A feast of 50 over finals at the Basin Reserve

 

Men’s eliminator final, Wellington v Central Districts

Women’s final, Wellington v Northern Districts

Men’s final, Canterbury v Central Districts

There was general agreement among the RA Vance Pessimists that I had not missed much during our ten weeks on grandparent duty in Canada. This was true of both the cricket and the weather. A mundane test match against the West Indies finished in three days (work commitments would have prevented me attending had I been in the country) and the Wellington men had a shocker in the T20 competiton. Steve the Scottish stats guy revealed that in 24 home games over five years Wellington had only three wins, all against Otago (the UK equivalent, with apologies to my Welsh friends, would be beating only Glamorgan). The women’s team, the Blaze, provided consolation, as they usually do, winning the competition for the third time in a row and for the seventh in the last ten years.

Watching one of the T20 matches on TV in our Toronto apartment, I noted that the crowd at the Basin was dressed in much the same manner as we had been earlier that day when we ventured forth in sub-zero temperatures.

So it was good, on my return to the Basin Reserve, to find the weather agreeable for three successive days of 50-over cricket. The men’s eliminator match (second v third) was followed by the two finals, women’s then men’s.

Watching 50-over cricket is like finding an old friend at the door, with time on their hands to provide intelligent and amusing company. The pleasure is tempered by the lurking thought that these days are running out and that soon there will be no more knocks on the door.

Perhaps this is too gloomy. The other day I found a piece on Scorecards in which I speculated that the game I was writing then about would be the last 50-over game I would see (then the worry was that 40 overs would become the new 50). That was written more than a decade ago, yet here we were watching a weekend of 50-over cricket.

Great fun it was, with plenty of classy, bright cricket. Unfortunately, none of it was played by the home teams. We did not realise it at the time, but the highlight of the weekend from the partisan point of view was having Central Districts at 22 for two batting first in the men’s eliminator final.

Will Young and Dean Foxcroft rebuilt the innings with a third-wicket partnership of 165, a record against Wellington. At first, they were painstaking and for a while it seemed that a target of not much more than 250 was in prospect. But Central had a good plan and were sticking to it. They knew that if they could preserve their resources they could treat the end of the innings as a T20 and that is what they did. Young’s 50 took 75 balls; moving from there to 100 just 29 more. The prospective target increased exponentially: 300, 320, 340? Biffers Cleaver and Clarkson added 76 in under five overs to take it to 350.

That was always likely to be too much for a Wellington line up that had struggled to last 20 overs in the recent short-form competition and were anchored to the bottom of the Plunket Shield table at the halfway stage. But, we told ourselves, at least they have a template to follow. Do what Central did. Concentrate on keeping wickets intact for 30 overs then launch an onslaught.

When first Greenwood, then Robinson were dismissed charging down the pitch in the early overs it became clear that Wellington had not paid attention to what went on while they were in the field. There was speculation that Brendon McCullum had returned home and had taken over as Wellington’s coach.

In The RA Vance Stand we entertained ourselves by wondering if Wellington could keep within 200 of the DLS mark; they could not, all out for 138.

In the women’s final the hope lasted longer, throughout the innings of Northern Districts, who batted first. Wickets fell regularly and at 94 for seven it appeared that Wellington had the game was as good as won.

Again, the opposition had a plan. The last four in the order provided an exemplary display of what to do. They batted for 21 overs, adding 88 runs with only three boundaries, working the ball around for ones and twos. Wicketkeeper Holly Topp was last out with a boundary-free 39 from 61 balls. Nos 10 and 11 supported her well. Kayley Knight made 14 from 31 and Lucy Boucher 12 from 23 as they reached 182.

I did get the feeling that Wellington waited for things to happen in this period, assuming the removal of the top half of the order had been enough and that the rest was mere formality. When they batted it quickly became clear that it was not.

New Black Ferns captain Melie Kerr was second out, for four. So critical is Melie for the wellbeing of any team for which she plays that her early departure was enough to embed concern. Run scoring became a challenge akin to speaking an unfamiliar language, as the usually ebullient Xara Jetly’s 13-ball duck showed.  As they had on the previous day, the Pessimists’ thoughts drifted to a wish for the early bus home. Northern won the Hallyburton Johnstone Shield by 67 runs.

