Brendon McCullum, who took over as New Zealand captain under controversial circumstances after Ross Taylor refused an offer to remain as the leader of the Test team in a split-captaincy scenario, has said he is concerned for his predecessor as well as the team ahead of a tough tour of South Africa. Taylor has asked for a break and will not be travelling to South Africa. “I’m more concerned now with how the team is handling the situation and where we go from here – how we try and galvanise the unit, rather than my own individual accolade of picking up the captaincy,” McCullum told reporters at a press conference in Lincoln. “I’m obviously worried for Ross and how he is dealing with things at the moment, and obviously how we try and ensure that we pull together this team inside a very short space of time for what is going to be an incredibly tough tour.” McCullum said he had been in touch with Taylor, who said on Friday he felt he never had the support of New Zealand coach Mike Hesson. “I’ve spoken to him a couple of times – two days ago and then left a message with him again this morning – but he obviously needs a little bit of space at the moment as well, and I thought he did a really good job yesterday with the media of being able to deal with some tough circumstances,” McCullum said.
