NZC walking a tightrope

And so it has come to pass. New Zealand Cricket has decided to waste more time, effort and, no doubt, money in its latest attempt to reinvent the wheel.

As everyone with half a sense of what was going on knew as far back as late-November, a new manager is to be appointed with incumbent manager Lindsay Crocker heading to Australia this week with the national team, his final assignment for the side.

At the time of writing no appointment as his replacement had been announced.

What is it about a country as poorly resourced in cricket as New Zealand that it keeps falling into administrative holes time after time?

The fall-off in resources, both playing and administrative, at NZC reads like a hall of shame in the game's history.

The ham-fisted treatment supposedly to better the team in its bid for a suitable placement in the world rankings, in Test and one-day cricket, features an ever-growing list of discards which diminishes New Zealand's stature as a potential force in the game with each passing episode.

After the pressures were mounted that weeded from the team notable presences like: Stephen Fleming, Chris Cairns, Nathan Astle, Craig McMillan, Lou Vincent, Daryl Tuffey - all of whom departed the scene before their use-by date, New Zealand faces a long, hard haul back up the ladder.

Compounding matters were the disgraceful exit of Shane Bond from the international stage and now the off-field bleeding of institutional knowledge which no organisation, least of all New Zealand Cricket, can afford when its resource base is so low.

There are only so many dollars that can be paid to overseas personnel to fill the gaps left on the New Zealand stage. So after playing, coaching and administrative expertise has departed, now the loss of a team manager will mean a new man must come in and be expected to pick up the cudgels of office.

Will this be a cricket person? At least that would suggest some familiarity with the requirements of the game.

If it is not, and that looked like being the case before unconvincing denials left tobacco-juice discoloured stains all over NZC's integrity in the December fiasco surrounding the case of Craig Ross, then it can only be wondered what calamities lie ahead in team management in the foreseeable future.

Good managers are rarely seen or heard. Their job is to ensure the smooth passage of teams from country to country, airport to hotel, hotel to ground, ground to hotel et al ad infinitum. But there is much else to be involved in keeping a touring cricket team in one cohesive piece.

Cricket managers, increasingly, have to deal with a myriad of issues involved in keeping the integrity of their side intact. Player behaviour, by those normal standards applying to sports teams, and those abnormal standards as occur in policing potential gambling infractions, drug abuses and any number of other possible scenarios, has to be monitored. That's life in the modern world.

Replacements for injured players have to be moved to venues quickly and without fuss while injured players have to be catered for in terms of medical treatment. The list goes on and on.

Successfully doing that work requires familiarity and continuity, that is why so many managers of international sides have such long service in their roles. Their work cannot be measured by averages or