Taylor did not communicate with his team – Brendon McCullum

Brendon McCullum has written of the uninspiring leadership of Ross Taylor and how the tension and mistrust during his captaincy left the New Zealand team on the verge of imploding. In his book Declared, McCullum has devoted a whole chapter to “the coup that wasn’t”, describing in some detail Taylor’s failings as a captain and the circumstances that led to the souring of their relationship, and clarifying that he had no role to play in the axing of Taylor as captain.

The captaincy switch from Taylor to McCullum in 2012 is one of the more bitter chapters in New Zealand’s cricket history. The timing of the fresh revelations could not have been worse, with Taylor struggling for form on New Zealand’s tour of India. The team, too, has had a tough tour, having lost all three Tests and the first ODI by the time the book was released on October 20. Since then, they won one ODI and lost another, with Taylor’s drop of Virat Kohli in the third ODI costing New Zealand 148 runs and arguably the match. NZC’s manager of public affairs Richard Boock told the New Zealand Herald that Taylor has seen media reports but is not “rushing out to find a copy” of the book.

After Daniel Vettori gave up captaincy following the 2011 World Cup, Taylor edged McCullum as the next captain after a “public” process in which both of them were asked to present their cases. In the book, McCullum speaks of not being satisfied with that process, and of how the public nature of rejecting one of the candidates was not good for “our relationship, or any team with the two of us in it”.

The cracks first appeared on the West Indies tour of 2012. McCullum had been rested for the limited-overs leg of the tour, but an injury to Taylor meant he was sent an SOS to lead the team. This was also the last assignment as New Zealand coach for John Wright, who was struggling to forge a good working relationship with John Buchanan, director of cricket at NZC. McCullum made it to the West Indies in time for the third ODI, but he was told Kane Williamson, who had captained in the first two, was going to continue leading for the sake of continuity. McCullum didn’t play that game, but his introduction later made little difference as New Zealand won just one ODI on a tour of two Tests, five ODIs and two T20Is.

“Either Ross was highly resistant to my captaining the team and leant on Wrighty to change his mind, or it was just an organisational cock-up by Wrighty,” McCullum writes in Declared. “The rest of the tour suggested the latter, because much of it was a shambles.”

Like Taylor, Wright comes out in poor light, but the appointment of Otago’s Mike Hesson as new coach widened the cracks in the relationship between McCullum and Taylor. In McCullum’s estimation, Hesson was seen as his mate whereas Wright hadn’t been seen as a big fan of McCullum. In the book, McCullum reveals he had actually recommended Australian Matthew Mott despite knowing his friend Hesson was in the fray.

McCullum feels that with Hesson’s appointment, Taylor withdrew further; he had, according to McCullum, already been burdened by Wright’s failings as coach.

“It seemed to me that, right from the start, Ross was suspicious of Hess’s motives,” McCullum writes. “So instead of taking Hess on his merits, Ross seemed already closed to him. I knew there had been a bit of talk behind the scenes after Hesson’s appointment, and that some were seeing a conspiracy.

“It wasn’t a very complicated scenario they were pushing: that my mate Stephen Fleming had influenced the …

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