The 2006/07 Ashes Revisited

The lockdown has been kind to us here at Scorecards Towers in Wellington. We have both been busy working from home, in a big house with plenty of books. People who watch County Championship or Plunket Shield cricket are likely to be temperamentally suited to lockdown life. What’s more, Sky TV NZ’s cricket channel has been a treasure trove of delight; archive material is filling the Sky box, lifestyle programmes and earnest dramas surreptitiously deleted to make room.

Best of all, they are reprising whole Ashes series, first 2006/07, then 2010/11. Not highlights, but full days, with the commercial breaks edited out, so the over rate cracks along.

I knew the outcome of the 2006/07 series of course: a five-nil drubbing for the old country. There was a fair smattering of memories: England losing at Adelaide when it seemed impossible to do so; Gilchrist’s onslaught at the WACA; most of all, a lunchtime pub in Wellington falling silent for the first ball of the series, then erupting in laughter as Flintoff collected it at second slip. Of the fourth and fifth tests I had almost no recall at all; I had returned to the UK for a few weeks, and saw none of it live. I didn’t look at any scorecards or reports in advance of watching these repeats, so a lot of it came fresh, despite knowing the results.

There was more that surprised than might have been expected from the first whitewashed Ashes series since Warwick Armstrong. Five-nil suggests Australian dominance from first ball to last, but that’s not how it was. In every game England were in a good position at one time or another. At the Waca Australia were all out for 244 having won the toss. Margin of victory: 206 runs. At the MCG England were 101 for two before collapsing to 159; then they had Australia at 84 for five. Margin of loss: an innings and 99. At Sydney they were 166 for two. Margin of loss: ten wickets. Worst of all, in Adelaide how could they have lost from 551 for six declared batting first?

The Adelaide defeat was because England froze on the last day, the runs drying up like grapes in the sun. Had they made 30 more, but been out at the same time, the game would have been saved. Australia were better equipped to make sure that at the turning points the match went down the green-and-gold road. There was no shame in this for England as that Australian side was one of the finest test teams ever to play the game. They had four great players: Gilchrist, McGrath, Ponting and Warne, and a few more who weren’t far off.

For McGrath and Warne, it was last-chance-to-see, in test matches anyway. With the Ashes reclaimed at the earliest possible moment, the the Melbourne and Sydney tests became a royal progress celebrating the two great bowlers, and rightly so.

McGrath rarely ventured outside the 120s in terms of kph, and was not quite the force he once was; but he was still good enough as he showed by destroying England’s middle order in Sydney. He got the timing of his retirement exactly right, past the summit but before the downward slope got steep.

Warne might have carried on for years on this evidence. By this time, he was part spin bowler, part hypnotist and part PT Barnum. He certainly had a sense of theatre and the gift of timing: his 700th wicket was taken at Melbourne on Boxing Day and his 1000th in international cricket at Sydney in the New Year (though it seemed wrong to have him bowling defensively down the legside at Adelaide, like commissioning Canaletto to whitewash the ceiling).

The biggest difference between test cricket then and now was the absence of the DRS system. Over the series as a whole the umpiring was pretty good, but there were plenty of mistakes, and most of the critical ones went against England. Andrew Strauss copped a couple in Perth, caught behind off the thigh pad in the first innings and given lbw in the second for a duck off Lee, when the ball would have cleared the stumps as comfortably as a literary joke passing over the heads of the Barmy Army. Australians will make the point that, had the DRS been available in that era, it would have spotted that Michael Kasprowicz’s hand was off the bat at the climax of Edgbaston ’05, removing that series from the legendary category in a couple of frames.

Rudi Koertzen had a poor game at Melbourne. Hayden was stone-cold lbw against Hoggard twice in the same over early in his innings; Symonds was reprieved in the fifties. Both made 150s and put on 279 for the sixth wicket from 89 for five. That’s the biggest difference between then and now—putting up with poor decisions.

