adminpositive intent shown by the batsmen as not only did they pick up early boundaries, but sharp and decisive running between the wickets by all the batsmen meant that they were able to maintain a healthy run rate throughout most of their innings in both matches.
The one man who will be allowed a sigh of huge relief will be top-order batsman, Hamilton Masakadza, who until Saturday would have been hoping his nightmare tour comes to an end as quickly as possible.
But he responded like a true sportsman, when placed against the ropes, and showed us what he is capable of as his combination of power and timing saw him return to welcome form with scores of 53 and a muscular 62.
I remember Hamilton once telling me that T20 cricket was a form of the game he was beginning to love because of the fact that you don’t really have to pace your self.
It’s all about expressing your self as an attacking batsman and that is exactly what he did.
A few grey areas are the ones that we have mentioned time and time again – the inconsistent bowling backed up by some pretty woeful fielding at times.
For example, the first ball of the sixth over in the first T20 match saw Hamilton Masakadza fire the ball out towards the cover boundary and no less than four New Zealand fielders ran after the ball making very sure that the batsman would be restricted to just two runs.
Zimbabwe, on the other hand, gave away far too many extra runs through miss fields.
The second T20 international saw Zimbabwe putting New Zealand under pressure for the first time on the tour and made the Black Caps work really hard for their five-wicket win.
The entire top four were outstanding, as from the start, they put the Kiwi bowling to the sword, plundering boundaries as well as running hard between the wickets and one could clearly observe the transfer of pressure as the New Zealand bowlers presented the batsmen with a number of friendly full tosses which were duly dispatched into the crowd for six.
This, in turn, affected the fielding which became sloppy for periods of time and Zimbabwe were smart enough to capitalise on the mistakes and turn ones in to twos.
Having achieved a more than respectable total of 200, you would more offen than not think that such a large total would have given Zimbabwe a real chance of coming home with something to smile about.
But it was not to be as the home side went about their business in a very impressive manner as they kept wickets in hand and then accelerated towards the back end of the innings.
They also took full advantage of the fact that it is extremely difficult to defend totals on that ground, thanks to the dimensions of the field with its ridiculously short straight boundaries.
And so we come to the end of what has been a very heartbreaking and disappointing tour.
Not so much because of the results, but so much because of the ease in which New Zealand repeatedly beat Zimbabwe in the Test and the One day Internationals, a form of cricket the team is experienced at.
But there were some positives to talk about.
Shingi Masakadza impressed everybody with his work ethic and skills, his ability to bowl cleverly disguised slower balls out of the back of his hand as well as his lower order potential with the bat would have pleased the coaching staff. And so was the welcome return to form by senior players such as Hamilton Masakadza and Elton Chigumbura who was back to his very explosive best.
Online Reporter