CRICKET: Australia continue their ODI domination

ANENDRA SINGH | 8th March 2010

White Fern Sara McGlashan is lost for words.

Like many cricket fans, she is struggling to explain why the New Zealand women's representative team haven't won a single limited-over match against the Australian Stars in the home-and-away Rose Bowl Series.

The Stars yesterday clinched another 3-0 whitewash at Queen's Park, Invercargill, on the heels of a 4-0 clean sweep in Australia last month.

Conversely, the White Ferns have clinched outright the Twenty20 bragging rights with a 3-0 win across the Tasman and 2-nil here.

Nevertheless, they didn't have a show in wresting the Rose Bowl off the Aussies when both the T20 and one-day internationals successes were tallied up.

Yesterday Aussie bowler Lisa Sthalekar claimed a five-wicket bag in the final ODI as the tourists beat the Kiwis six wickets to etch their name on the silverware with a 3-2 series win.

The spinner claimed the prized scalp of Central Districts Hinds batsman McGlashan (pictured), who top scored with 46, before snaring the wickets of the remaining four batsmen for a premature 173 all out with 36 balls to spare.

The Australians eclipsed that total with 174-4 in 37.2 overs despite season's rookie, Kate Broadmore, of CD, snaring Saturday's century maker Shelley Nitschke for just six runs.

On Saturday, The Ferns had a respectable 255-8 with Amy Satterthwaite (81 runs) and Suzie Bates (61) providing the platform but the bowlers, including the Bay's Abby Burrows, came up short bar skipper Aimee Mason in their six-wicket defeat.

The Ferns' innings was characteristic of the hosts' lack of stickability on the batting crease.

Asked what exactly was the problem, McGlashan was bereft of ideas but was convinced it wasn't Sthalekar.

"I don't want to take the gloss off her bowling but they were soft dismissals," said the Hawke's Bay player based in Christchurch, lamenting the lack of commitment from the Ferns to establish meaningful partnerships.

"We haven't had a game where we've had a complete performance with both the bat and the ball."

Pressed further as to why so late into the season, McGlashan replied: "Who knows, if we knew I suppose we wouldn't have lost 7-nil."

The New Zealand players, she felt, needed to take a hard look at themselves while preparing in winter.

Their immediate focus was now on the Twenty20 World Cup in the West Indies in May with a squad of 30 players, comprising mostly the crop of Emerging players, who will be culled to a travelling 15 for a camp mid-next month.

While not privy to the selectors' mindset, McGlashan didn't anticipate any major changes, looking at the success of the current T20 13 who have performed ably against the Aussies.

However, their biggest challenge will be the reigning T20 and ODI world champions England.

On reflection, it almost seems as if the women need a (Black Caps coach) Mark Greatbatch figure to make sense of a team too preoccupied with the hit-and-giggle version of the game.