The New Zealand cricket team have an interesting nervous tick or trick. I call it the 'sore tummy' cop out and it has been seen more than once this season already. I first saw this attempted pride-salvaging ploy when they were crushed against South Africa's Proteas earlier this year.

Now, at the start of their English campaign, the Kiwis again seem unable to take their likely hiding like a man and are again finding a list of cop-outs should they be humiliated by England as is 99.9 per cent expected.

'Shane Bond limped off into the sunset and was followed by an amazing list of the battle-weary. I've never witnessed anything quite like it'


At the beginning of the year, the Black Caps toured South Africa. The series had a grudge element as the Proteas felt they had been poorly hosted (as guests on and off the field) in New Zealand the last time they visited their country.

Stephen Fleming, then the Black Cap captain, had manufactured an unlikely series victory over the Proteas in New Zealand and South Africans with elephant memories were lining up the Kiwis for a wee bit of payback for that ill-natured tour.

Sensing a whipping, the Black Caps came armed with a list of excuses for why they were not at their peak. The old 'sore tummy' routine I used in tennis when I was 10 years old and getting an unpleasant hiding, something like my wife with a headache.

Then the Kiwis, as they are now in England, really battled in their pre-series warm-ups and the down-trodden New Zealanders started to unleash their 'pity me' propaganda. They arrived with apparently half the team in slings, the other half, the walking wounded were bravely biting some or other bullet and generally putting up a great show of chivalrous and sporting bird-with-a-broken-wing bravado.

As the series got under way and the Kiwis' whipping intensified, they simply packed their bags and quit. Shane Bond limped off into the sunset and was followed by an amazing list of the battle-weary. I've never witnessed anything quite like it.

Ultimately, Craig Cummings (a late replacement himself) got properly injured by a deadly express ball from Dale Steyn which smashed half of his face. By then the Black Caps were in tatters.

I thought I would never see Daniel Vettori looking so forlorn and I was truly surprised to see the same old face at the advent of their English campaign. The old lost puppy look is back.

I predict the English will hand the Black Caps a proper whipping but that the Kiwis will play their get-out-of-jail-free card and haul out a list of casualties and excuses for their defeat.

Pretty weak Danny boy. It may be a bitter pill, but take it you will.