Ross Taylor, two days after arriving in the UK from a family holiday at Disneyland, refused to take the bait and refer to England as a Mickey Mouse team following their humbling defeat by West Indies in Barbados.
Instead, the batsman was the model of diplomacy, insisting Peter Moores’s side are likely to be even more determined to bounce back in the two-Test series against his New Zealand team.
There are just 17 days before the first Test of the English summer begins at Lord’s, meaning little respite for a group of England players who collectively have suffered a horrific winter, including a humiliating group-stage exit at the World Cup.
New Zealand, of course, are still riding high after reaching the final of that tournament for the first time, winning every game on home soil before eventually losing out to the co-hosts Australia in Melbourne.
Asked if this was a good time to be facing England, Taylor said: “No, any time you play England in their home conditions it’s going to be tough. They’ll probably have even more motivation coming off a loss against West Indies. We know we have to be at our best to compete.”
Taylor, speaking at Lord’s as preparations begin for the opening tour match at Somerset on Friday, was asked further about the problems England face, with on-field defeats exacerbated by off-the-field uncertainty over the future of Moores, the coach, and the identity of the new director of cricket. However, he was able to deftly sidestep going into any more detail thanks to his trip to see Mickey, Goofy and company in California.
“To be honest I’ve been away in Disneyland so I haven’t seen a lot of what’s been happening with England cricket,” said Taylor. “But I’m sure they’ll be looking forward to getting back home and sorting out whatever needs to be done. We can’t be distracted by that. We know the England team in their own conditions will be very tough and we haven’t had a lot of success here in recent times. Hopefully we can change that.”
New Zealand’s last Test-series win in England was in 1999 and their attempts to break that 16-year duck have not been helped by the fact five of their best players – captain Brendon McCullum, Kane Williamson, Trent Boult, Tim Southee and Corey Anderson – arrive in the country from their stints in the Indian Premier League just three days before the first Test.
“It’s not ideal but it is what it is,” said Taylor. “We did it in the West Indies [last year] and the players who came from the IPL went straight in and were very successful. We won the first Test.
“You can dance around the question as much as you like but that’s the landscape we live in at the moment. We’ve got the five-week window for IPL and it’s good these players can still come back and play Test cricket.”
