Test career still in front of him he would be looking to achieve a better conversion rate.

Taylor confirmed that he would still have asked Zimbabwe to bat first had he won the toss, although the New Zealanders would have had to bowl well. Putting the opposition in needed to result in three or four wickets in the first session to make it worthwhile -Zimbabwe got none.

"We batted pretty well in that first hour and negated any momentum Zimbabwe may have had if they got any early wickets," he said.

New Zealand's bowlers would like to pitch the ball up and try to swing it to fully test the Zimbabwean batsmen's techniques.

"Obviously our four quicks still have to bowl well. That will be the first plan, but hopefully we'll still be batting for a while.

Taylor said he thought there was still some moisture in the pitch and that day three would see at its batting optimum.

 
Photograph Copyright : Getty Images

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