I had long assumed that Hallyburton Johnstone were the sponsors. Purveyors of fine sausages perhaps, or a manufacturer of unguents for those of a sensitive disposition. In fact, Hallyburton Johnstone was the original name of the prize, and had been since it was first competed for in 1936. It began as a challenge competition where one province held the shield until defeated by another. New Zealand likes contests of this kind. Rugby’s Ranfurly Shield still operates this way, as does cricket’s Hawke Cup, competed for by minor associations. As I write, Bay of Plenty are defending it against Canterbury Country. Matches are two-innings played over three days, as was the Hallyburton Johnstone Shield (mostly) until the 1980s when it became a limited-overs, one-day competition.

This was Northern Districts’ first time winning the shield. They have been competing for it only for 26 years, but have had some fine players in that time, most notably former New Zealand captain Emily Drumm, so it still came as a surprise. That New Zealand women will one day again have a multi-day competition remains a dream, unfortunately.

The men’s final was most enjoyable, dominated by fine performances by the best players. Canterbury batted first. After the early loss of the dangerous Chad Bowes, Black Caps captain Tom Latham and Henry Nicholls put on 185 for the second wicket. Latham is a proud Cantabrian who takes every opportunity to turn out for his province. Nicholls is no longer in the first-choice batting lineup for the national team, but made 150 when called up in Zimbabwe last year. This innings supported his case to be in the party to tour England in the coming May. It was Nicholls’ fourth century of the 50-over campaign.

When Latham was fourth out (for 80) from the first ball of the 41^st over with the score at 237 it appeared certain that Canterbury, with some notable bashers to follow, would set a target in the general area of 340. It was in these ten overs that Central won the game.

Outstanding bowling by seamers Brett Randell and  left-armer Ray Toole meant that six of these overs went for six or fewer. The final total of 302 for seven will never be a bad one, but it was Central who left the field happier at the end of the innings.

Like Canterbury, Central lost an opener early, but Will Young and Curtis Heaphey settled into a second-wicket partnership that the description “match-winning” could be attached to at an early stage.

As with Canterbury, it was the international batsmen who looked a cut above the rest. Will Young’s innings was a copy of his effort 48 hours previously in that he started with circumspection, his first fifty taking 72 deliveries, before putting the foot down so that the next fifty took only 29 more. The difference was that in the final he carried on for fifty more at the same pace, taking his team to the brink of victory. Having made only 14 runs in three innings in the recent West Indies test series, his place for the England tour is in serious doubt, but hitting two match-winning hundreds in the pressure of finals weekend is as strong a case as he can make for retention.

The other successful international batter was 22 year-old Curtis Heaphey, who made 105 in a partnership of 257 with Young. The description “international batter” is not wholly accurate. It has to be conceded that  Heaphey has not actually represented New Zealand at full international level. This is a mere detail. He has the phrase in his DNA, just as a stick of English seaside rock has Margate, or wherever, right through it. Unlike most promising young players of the modern era, he could have come from any time in the game’s history.

After 24 first-class games he averages 46 at a strike rate of 40. In 50 overs it is 53 at 68 and in T20, 25 at 110. The latter won’t do much for his bank balance at this stage, but he bats as if that doesn’t matter. Here, his innings was perfect for the occasion and went much of the way to winning the trophy for his team, just as another century in the final group game got them to the final. The best reason for omitting Young and/or Nicholls from the tour party to England is so that Heaphey can take their place. Central’s win was comfortable: by six wickets with 13 balls to spare.

This was an immensely enjoyable weekend’s cricket, especially for me, returning to the cricket for the first time in three months. But it was nothing like any of the 24 domestic one-day finals that I attended at Lord’s from 1967 to 1997. The crowds on each of the three days were small, even on the two that on which Wellington played on their home ground. It wasn’t considered worth the rigmarole that goes along with charging for admission, which was free. The games were not advertised. The Basin Reserve remains a public thoroughfare when no tickets are being sold, so hundreds passed through as these matches were being played, mostly oblivious to the knowledge that they were in proximity to domestic cricket at its peak. The only concession made to public comfort was the arrival of a chip van for the last two days. There was TV coverage, but only on TVNZ’s streaming service. When I last observed so few cameras being used to cover a game, Tom Graveney was playing.

We will enjoy it while we can.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The CricInfo Years Part 4: 2002/03

 

The final part of the series on my four years as a reporter for CricInfo in New Zealand: 2002/03.