I’d forgotten about Koertzen’s self-indulgent manner of giving batsmen out, drawing the left arm from behind the back with cruel slowness; a man could be halfway back to the rooms before the finger was fully extended. In comparison, Billy Bowden’s crooked finger of fate appeared understated. Alim Dar also officiated, the only umpire from that time still on the international circuit (though Bowden still favours the domestic audience here with displays of his powers of rain divination, I am pleased to say).

Symonds achieved his maiden test hundred with a straight six off Collingwood. Reaching the landmark had taken him longer than expected and there was to be only one more century. I had the pleasure of seeing Symonds often when he came to play for Gloucestershire as a teenager, the most talented player of that age that I have seen. He had a good international record, with averages of 40 in both tests and 198 ODIs, yet there remains a feeling of what-might-have-been.

Symonds isn’t the only player who evokes that emotion in this series. Monty Panesar had been England’s leading test wicket taker in the 2006 season, but Ashley Giles was picked ahead of him for the first two tests of this series, continuing England’s long tradition of picking the lesser player in search of that elusive quality, balance (Giles had once been a worthy first choice, but that time had passed). As I write, somebody on Twitter is asking (out of genuine perplexity) how come Derek Pringle was ever picked for England.

Picked for the third test, Panesar finished second in the bowling averages, a fraction behind Hoggard, though the fact that they were both on 37 tells us much about the series. One of the commentators (I think Benaud, though it sounds a little acerbic for him) said that England had replaced a slow bowler with a spinner. They were critical of how Flintoff handled him at times. Ian Chappell said at Sydney that Panesar should introduce himself to his captain to remind him that his name was not Ashley Giles, and that Flintoff should stop setting fields as if he was.

Panesar was 24, and appeared set for a distinguished career. He finished with 167 wickets from 50 tests, which is not bad, but the exuberant, popular young man who bowled with such imagination and confidence here was capable of so much more. Of course, the emergence of Graeme Swann as a top-class spinner limited his opportunities, and he has faced some mental health issues bravely. At 38, he is two years younger than Jeetan Patel, and could have been mesmerising the best batsmen in the Championship still.

The biggest unexpected pleasure of rediscovering this series was the wicketkeeping of Chris Read, unexpected not because there is any doubt about Read’s quality, but because I had forgotten that he replaced Geraint Jones in the final two tests. Ian Healy said that Read’s was “the most convincing, efficient, technical display I’ve seen from an England keeper for 20 years”, and went on to say he was just as good as Alan Knott, which caused Bill Lawry to say “You’ve just made me fall off my chair”. Knott remains the gold standard of keeping for those who played with or against him, but the fact that the comparison is not fanciful is compliment enough.

Read never played test cricket again. Utility, in the form of Matt Prior, was preferred over beauty. Read continued in county cricket for another ten years, becoming, almost certainly, the last keeper to make more than a thousand first-class dismissals, and finishing with 27 centuries and a career average just a couple under Prior’s. That he did not have at least a hundred test caps is a scandal.

Coverage was from Channel Nine, close to its peak. In Richie Benaud and Ian Chappell they had two of the great commentators and the rest were more than the sum of their parts. They each had a distinctive voice and style, from Mark Nicholas’s plumed hat to Bill Lawry’s excited-falsetto. Nicholas spent much of the first test explaining the innovation of Hot Spot in the manner of someone introducing fire to the Neanderthals. In Nine’s final years, it was difficult to tell which of Clarke, Hussey, Lee and Brayshaw was at the microphone; they weren’t bad commentators, but they all sounded much the same. The common criticism that they looked at the game as if every day were Australia Day could not be levelled in 2006/07, it being difficult to over-praise a team that won five-nil.

Finally, what of Andrew Flintoff? The memory, and a superficial look at the numbers, says that his captaincy was a disaster from first to last. As ever, the reality was more complex. The commentators were quite impressed early on, at least in terms of setting an example and leading from the front. His handling of Panesar was astute when the spinner returned to the side in Perth. Many captains would have pulled Panesar out of the attack when Symonds took him for 17 in an over, but Flintoff showed confidence in a bowler who went on to take only the third five-for by a spinner in a Waca test. But the captain’s self-belief waned with each missed opportunity. It was that Hayden/Symonds partnership at the MCG that finally brought him down like a slaver’s statue. From that time on, he had the crestfallen look of a man who knew that there was a pedalo out there, waiting for him.

