Streak fit to play against Sussex

Zimbabwe's captain, Heath Streak, will play against Sussex in the four-day tour match which starts at Hove tomorrow, after recovering from a back injury that dogged him throughout last week's game against Worcestershire. Geoff Marsh, Zimbabwe's coach, said that Streak was especially keen to play, given that this was the final warm-up match before the first Test, which starts at Lord's next Thursday.

With the exception of Douglas Hondo, who is being rested, Zimbabwe's team is likely to be the Test side. Hondo's replacement, Mluleki Nkala, is playing his first match of the tour and is an outside bet for Lord's. Barney Rogers and Travis Friend also drop out of the side that played in Worcester, with the allrounders Sean Ervine and Douglas Marillier taking their places.

At first glance, the team looks very short of specialist batsmen, but their strength is in their allrounders. Raymond Price is the only man not to have scored a century at first-class level, but even he has several fifties to his name. The allrounders, in fact, have often done better than the specialist batsmen, and as Worcestershire discovered, this team cannot be counted out until the tenth wicket falls.

Streak will probably nurse himself with the ball to ensure he has no fitness problems before the Test, leaving most of the seam bowling to Andy Blignaut, Sean Ervine and Nkala. Nkala was in such woeful form a few months ago that he was omitted from the World Cup squad, but has improved since then and will be keen to impress. Price will expect plenty of work with his left-arm spin, but Marillier's offspin and Grant Flower's slow left-arm will probably also be used.

Marsh believed the tie against Worcestershire had done the team a lot of good. "There was a lot of intensity and real pressure out there," he said. "Some practice games fade out and have little value, but the pressure was on the team the whole time [at Worcester]. I think we dominated the match on the whole, although the result doesn't show that. It was a good warm-up game."

Sussex, ironically, will be captained by former Zimbabwean batsman, Murray Goodwin, who scored a magnificent 148 not out at Trent Bridge in 2000 in Zimbabwe's last Test against England. As is sadly the case these days, Sussex will not be fielding a full-strength side, although they themselves could do with a boost after their heavy defeat by Warwickshire over the weekend. For Zimbabwe, there is little doubt that their main aim will be a morale-boosting win on the eve of the Lord's Test.

Zimbabwe 1 Dion Ebrahim, 2 Mark Vermeulen, 3 Stuart Carlisle, 4 Grant Flower, 5 Tatenda Taibu (wk), 6 Sean Ervine, 7 Douglas Marillier, 8 Heath Streak (capt), 9 Andy Blignaut, 10 Mluleki Nkala, 11 Raymond Price.