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Despite their limited resources and population, New Zealand have regularly punched above their weight and impressed the cricketing fraternity. Gary Stead, who stood down as head coach in early June, deserves huge credit for the fabulous performances of the Black Caps over the years.

Not only did New Zealand win an ICC trophy after 21 years during his tenure, but they made it to the knockout stages in five out of the last six ICC white-ball tournaments. After being named the head coach in 2018 replacing Mike Hesson, Stead went on to script a historic legacy and forged a memorable alliance with Kane Williamson. During his time as head coach, the Kiwis won 268 games across all formats.

While speaking to Arvind Kalyana Krishnan in an exclusive interview for CricBlog, Stead drew light on his seven-year stint in the role including some of his best memories with the team.

While winning the inaugural World Test Championship in 2021 was one of the greatest accomplishments during his tenure, the 53-year-old also mentioned that whitewashing India 3-0 in the Test series in 2024 will go down as one of his most cherished moments. He gave a detailed explanation behind the Tom Latham-led side’s preparation for this three-match Test series, and how they defied all odds to script a historic series win. Further on, he also spoke about Matt Henry’s injury just before the Champions Trophy 2025 Final against India, and how badly the pacer wanted to play that game.

Stead also drew light on the 2019 Cricket World Cup Final, the controversial “Boundary Count”, and the reactions of the players after the match. Also, Stead gave his opinion on players choosing to prioritise T20 leagues over international cricket, with Kane Williamson and Trent Boult declining contracts, among others. Cricketers choosing to play T20 leagues instead of representing their country has taken the world by storm after the recent retirements of Heinrich Klaasen and Nicholas Pooran as well.

Gary Stead Exclusive Interview: Proud of seeing the team grow during my time as coach

Below is the entire conversation between Arvind Kalyana Krishnan and Gary Stead, both in video and text format.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: You had a successful tenure with the Black Caps. There have been several appearances in the finals of ICC tournaments and you’ve won an ICC trophy too. So if you were to summarize your tenure, what would rank amongst the best memories for you? Some of the greatest achievements for New Zealand under you?

Gary Stead: Look, I think any time you’re involved with international cricket it’s a great privilege and I guess one of the things I’m most proud of is just seeing the team members grow in their time as well and look, we’ve had some amazing achievements in the past few years.

Obviously, the World Test Championship and winning the inaugural World Test Championship was something very special to the team, and making World Cup finals and ICC event finals as well. Yes, we didn’t quite get over the line in those but still to get there against some quality teams around the world has been fantastic…..

But probably the greatest achievement I think with this group was winning 3-0 in India. I think that’s probably the hardest thing to do when you consider things around the world and things you’re going to try and achieve, and for us to win all the three Tests will be something that’s probably right up there with the best achievements with this team in history.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: Now moving to my next question, you mentioned that you couldn’t get over the line in a few encounters. I know this might not be amongst the greatest memories for you but I want to speak about this. During the 2019 Cricket World Cup, we all saw what happened. New Zealand came very very close and some people might even say that you deserved to win which even I agree, you deserved to win. But it was on a “Boundary Count” from which England won.

So my question to you is that after the match happened, we saw Kane Williamson smile and the players….Like the players you know, didn’t show any kind of frustration or any sort of anger. So after the match got over, behind the scenes and in the dressing room, how was the environment? Was Williamson still calm? Or was everyone still frustrated and furious over what happened? Can you just speak about that?

Gary Stead: I think no doubt there was frustrations in the group and in the team. I guess as a whole you look at it and it was an amazing game of cricket; I mean the same number of runs scored by both teams over the game. I think it showed the evenness of the competition, and in some ways it’s sad that there has to be a winner and loser in that situation but we were lucky in a way that we had to move on very quickly.

We had a series soon after in Sri Lanka that we had to get to, so that’s the thing with international cricket. The world keeps rolling on very very quickly so whilst it was very very disappointing, I think it was a good thing that we were playing cricket again pretty soon and we could move on and look, time heals over that period and whilst still can be raw to talk about because I thought we played very well that day. You have to get on with it and accept that they were the rules on that day.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: True. Since I spoke about a memory that still hurts, but now let me speak about something which is probably in the history of Black Caps. The whitewash over India in India last year. So my question to you is that you did the unthinkable, beat a strong Indian team in India. So if you can just draw light on the kind of preparation you had and during the match, when you had already won the series 2-0 going into the third Test, was there any pressure from India? Did the players resort to any kind of sledging or banters or anything? If you can just speak about the entire series.