 

The Plunket Shield Returns: Declarations and Dropped Catches

Wellington v Northern Districts, Plunket Shield, Basin Reserve, 21 ­– 24 March 2019

Scorecard

New Zealand’s domestic first-class season resumes at last. The first half was so long ago that I have a half-formed memory of Bert Sutcliffe and Dick Motz having played in it. With four of the eight games to go, Wellington are in fourth place, six points and two places behind visitors Northern Districts.

I wasn’t there for the first day, at the end of which Wellington were 367 for five. The pitch was, apparently, rain-forest green at the start but did little more than carry through at a perfect pace for the batsmen. Rachin Ravindra, on his first appearance in first-class cricket at the Basin, made 96 and Devon Conway was 146 not out overnight. Conway has now made 200 more runs than anybody else in the Plunket Shield this season, having been the leading run scorer in the domestic T20. From South Africa, Conway will qualify for New Zealand in 2020, and looks a shoe-in in all forms as things stand.

Earlier in the week, a three-day deluge had been forecast, so it was good to see the players taking the field as I arrived at the Basin at the scheduled start time. But it was only as I took my seat that I registered the presence of umpire Brent “Billy” Bowden, already well advanced in his rain-divination ritual. Sure enough, microscopic water droplets were coaxed out of the air, and the players were off the field before a ball had been bowled.

It did get a bit heavier, but only briefly, and hardly sufficient, it seemed to make much of a difference to the state of the outfield. Nevertheless, it was determined that play could not start until a hot-air blower had circled the ground a few times, and at some speed. This is the twenty-first century’s version of a rope being dragged around the ground, but less effective, one would have thought.

With Bowden satisfied that the outfield had been returned to as near a desert state as was possible in the circumstances, play began. But not for long. In the sixth over of the day Logan van Beek slapped a straight four that disappeared under the sightscreen. First one player disappeared behind the screen to retrieve the ball. Then another. Then another. Five players there in the end. They emerged in the manner of schoolboys from behind the bike sheds, but the ball was found—in a drainage channel, so it was soaking wet. Umpire Bowden retreated, at stately gait, to the dressing rooms, returning with a replacement. This was deemed unsuitable, so he repeated the excursion, this whole proceeding taking place at a speed that would have shamed a funeral. The next ball was bowled more than ten minutes after the last.

In between the interruptions, Conway completed his 150 and van Beek his 50. With maximum bonus points harvested, Wellington declared at 400, earlier than would usually have been the case because of the foreboding weather forecast.

Northern Districts captain Daniel Flynn inside edged to uproot his leg stump from Hamish Bennett’s second delivery, but that was only wicket for the rest of the truncated day. Cooper should have been a second, but was dropped by keeper Blundell, diving across Patel at first slip. There was some criticism from the cognoscenti about Blundell having taken the catch away from Patel, but the man with the gloves should always go for anything catchable. His mistake was not that he went for it, but that he dropped it, and it was to have critical consequences towards the end of the game.

Northern Districts were 78 for one at lunch, but the rain returned, diffidently but enough to finish play for the day, bar one brief return during which three were added to the total. So it was an afternoon of hanging about at the cricket waiting for something to happen, which is never disagreeable as long as I have a book and a coffee.

When we got to the ground for the third day, the scoreboard showed the Wellington were nought for nought, so, assuming that the North Koreans had retaken control of the information channels, we joked that ND must have declared. They had, 319 behind on first innings. I have seen many a declaration deal that was a consequence of the weather, but can’t recall one predicated on the forecast of rain, rather than actual wetness. The assumption, entirely correct as it turned out, was that there would be no fourth day. Nobody likes these negotiated finishes, but there are occasions when it is for the best and this was one of them.