CricInfo was a fine example of the potential of the internet and of the wild overestimates of its ability to turn tech into profit. Founded in 1993 by cricket enthusiast Simon King at the University of Minnesota as a safe place for cricket nerds, it rode the crest of the dotcom boom wave, valued (according to Wikipedia) at US$150 million in 2000. There was no limit to its ambition, which happily included the setting up of the New Zealand operation.

This was based in Christchurch, in a modest suite of offices, proficiently managed by Lynn McConnell, who brought with him the tested disciplines of a distinguished career in newspaper journalism. If the New Zealand model had been applied worldwide things might have gone better. But the UK operation for one, based in a converted manor house in the Wiltshire countryside, was more profligate. A visitor from the New Zealand team observed that he would not have thought it possible that so many people could produce so little in the course of a working day.

The editorship of the daily CricInfo newsletter was passed around the world so that an off-season office was in charge. McConnell took this role for three months or so, never missing a deadline or a story, seven days a week. He then passed it on to the UK office, which announced that the newsletter would now only be published from Monday to Friday as they didn’t care to work at the weekends.

The 2001/02 season had ended uncertainly. The final pay for the season was delayed and it became clear that the “dotcom boom” was actually the sound of it exploding into tiny fragments. Even those of us without a business brain began to work out that a site that carried almost no advertising had to be in some sort of trouble.

So the news that live coverage of domestic cricket was to be pared back to just the 50-over competition came as no surprise (this was before T20 burst upon us in the English season of 2003). I was assigned Northern Districts’ five round-robin games.

I still had my media pass for all cricket that season and used it to gain free admission to the second test of two against India at Seddon Park (then WestPac Park). The first day had been washed out. I was at work in Rotorua until midday on Friday, but still made it to Hamilton before the delayed first ball was bowled at 4 30pm. I did not expect to have seen an entire test match by the time I returned to work on Monday morning, but that is what happened.

When the pitch was unveiled it was the bottle-green colour only a few shades deeper than what was usual at the ground, which had an excellent reputation at that time and did not usually offer bowlers more help than was reasonable at the start of a first-class game.  The difference here was that it was wet close to the surface, which assisted the bowlers in cricketing terms as much as paying off their mortgages and buying them all a Ferrari might have done in their lives generally.

By the close India were 98 for eight, adding only more for the last two wickets the following morning. VVS Laxman was highest scorer with 23, Harbhajan Singh’s 20, consisting of five fours, the only other in double figures. Lynn McConnell reported that “the off-spinner unveiled an array of shots which were probably best suited to other sports”. Four wickets each for Bond and Tuffey.

Yet it was enough for a first-innings lead. Stephen Fleming’s 21 was the highest score in a total of 94. The notes on CricInfo’s scorecard say that it was the first time that neither side had reached 100 in a completed first innings of a test match.

That India got as many as 156 was due to two 30s by great batsmen: Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar. Dravid’s 39 (the highest score of the match) was painstaking, from 100 balls. Tendulkar’s was more rapid: 32 with five fours from 48. Both have scored any number of centuries that drew less on their skill.

New Zealand needed 160 to win and took 57 overs to get them, losing wickets often enough to keep us tense. It was old-fashioned cricket, cautiously prodding the ground ahead for mines rather than charging at the guns. Appropriately, Robbie Hart, ND’s captain, hit the running win. I was pleased to see this as I had interviewed Robbie before the start of the season for an ND promotional brochure. A version appeared on CricInfo.

My reporting that season started at one of my favourite venues, Owen Delany Park in Taupo. Canterbury were the visitors. The most striking thing about the live report is that the performance of several players in this and other games at this time would influence the selection of the New Zealand squad at the upcoming World Cup. Domestic form as a selectorial aid is a notion that has become quaint in some parts of the cricketing world, most notably England (though Australia, to its credit, still holds the Sheffield Shield in high regard). I write having just watched television coverage of New Zealand team with second-string bowling attack driving our first ODI series win in India. Speaking at the end of the match, 31-year-old debutant Jayden Lennox emphasised that it was the strength of domestic cricket that enabled him and his internationally inexperienced colleagues to survive in the deep end at this level.

At Taupo, Craig McMillan illustrated this point in reverse. The Canterbury batter was having a poor run in the series of seven (!) ODIs against India. He had failed again the previous day at Napier, so somebody had the bright idea of sending him over the hill to Owen Delany Park where it was hoped his form could be found by knocking the ND attack about. In fact, he scratched about for two from 16 balls, the ND bowlers sensing prey that was lame.

