Frustrated Fleming heads home
From Stuff, 17 November 2003
MUMBAI: New Zealand cricket captain Stephen Fleming
boarded the plane home today, resigned to a period on
the sidelines and frustrated with the past eight weeks.
Fleming and medical staff decided against a patch-up
job on his abdominal strain in favour of an assessment
by New Zealand Cricket's (NZC) doctor Rob Campbell in
Christchurch.
It means he will miss the tour of Pakistan which was
still in limbo today.
A largely silent NZC again held off until tomorrow
with their decision on whether the tour would go ahead
after an anonymous email threat to the team.
Fleming followed 12 hours after team-mates Craig McMillan,
Scott Styris, Lou Vincent and Ian Butler, who all opted
out of the Pakistan tour last week, left for home.
The captain said just before departure that there was
still no diagnosis on the injury and he was non-committal
about when he would be back.
"I just want to get it sorted, and that's the best
thing for the team, and have a definite course of action,"
said Fleming, whose only other major injury was a groin
problem which required surgery and kept him out for
six weeks in 1999.
"It's been simmering for three weeks and progressively
got worse, and hasn't responded to treatment which suggests
it's something more serious than just muscular."
He left the remaining nine players plus management
bunkered down in Mumbai awaiting word from NZC who were
updating them each day.
"They're looking forward to a resolution but I'm leaving
them in good shape. They appreciate the importance of
the decision."
DISAPPOINTED
After all the build-up to the tour of India, still
a frontier New Zealand are yet to conquer in terms of
a test series win, Fleming left disappointed.
The results were only mediocre, with two drawn tests
although a points victory in Mohali, then just one win
and four losses in the TVS Cup tri-series.
"There was frustration, sort of nearly all the way
through. It's disappointing because I could have played
a bigger part," said Fleming whose top score was 40
in nine innings.
"I think the test series was great. We could have scored
a little bit quicker in the second test to set up a
win but it was basically the blueprint of how we wanted
to play it.
"We've still got problems with the one-dayers and we're
looking forward to John Bracewell's input. He's done
it very well with Gloucestershire."
Fleming said his batting problems were mental rather
than physical.
He felt "a million dollars" with the bat but maybe
got too far ahead of himself in wanting to dominate
the bowling.
The success stories of the tour were Styris, McMillan
and paceman Daryl Tuffey who all enhanced their reputation.
Styris scored his second test century in Mohali, put
in a match-winning allround effort against India in
Cuttack and notched his third consecutive half-century
in the 145-run hiding by India on Saturday.
McMillan made a triumphant return with 237 runs in
the test series and a classy 82 not out in Cuttack while
Tuffey showed he could bowl in all conditions with a
seven-wicket haul in Mohali and 11 tri-series wickets
at 24 runs apiece.
The top-order batting though was a big concern with
Chris Nevin and Lou Vincent a worry in the one-day arena,
while the struggling Chris Harris was again promoted
unsuccessfully to No 3.
Death bowling was also a problem, with Jacob Oram,
Tuffey and Daniel Vettori all taking stick late in the
innings.
"They're pretty disappointed. It goes back to the game
against Australia in Pune where we let it slip. Every
loss we had started to sit a little bit heavy as the
tour went on," Fleming said.
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