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T O P I C R E V I E W
Smack
Posted - 09/06/2011 : 02:16:39 I bought a Slazenger Pro Blade Ultimate in 2009, at the time it was Slazenger's top bat costing £230.
The pick up of the bat was amazing. The best in the shop and I tried every bat there. I wanted something that picked up like a feather but was meaty with a good thickness to it. The only bat that eclipsed it was the Kookaburra Ricky Ponting which at 300ish was a bit too pricey for me.
Wood quality is remarkably good on most top range bats regardless of the manufacturer and playing with the Pro Blade proved that. Even a drive off the bottom of the bat makes its way to the boundary.
Unfortunately, as tends to be the case with a lot of modern bats you pay for performance over durability and the bat broke during a club game with a deep crack running through the bottom of the bat.
Having returned the bat to Slazenger they did a poor job of repairing it and a week later it broke again with the entire bottom corner coming off. The bat had now expired its warranty.
My experience is Slazenger make well balanced, high performance bats. Unfortunately their customer service is extremely poor. Modern day bats break quite often within a year and most manufacturers will give you a new bat as a replacement under warranty. Slazenger didn't do this. Furthermore you want to be able to access manufacturers easily. Slazenger are tough to get hold of. No phone number, no email address, only a warehouse postal adress and unhelpful replies to any letters you send them.
Bottom line for me is if you're going for a high performance bat, go for a manufacturer like Gray-Nicholls or Newberry who will replace your bat if it breaks under warranty!
