Last match of 2010 to be played on Thursday
The last cricket match of 2010 will be the Twenty20 match between Pakistan and New Zealand at Christchurch.
The host team has already won the series by winning the first two matches of the three-match series. The visitors will play for their pride and hopefully end the year with a win.
Pakistan had a troublesome 2010 as they were involved in many controversies. No one could have predicted the state in which the Pakistan team is currently in. The team won the Twenty20 World Cup in 2009 and has featured in all semi-finals of Twenty20 World
Cups played until now including two finals.
Barring that, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 team has been unable to perform in the Tests and ODIs. Since the start of 2010, the team has even faltered in the shortest version of the game as well.
Apart from a Twenty20 series win in England against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/South-Africa-c757 and now against New Zealand.
Pakistan has the firepower to match the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754 team but they may be missing Mohammad Amir and Kamran Akmal who have been regular performers in this format of the game.
The strike bowlers like Umar Gul and Shoaib Akhtar have been too expensive and the batsmen have struggled against the pace and bounce of the New Zealand tracks. The batting has been ordinary for Pakistan and apart from Mohammad Hafeez, none of the other
batsmen have looked in-form.
Pakistan need to lift their game in the final match and try to get some momentum for the Test and ODI series.
On the other hand, Kiwis will be confident of a whitewash series win over Pakistan. They have put up a good performance so far after losing 11 consecutive ODI matches against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Bangladesh-c747.
The team was without Daniel Vettori and Brendon McCullum in the Twenty20 series but they still managed to come out good. Both the senior players had back injuries after the mentally tiring tour of sub-continent.
The New Zealand team is also playing under their new coach John Wright. He was appointed after Mark Greatbatch was sacked from his duty. Wright has been the Indian coach as well and has a very good experience of the subcontinent conditions. His experience
can benefit the New Zealand team in preparing for the ICC World Cup 2011.
Both New Zealand and Pakistan look evenly matched for the current series. The only advantage that New Zealand has over Pakistan is the home conditions. Pakistan will however be expecting some of their senior players to perform well with the bat.
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