It was vitally important for world cricket that India kept playing cricket the way it did, coach John Wright said today when promising plenty of traditional action from his side on their New Zealand tour.

Wright was speaking at the National Bank sponsors launch of the international summer in Christchurch on his first return to his home town with his adopted team since taking up the coaching position with India two years ago.

"India play a particular brand of cricket that is important for world cricket. I hope we can see our batsmen and bowlers express themselves and play the Indian brand of cricket that is so exciting.

"I know we will be welcomed here because I have been accorded that respect in India," he said.

Wright said that he was delighted to have been part of cricket since an early age and to have been associated with two great cricket teams.

"Firstly there is the team I played for and secondly the team I am proud to coach.

"New Zealand and India are gaining in stature as the history of the game goes on and the Indian support for the players I work with is outstanding.

"The love, affection and hope our players carry wherever they are is always surprising. The Indian cricket team has to be one of the most loved teams in sport, wherever they play, not only from the cricket fans at home but from those who live in New Zealand and other countries," he said.

The Indian team manager Mr N R Chaudhury said there was a long and friendly association between Indian and New Zealand cricket and he was sure that tradition would continue this year.

"Our boys have been very busy over the last few months and John Wright has a tough task here in New Zealand. We know New Zealand has produced some great players and we would just like to wish the New Zealand team all the best," he said.

New Zealand Cricket's chief executive Martin Snedden said that after all New Zealand cricket had been through in the last few months there was much enthusiasm now that the cricket season was up and running.

"India have a team full of the most exciting cricketers in the world at the moment.

"Our team have built themselves up into a very good team and are deservedly ranked No 3 in the world. There have been more ups and downs on the one-day side of things," he said.

However, he expected both the Tests and the one-dayers in the National Bank Series to be tremendously competitive and exciting.

Snedden said it was delightful to have Wright back home with his team.

"He was a superb player for New Zealand and it has been great to watch him coaching India so successfully and he is to be congratulated for what he has achieved," he said.

Snedden welcomed the Indian team and captain Sourav Ganguly and recalled his memories of star batsman Sachin Tendulkar's first tour of New Zealand in 1990.

He remembered bowling to the then 16-year-old Tendulkar as he got very close to becoming the youngest player to score a Test century, and him getting out for 88, caught, ironically, by Wright off Danny Morrison's bowling.

The schoolboy-looking player had become one of the great players of cricket, and with possibly another 10 years ahead of him was set to break all sorts of statistical records.

The tour opens with a Super Max International against the TelstraClear Max Blacks at Jade Stadium in Christchurch tomorrow evening. The game starts at 6.30pm.

© CricInfo