Obviously, Wellington would score as many as needed to reach an agreed target, but this passage of play was different to what would normally be expected in this situation. The Northern Districts opening bowlers, Kuggeleijn and Baker, bowled with hostility at full pace, with plenty of short stuff. The Wellington batsmen sliced and swished, the runs coming rapidly as a result. No cognisance was taken of this in terms of the field settings or the approach of the bowlers. It was as if two games were taking place at the same time, each politely ignoring the other.

Wellington reached 53 for two in six overs in this manner before the declaration, leaving Northern Districts a target of 373 with 88 overs scheduled. However, this was the third, not the fourth, day, so the possibility of an extra eight overs if a result could be achieved had to be factored in. This would reduce the required scoring rate to under four an over, possibly generous on a pitch as friendly to batsmen as a labrador to a butcher.

Flynn went early and softly, guiding a legside delivery into the hands of Blundell. Seifert was dropped early at third slip by Nofal off the bowling of Newton, high to the left-handed fielder’s right. That chance apart, Seifert and Cooper reached lunch progressing at the required four an over and looking easy about it. Already the second gully and third slip had been relocated to more defensive positions.

Hamish Bennett began his second spell after the interval and a menacing line on off stump dismissed both batsmen to slip catches. At any other point in New Zealand’s cricket history, Bennett would be in or near the national team, but such is the depth of pace bowling here that he isn’t mentioned.

At the other end, Jeetan Patel called the batsmen to him and attached a leash to their collars, conceding just 17 from his first 12 overs. Dean Brownlie hit a series of attractive cover boundaries at the other end, but it may have been Patel’s control that induced him to play loosely at McPeake to be caught at third slip by Nofal.

Daryl Mitchell (to repeat, not the Worcestershire version) slipped Patel’s leash and went for a run in the park by hitting a six onto the top deck of the RA Vance Stand, happily missing the only spectator in any of its thousand or so seats at the time—your writer—by some way. His liberty was temporary as Bennett had him leg before, playing across a full delivery from Bennett.

Carter gave Patel his only wicket of the innings with a caught and bowled to leave Northern on 236 for six, but not out of it as long as BJ Watling remained out there, at the scene of his two world-record test partnerships. There is no cricketer in the world whose excellence goes so unrecognised. He keeps wicket as well as any of the regular test keepers, if, as it seems we have to, we regretfully exclude Ben Foakes from that category. Williamson and Taylor apart, he is as good an orthodox batsman as New Zealand has. It is generally a surprise to look at the scoreboard to find how many runs he has, usually 20 or so more than you realise, made by playing appropriate shots with no fuss at all. He made 77 in this manner today, looking the best batsman in the side by a street. Only when he was seventh out at 258 did Northern’s aspirations for victory disappear. Kuggeleijn was bowled by Newton, leaving no doubt that the umpires would agree to the extra eight to settle it.

Just before the extra overs began there occurred the first of two fielding errors that decided it. Blundell—still with that failed dive across first slip in his head—did not go for a chance that passed him at a nice height before continuing past first slip well to Patel’s left. Earlier he failed to collect a Patel delivery that beat Watling. It was unclear from the long room where Watling’s back foot was, but it was certainly close enough for the bails to have been removed to test the case.

It was little over a year ago that Blundell played a couple of tests when Watling was injured, scoring a century on debut. Now he looks like a keeper whose confidence has gone.

From the first ball of the extra overs Baker was caught at first slip to give Bennett his fifth wicket. Twenty-one-year-old Zak Gibson joined Ish Sodhi with seven overs and five balls to see out for the draw, if the weather forecast was correct. Gibson looked a capable No 11 and Sodhi made no attempt to protect him from the strike. Given some of Sodhi’s shot selections, it might have been an idea for Gibson to have protected him.

With nine down and safety just a few overs away, hooking Newton was unwise. Sodhi got under it and the ball flew towards long leg where Bennett awaited. He had to move in a little way, but did so quickly, too quickly perhaps, as he now had a second or so to ponder the context, to make a list of all the ways in which it could go wrong.

It went straight through his hands.

There were a few close things and near misses, but Sodhi and Gibson survived the remaining overs. Players and spectators were all confused about how to react at the end of the day. Had Northern saved the game? It all depended on the weather.

