Kane Williamson will take over the captaincy of the BLACKCAPS squad for the Twenty20 and One Day International legs of the tour to the United Arab Emirates.
The 24-year-old batsman will receive the chance to add to his international captaincy experience in the absence of Brendon McCullum who, along with Tim Southee and Trent Boult will now return to New Zealand to prepare for the upcoming home campaign against Sri Lanka.
Other features of the squad, to play a brace of T20 Internationals and five ODIs against Pakistan, are the return of the previously injured Ross Taylor, and the addition of fast bowler Adam Milne and batting all-rounder Anton Devcich.
BLACKCAPS squad for the two T20Is and five ODIs v Pakistan
Kane Williamson (c)
Corey Anderson
Dean Brownlie
Anton Devcich
Martin Guptill
Matt Henry
Tom Latham
Mitchell McClenaghan
Natham McCullum
Kyle Mills
Adam Milne
James Neesham
Luke Ronchi
Ross Taylor
Daniel Vettori
GM National Selection Bruce Edgar says the decision to give McCullum, Southee and Boult extra time at home to prepare for the Sri Lankan visit was based on the trio’s recent workloads, and the fact the first ANZ Test will start less than a week after the return to New Zealand of the ODI squad.
He stressed the decision was made well before the tragic death of Australian batsman Phillip Hughes.
“Managing players’ workloads will be an important part of our summer’s plans and this is simply an example of that," says Edgar.
“On the flipside, it gives us a chance to assess and evaluate other players in contention for the Cricket World Cup squad, and allows us to work on some of our contingency plans – such as developing Kane’s captaincy experience.”
Williamson has captained the BLACKCAPS in three ODIs and two T20Is – the most recent the second T20I against the West Indies in July.