I don’t say much about the pitch in the live report, but it seems that there was a sporting balance between bat and ball. For much of the reply it appeared that Canterbury’s modest looking 196 would be enough. ND did not make scoring look easy and subsided to 107 for six. A partnership of 76 between Scott Styris and Robbie Hart kept ND in the game, but they were left with 14 to win on the last over, a colossal prospect in the pre-T20 era, but one that Styris addressed by hitting the first two deliveries from Stephen Cunis for straight sixes. He took a single from the next, leaving Graeme Aldridge three balls to hit the winning run (ND had lost one more wicket than Canterbury, who would take the points in a tie). The fast bowler could only block the fourth ball. The fifth he hit straight to Paul Wiseman at mid off, expecting to be run out but giving Styris the strike for the final ball of the match. The fielder, perhaps flustered by this  kamikaze approach, let the ball through his legs and ND had won by two wickets (not the three wickets misreported by CricInfo).

Next, it was back home to Smallbone Park, Rotorua, where ND crashed and burned against Otago, going down by 79 runs. Otago’s star player was Marcel McKenzie, with a career-best score 90, a catch and a run out. I have no memory of him even though I clearly interviewed him at the close of play. I doubt that he remembers me either.

The star attraction for spectators was an Otago all-rounder playing his first cricket for more than a decade: Jeff Wilson, scorer of 44 tries in 60 internationals for the All Blacks. Wilson rejected what had become an All Black pension plan of a lucrative contract with a club in Europe, though he had many offers. Instead he went back to the distinctly unstarry world of New Zealand domestic cricket with the aim of returning to the international team, for which he had made four ODI appearances in 1993.

At Smallbone Park, Wilson conceded just eight runs in five overs. The following year he made two further appearances in ODIs as well as the inaugural T20 international, won by Australia, who took it altogether more seriously than New Zealand, who wore the retro beige kit and, in Hamish Marshall’s case, matching bouffant afro hairstyle.

ND’s three other home games were all at Seddon Park in Hamilton. The first two, against Wellington and Central Districts respectively, were notable for the return of Daniel Vettori to the ND line-up. Vettori was plucked out of domestic cricket at 18 so made few appearances for the province thereafter (in total 19 first-class and 33 List A). I’m pretty sure that this was his first appearance in a game that I reported in the three years I covered ND, though he would quite often turn up at games if he was at home in Hamilton off-duty.

Learning in the international arena benefitted Vettori’s bowling but held back his batting. So he made the most of the opportunity to open in these two games, top-scoring in both with 89 and 57 respectively. His combined figures for 20 overs were three for 52. Vettori’s performance was decisive in the 43-run defeat of Wellington, but could not avert the 100-run loss to CD. ND’s score against Wellington was enhanced by 55 extras including 31 wides.

There was another defeat in the final home round-robin game, against Auckland. ND had a fair excuse: the rain. Their innings was interrupted four times and the Aucks lost six wickets in pursuit of their reduced Duckworth-Lewis target.

I am surprised to find that, despite three home losses out of five, ND not only qualified for the knockout stage of the competition, but went on to win it. A low-scoring semi was won at the Basin Reserve. A partnership of 107 between the Marshall brothers was key in the final win at the North Harbour Stadium in Auckland (and I would have taken five or six guesses to have identified the venue).

And as far as my professional career as a cricket writer went, that was that. There was hope in the sale of CricInfo to the Wisden organisation, then owned by J Paul Getty, who had a delightful combination of a love of cricket and stacks of money. But a couple of months into the winter we had to return our laptops to Christchurch “for maintenance”. This was soon followed by the news that the New Zealand operation was shutting down. In the near quarter-century since, CricInfo reporters have been present at New Zealand grounds rarely, mostly for visits from the big three international teams and not always then.

It was an immensely enjoyable privilege to be paid to travel around the North Island to write about the cricket. I missed it when it was gone. For the next three years I watched very little cricket in person. This was partly because I was busy during the working week, and lived over an hour’s drive away from the nearest venues, but it was also because I found the experience of sitting out on the bank without a notebook in hand (and having to provide my own lunch) to be rather empty. It was not until I moved to Wellington in 2006 that the proximity of the Basin Reserve eased me into the resumption of regular attendance.

The missing pleasure of writing about the game was a gap filled by the creation of Scorecards in 2009. If you are at the Basin and come across someone making notes for no apparent reason, do say hello.