Bennett—without whose splendid bowling Wellington would not have got remotely as close to winning the game—looked mortified. Had it been the real last day he could at least have put it behind him straight away. But he had to return the following day to watch the rain in the hope that there would be redemption. One over might have been all it needed.

I didn’t go down to the Basin on the last day (it might have been worth it to watch Billy Bowden’s all-day portrayal of torment, a fine substitute, I am sure, for those of us who missed Olivier’s Othello), but kept an eye on the weather just in case. Apparently, they came close to starting after tea, but another squall came in and that was that.

A win would have put Wellington up to third, just nine points behind new leaders Auckland. As it is, they are fifth of six with three to play.

Back at Hamilton: leg spin and an inflatable pub

Northern Districts v Wellington, T20, Seddon Park, 22 December 2018

Scorecard (contains video links of wickets, boundaries and beards).

For the first time since I moved to Wellington in 2006, I have been to the cricket at Seddon Park in Hamilton. I was a regular in the press box there for three years or so from the turn of the century as CricInfo’s man in the central North Island, and reported upon a good deal of interesting cricket while enjoying Northern Districts’ free lunches.

At that time the ground was newly remodelled to double the size of the banking that surrounds two-thirds or so of the playing area, so as to attract more international fixtures. This involved taking out the trees that formed a near continuous canopy around the top of the bank when I first went to Seddon Park twenty years ago. It was pleasing to see that their replacements have matured, returning the rural feel that the ground has despite its central-city location (as I have noted previously, it is the only ground I have spectated at where I have been able to get a haircut and sit-down meal and still been back in my seat for the first ball after lunch). As well as the bouncy castle, without which no T20 match can be played, there was also an inflatable pub.

It was a pleasure to watch under lights in a part of the country where the climate does not necessitate an overcoat, several sweaters and a balaclava to survive the experience. Flags were given to spectators on arrival rather than the thermal blankets that are more appropriate in Wellington. 

The occasion was the opening game of the domestic T20 season, with Northern Districts hosting Wellington. A pleasing scheduling development this year is that many games are double headers, with the men’s match preceded by a women’s game. I arrived in time to catch the last ten overs of so of ND’s innings. Chasing 144, ND were well-placed with 60 or so needed and eight wickets standing, but they collapsed like the morale of the turkey population at this time of year, losing seven wickets for 23 runs.

Amelia Kerr was playing for Wellington. Recently turned 18, in June she broke the women’s world ODI record for an individual with 232 against Ireland. Good judges say that she is a rare talent, and I look forward to seeing her bat. Today it was her bowling that took the eye. She took three for ten with her leg spin, inducing cluelessness in the opposition as only a good leg spinner can. The last time I saw a leggie do that was when Ish Sodhi ran through Wellington at the Basin earlier this year. Though in the other camp, he greeted her with warm approval after the match, the fellowship of the wrist-spinner’s union overriding team loyalty. The ND lower order may not be technically equipped to meet the challenge, but a bowler who lands it with consistent accuracy and turns it both ways with bounce as Kerr does, will bamboozle better players than them.

In the men’s match, Wellington won the toss and put ND in. On a good pitch for batting, as Seddon Park is, I remain of the opinion that it is better to bat first as the pressure of chasing a large total undoes a team so often. That is, more or less, what happened here.

Though Walker wasn’t in the home side here, the other two bearded crowned heads were, and it turned out to be a royalist triumph, though it did not seem that way when Devcich was forced to abdicate from the second ball of the match, top edging Woodcock to short third man.

Devcich was replaced by his emperor-cousin Dean Brownlie who played the most substantial innings of the day, 99 from 45 balls, 76 of which came in boundaries. It was a satisfying combination of muscle and guile. One short of the hundred, Brownlie deserves credit for going for the big hit rather than taking the easy single that was there for the asking.

