Bracewell wary of English pitches

John Bracewell, the New Zealand coach, has admitted he is unsure of what types of pitches to expect in the forthcoming NatWest Series after the tracks used in the Tests.

Bracewell, who coached Gloucestershire for five years, said England had produced pitches to suit their style of play during the Test series, rather than using the typical early-season seamers.

"The types of wickets they produced are not consistent with the ones they produced over the last five years in the early season," Bracewell said. "They obviously found a combination playing in the West Indies of playing on drier wickets suited their bowlers who hit the deck, and they found that variable bounce."

Bracewell insisted he now wasn't sure what to expect in the one-dayers. "They're a canny bunch and they may come up with something completely different for the one-day series," he said. "Last year they varied them, they played one team on faster wickets [Zimbabwe] throughout the series and one team [South Africa] on slower wickets."

He added that preparing pitches was not something not in the rule book in New Zealand. "Good luck to them. While we're not allowed to do it in New Zealand, they're obviously allowed to do it over here," Bracewell said. "Our policy is to produce the best cricket wickets possible, not ones that suit the home team. I'm quite happy to go along with our policy.

"England have done it well. It hasn't been a surprise, it's been a surprise it's taken them so long to work it out."

New Zealand began their preparations for the NatWest Series with a loss against Derbyshire, and they face Essex and Northamptonshire before their opening game of the competition, against England at Old Trafford next Thursday (June 24).