The 12 Things New Zealand Cricket Must Do Immediately To Fix This Mess

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Shame, shame, shame on you New Zealand Cricket. Fine, if Ross Taylor's captaincy isn't working, then privately figure out a way forward. Maybe give him until the end of the season to turn things around. Maybe look at the root causes of why we are losing and why there are the rumoured factions amongst teammates. But at the very least give our finest player a bit of respect.

It needs to be noted that Chris Moller the chairman, David White the CEO and Mike Hesson the coach have not publicly made any supportive comments (even for his role purely as a player) of Ross Taylor these past couple of weeks. Indeed Moller went so far as to publicly refuse to back Taylor on the eve of a test match! Which as we know, we won, thanks in no small part to Taylor.

The inability of the men in the New Zealand Cricket hierarchy to employ basic commonsense and decency is the real reason this team has underperformed in recent years. Even when things have been relatively good, like they were for much of the Stephen Fleming years, management still felt the need to meddle. It's as if a small player pool isn't a large enough hurdle so they decide to add things to the mix like encouraging our best players to retire early (Fleming, Astle, Cairns), holding presidential-style captaincy campaigns to ensure the team is split long after the captain is chosen and employing senior members of staff who are so chalk and cheese in their methods (Buchanan and Wright) even a five year old would know they wouldn't get along.

And that doesn't even go into the Shane Bond in India fiasco, the forgetting to get Allan Donald's signature on the dotted line as bowling coach tomfoolery, nor the "let's bat our best limited overs opener at 3 in limited overs and open with him in tests even though everyone knows he should bat at 5" roughhousing. Nor why Vettori, as the best ODI bowler in the world, retired from that format and not tests. So it's frustrating, because I can actually look at our best 11 players and feel optimistic; there is some genuine talent there. In that quick bowling attack alone (Southee, Boult, Bracewell) you can see a very positive future. But this is what needs to happen:

• Coach Mike Hesson must be sacked for bringing the game into disrepute and potentially jeopardizing the career of our best player. They are allowed to relieve Taylor of the captaincy, but they could not have gone about this in a more amateur, destructive and downright rude way.
• Appoint John Buchanan as coach. He is already on the payroll and has a cracking CV and given that not many good candidates would apply anyway, give him the job. UNLESS...and here is another New Zealand Cricket mistake from years gone by, they can lure fellow Aussie Steve Rixon back. I say "mistake" because Rixon said several times he would love to coach the Black Caps again, but he would need to be approached. No-one approached him - a massive shame because his results as coach speak for themselves.
• Keep Taylor on as captain, but have an end of season review.
• In ODIs and T20s, ALWAYS open with McCullum and Guptill.
• In tests McCullum should bat at 5 or 6.
• Wicketkeeper Kruger Van Wyk is almost 33 and with an sub-standard international record. BJ Watling is 10 years younger and with a good international record. Swap the two.
• Taylor is our best batsman and must bat at 4 in all forms of the game. No more having him bat at 6 in T20s to preserve the dubious advantage a left-hand / right-hand combo gives you.
• Williamson needs to know his place in the team and should be locked in at 3 rather than as a floater.
• Jesse Ryder needs a reintroduction plan.
• Vettori should be encouraged to play ODIs again and allowed himself to make a decision on his test future. 
• Crucially, the team needs to sit down and come clean about the mistakes of the Justin Vaughan era. Lay it all on the table; understand how they went wrong and by that, understand how not to make those mistakes in the future.
• Just as crucially, the NZC board need to start taking some management courses and reading some management books. Clearly the combination of gut, ego, dumbarsery and "my way or the highway" isn't working. Employ people with good people skills. It's not rocket science.

I don't know Ross Taylor personally at all and I have no contact with him. But Ross if you read this, the storm will pass and things will one day get better - they have to. And if it all goes to plan, over the next 10 years we will see you firmly established as one of the two best batsman in New Zealand cricket history. All the best!