Each of the first five overs of the innings was delivered by a different bowler. The aim of this is to prevent the batsmen from settling, but it is a tactic that can be more disruptive to the bowlers. Woodcock, for example, bowled a fine first over, but was immediately replaced by Neesham, who was hit for four fours (though more athletic fielding might have turned two of them into catches). One of these was a cross-bat smash by Seifert that rocketed towards non-striker Brownlie at waist height. He just managed to straddle jump the oncoming missile. An inch higher and the line of succession would have been terminated there and then. When Woodcock returned, he got tonked too.

Jeetan Patel, who stepped aside from the domestic 50-over competition, is back for the T20 and made an immediate impact, conning the in-form Seifert to tap the first ball he bowled back for an easy caught-and-bowled. Only a single came from that over, but Patel’s effectiveness diminished with each over that he bowled. In his last over his normally infallible control went missing, and three full tosses all went over the rope, by a considerable margin. I felt sympathy for Patel earlier, when a clear mishit by Mitchell went for six, a sure sign of imbalance between bat and ball. Nofal also went for three sixes in one over, all by Brownlie.  

Hamish Bennett’s clever change of pace restricted ND to four from the last over of the innings, but 215 for six is a T20 total that will win many more games than it loses, even in Seddon Park’s corseted boundaries.

It was good to see Mitch Santner back for ND after being out for nine months with a knee injury. The national team lacks balance without him, and 22 not out and three overs for 28 was a satisfactory start.

Leading the reply, Devon Conway got off the mark with a six over long off in the first over off Devcich, followed by a four through mid-wicket next ball. He hit seven more fours, all pure shots through the off side. It was the best cricket of the match.

It is Conway’s second season for Wellington since moving from South Africa. Such is the way of the world that a televised 45 here set off social media in a way that a double hundred in the Plunket Shield a couple of weeks ago failed to do, with many asking when he will be qualified to play for New Zealand (to which the answer is September 2020).

But returning to the theme of leg spinners instigating self-doubt, the mere appearance of Ish Sodhi ball-in-hand caused Conway to abandon the composed orthodoxy that had served him so well to that point. Sodhi’s first ball he unsuccessfully attempted to reverse sweep. The second he charged at brainlessly and was bowled.

Four of Conway’s boundaries came in Scott Kuggeleijn’s first over, and things got no better for the bowler, who had a shocker. The tenth over of the innings included three wides as he kept getting the slow bouncer wrong. At least that over eventually reached a conclusion. Kuggeleijn’s final over included two above-waist full tosses so he was stood down with two balls of the over left. Paradoxically, he bowled more deliveries than anybody else in the game, wides and no balls included, finishing with 3.4-0-58-1.

However, it was Kuggeleijn’s dismissal of Hose, caught behind from the last ball of the tenth over, that sparked the collapse that gave the game to ND. At that point Wellington were more than halfway towards their target with seven wickets standing, so were still narrow favourites.

But Neesham went in the next over, miscuing Sodhi to cover. Sodhi isn’t always the most economical bowler, but gets the key batsmen out, which is why he is No 6 in the world bowling rankings for T20 at the time of writing. Any hope that Wellington had from this point on was expunged by the deceptively unlikely figure of Anton Devcich.

If asked to demonstrate to a young person the art of pie throwing, simply show them a video of Devcich bowling and the job will be done, or so anyone watching him bowl for the first time might be forgiven for thinking. Any indecision on the batsman’s part would be merely whether to hit him over midwicket or long off. But beware. Devcich is in the great tradition of bowlers who carry the appearance of a friendly spaniel but who can bite like a rottweiler. Chris Harris is the personification of the type, his ambling windmill action apparently doing no more than placing the ball on the tee, yet performing good enough a con to bring him 203 wickets in ODIs. Darren Stevens is another example. Devcich finished with four for 27. Wellington’s last six wickets fell for 12 runs.

One man’s misfortune is another’s opportunity. Much of Kuggeleijn’s waywardness was communicated to the world by Billy Bowden, making the most of a rare appearance before the TV cameras to reprise his full range of theatrical umpiring signals, a Christmas ham a few days early.