Gary Stead: Yeah, I think in a way when you look back at that series. Losing the toss in the first game was pretty crucial as well. We would’ve batted first but the ball did a lot more than what we were expecting early on and I guess to get that jump on India in that first Test was fantastic.

I think the preparation before that, we had gone to Sri Lanka and we had lost 2-0 in Sri Lanka but we’d had 2-3 bad sessions which we identified and if we’d got them right then the series could’ve been very different as well. So we had a game plan around our batting in particular and to try and put pressure on their spinners and to immediately to not let them settle to any kind of rhythm.

So we were prepared to take probably more risks then what we might have in the past to try and put the Indian spinners in particular under pressure and we felt we’d be able to hold our own. I think from a bowling perspective and as long as we were in good areas for long periods of time…..We knew the pitches were going to be difficult to bat on so it was really about applying pressure for long periods and in the second and third Test we were lucky that we did win the toss and we got the better of the surfaces.

But it was an enthralling series because I think that all the Tests could’ve gone either way at different points and I guess we won some crucial moments and it was an amazing feeling and something that you know no one else in the world has managed to do, which is really special.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: Now my next question to you is that it all started a few years when Trent Boult declined a contract from New Zealand and it was last year after the T20 World Cup where even Kane Williamson didn’t want to take the contract, but at the same time he had stated that he will still prioritise international cricket. So what was your take on Williamson’s decision to not take a contract? And we’ve seen of late a few players who have decided to make a balance between playing T20 leagues and playing international cricket at the same time. What are your thoughts and opinions on that?

Gary Stead: Look, I think that when players get to the back end of their careers, then they’re looking at different options sometimes. I think it’s through a financial point of view and sometimes it’s through a motivational point of view but I think with all the players, I think the one thing that has stood recently firm is they still want to play for New Zealand, and still are prioritizing New Zealand on most accounts, but it’s just the odd league that doesn’t fit into the New Zealand calendar and so they’re hoping they can keep growing their cricketing experience through that as well. So my opinion is I understand that completely from a players point of view and I don’t hold any grudges against them or wanting to do that. So, yeah it’s just the reality of the modern world and where the game is going.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: Now my next question to you is that of late we had the Champions Trophy 2025 where New Zealand were absolutely fabulous in it. You came to the finals and lost a very close match to India. But in that match, I remember Matt Henry was about to play but he got injured in the last match (Champions Trophy 2025 Semi-Final) so if you can just speak to me about what was going through and did you speak to him because he seemed very passionate and was wanting to play that game. So if you can just speak about that.

Gary Stead: Yeah there’s no doubt that Matt Henry wanted to play that game and we wanted him to play as well but unfortunately, the morning of that match he woke up and he could hardly move. He did something to his back and whilst he landed on his shoulder in the earlier game vs South Africa, everyone thought it was a shoulder but he would’ve got through on that, but we had to make the very hard decision just before the toss that he wasn’t going to be able to play and that I know was devastating for Matt. Look it was very very tough on our team as well because he’d been so good throughout that tournament so sometimes injuries happen you can’t always control them. So it was very very bad luck for him.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: True, and I have one last question for you. As a coach of the Black Caps throughout your career, was there any one specific player from the opposition team or from the team you’ve played against from which you know you were genuinely…..I won’t say afraid but genuinely thought of building specific plans for that one player who was so good? For example someone like a Starc or a Virat or someone who was so good that you were thinking “ok we need to tackle this one player. He’s our main priority. Any such player in your career?

Gary Stead: Not really. I think all teams have such classy players all around the world. Now if you just single out one, you forget about the others. So there wasn’t an overemphasis put on anyone and look, I think the players you are mentioning are all world-class obviously. I think one of the strengths of our team was to just get on and fight as a team and whoever we come up against, you make sure they’re in a fight as well, and look, at the end of the day you have a winner and a loser every day a cricket match is played.

I think it’s one of the great things about our sport is that you go there and battle hard for that period of time and you’ve got world-class players playing against each other and when you do get surprised wins and what media might consider surprises then it does show what you’re doing is on the right track and that’s something I think that as a New Zealand team and Black Caps unit we can be really proud of that we’ve managed to I guess tip-up all opposition international teams at some stage.