Billy divines the rain: Wellington v Northern Districts, Basin Reserve, day one, 29 October 2016

Scorecard

Last weekend in Wellington was the New Zealand spring at its best. The sun shone from blue skies and the wind took a rare weekend off. What’s more, Monday was a public holiday. Wellington were at home to Auckland in the opening game of the Plunket Shield. How perfect to spend three days in the sun at the Basin.

A pity then, that the game was played in Mt Maunganui, 500 kms away from the capital. Why is unclear. The RA Vance Stand is shrouded in scaffolding, though the dressing rooms are open, and with a modicum of planning could have been last week, one might think.

Surely there is a venue somewhere in Wellington’s many parks and reserves that would be an acceptable local venue. The English equivalent would be Surrey being unable to play at the Oval and finding no alternative closer than Scarborough.

Admission to Plunket Shield games is free, which absolves the authorities from any responsibility towards spectators. Any coalescence between the fixture list and times when the working fan might get to the game are entirely coincidental. Wellington’s three remaining Plunket Shield games feature just a single day of weekend play.

It is good that the first half of next year’s (shortened) County Championship will be played from Friday to Monday, but the feeling remains that those in charge, mesmerised by T20, can’t be trusted with its well-being. New Zealand’s tale is cautionary.

Inevitably, this weekend it is cold and wet in Wellington. Nevertheless My Life in Cricket Scorecards braved wind-chill temperatures of six degrees and made its way to the Basin to for the first cricket of the season.

Two well-known Hamishes will play for Wellington this year. Gloucestershire’s Hamish Marshall has returned to New Zealand and today is in opposition to his old team Northern Districts for the first time. Marshall was playing the last time I had a day at the cricket, at Canterbury at the end of July. His appearance in the Wellington line-up does nothing to diffuse the air of superannuation about it. Not until Pollard at No 5 do we reach somebody who is under 33 years of age. When I covered domestic cricket for CricInfo 15 years or so ago there were hardly any players over 30 outside the international squad, because it didn’t pay enough. Now players can make a decent living they have no reason to move on. I’m not calling for a cricketing Logan’s Run; the presence of a couple old heads in a team is obviously of benefit, but there has to be space to try out promising young players in first-class cricket, as has traditionally been the practice in New Zealand.

Northern Districts have a much younger profile with only the openers, sometime test players Dean Brownlie and Daniel Flynn, over 30. ND have seven players with the Black Caps in India, evidence of their ability to bring on young players.

Hamish Bennett has moved to Wellington too. For a brief time four or five years ago he was the great hope of New Zealand fast bowling, but the strain of windmilling it down at 140 kph was too much for his body, as it so often is for New Zealand fast bowlers. He began well today, once Wellington had won the toss and put ND in. In the first over he produced a beauty that came back in to take Brownlie’s off stump.

Brent Arnel opened from the RA Vance Stand End, and trapped Flynn lbw with his first ball, which swung into the left-hander. Early indications were that this was a typical Basin first-day greentop. For new readers, Basin pitches have the life cycle of a domestic cat, offering playful excitement, unpredictability and regular danger in their youth before settling down to sleep through most of the last 75% of their existence.

Billy Bowden is standing in this game. Once the biggest act of all, Billy is now reduced to walk-on parts, cricket’s Norma Desmond. But what a pro. Even though there were only five of us spectators, we were privileged to be treated to the unexpurgated version of his rain-divination act. A brief shower sent the players from the field in the seventh over. It was gone almost as soon as it began. With the light improving, a lesser man would have restarted play, but Billy patrolled the middle using every human sense to divine moisture, wherever it might be. In a less sensitive age, a pig would have been taken to the middle and sacrificed so that Billy could read the entrails. He is to rain what Joe McCarthy was to communism—he sees its threat everywhere.

It should be said that he was quite right on this occasion. Some minutes later the rain came down more heavily and that was it for the day. But nobody else would have done it with such pathos and flair.

It’s great that he is prepared to go back to domestic cricket after losing his place on the international panel. He is still a star. It was the pitches that got small. Billy is always ready for his close up.

Here is another account of Billy Bowden’s weather divination. I wrote it for CricInfo in 2000.