The Return of the Kings

Wellington v Northern Districts, 50 overs, Basin Reserve, 4 November 2018

Scorecard

At full strength Northern Districts would be favourites to beat any other domestic team in the world, Surrey included. They have five bowlers in the top 15 of the world rankings in at least one format—Boult, Southee, Wagner, Santner and Sodhi—as well as one of the world’s best batsmen, Kane Williamson, other established internationals De Grandhomme and Watling, and Anderson and Seifert in T20.

“At full strength” is the key thing there. All the above except the injured Santner are on international duty in the UAE at the moment, where the Black Caps are taking on Pakistan in all three formats.

Wellington are without Blundell, van Beek and Rachin Ravindra, all with New Zealand A in the same location. Ravindra’s absence is particularly noteworthy as he is yet to play for Wellington’s senior team in first-class, list A or T20, but has been accelerated into the national A squad because of exceptional promise shown in international age group cricket, another straw in the wind that blows away the significance of the domestic first-class game.

What’s more, Jeetan Patel has opted out of the shorter forms for Wellington this year so as to preserve his aging bones for the next English season, for which nobody blames him in the least. Luke Woodcock has also decided to restrict himself to red-ball cricket, having made more first-class appearances for Wellington than any player has for any New Zealand province.

This is the New Zealand present, and the UK future: the national 50-over competition without the top talent, and with a fair portion of the middling talent unavailable too. This is what it will be like from 2020 when the Hundread (feel free to use that) gets under way.

Today’s match was an illustration of what the game becomes in these circumstances—a contest in who can best disguise their inexperience. Of course, a fine game of cricket can be the outcome, tolerable in the New Zealand spring, but lacking something as the main attraction outside the big grounds in the high English summer.

Andrew Fletcher and Malcolm Nofal opened, ND having won the toss and put Wellington in. Fletcher, who has earned his first professional contract at 25 with a lot of runs in club cricket, has been Wellington’s 50-over star so far, with two centuries in three games. He didn’t start like a man in peak form. One handsome cover drive apart, he was fortunate not to touch at least one of the deliveries that Brett Randell sent down the off-stump corridor.

As so often, a wicket fell after the release of pressure when good but unrewarded opening bowlers were replaced. The deceptively amiably paced Daryl Mitchell came on and had soon accounted for the first three Wellington wickets.

Nofal played casually across to be leg before, Conway feathered a catch behind (from his disappointed reaction the bird was already plucked), and Michael Bracewell top-edged a hook to fine leg.

Mitchell, by the way, is no relation to the Worcestershire player of the same name but is the son of John Mitchell, the former All Blacks coach who seems to be doing a fine job as England’s defensive coach, judging from the difficulty teams from this half of the world have had in crossing the line in the last couple of weeks.

For all Mitchell’s success, there was a right-arm-medium sameness about the Northern Districts attack. Fletcher was given far too many opportunities to play off his pads, which seems to be a strength of his.

Off spinner Joe Walker provided a little variety. He is one of several Northern Districts players whose off field time (there being little else to do in Hamilton of an evening) is the cultivation of big, bushy beards. A field-setting discussion between Walker, Devcich and Brownlie resembled a meeting of the crowned heads of Europe in the years before the First World War.

 

Devcich and Brownlie model ND's one-day and T20 uniforms

At 81 for three, Fletcher was joined by Jimmy Neesham, perhaps the best player left in New Zealand this weekend. At once, he was on the attack with great reserves of timing and power. The extent of his domination can be measured by the fact that when he reached 50, the fourth-wicket partnership was worth no more than 67.

Fletcher edged a catch behind off the slow left-arm of Anton Devcich for 64, but with ten overs to go Wellington were 203 for four, looking to set a target not far short of 300. At that time I wrote a cautionary note saying “all depends on Neesham”. So when he was out chasing a Devcich down the legside in the 42^nd over, estimates of the final total tumbled like those for the post-Brexit pound.

It was a smart piece of keeping by Bocock. Everybody around the boundary thought that Neesham had been stumped, but the clue was that no wide was given. It took the online replay to confirm a sharp catch, the bails whipped off in affirmation. Neesham made 86 from 67 balls with eight fours and four sixes.

That Wellington got as far as 269 was due to some loose bowling and optimistic hitting, particularly from Ollie Newton, whose innings was the cricketing equivalent of the golfer who keeps driving into the trees only to have the ball rebound into the middle of the fairway.

Devcich cleaned up the last three wickets to give him a career-best five for 46.

In the break between innings I called into the Museum, where I was delighted to find that they were having a half-price Wisden sale. I settled on an unusual 1950 edition, bound in hard covers, but dark red with a navy blue spine. I have never seen one like this before. Perhaps it was an individual collector salvaging a dilapidated copy with their own design; one or two of mine could do with some help. It cost NZ$30, which is about £15 at current rates.

That’s No 73 on the shelves in Scorecards Towers, with 1951 the most recent gap. I must get round to writing something in each edition about how I got it and where it’s been so that when they end up on other shelves one day, their story will be known.

Wellington’s opening bowlers Bennett and Newton started well, conceding just five runs from the first four overs. Bennett had Cooper leg before with a full pitch. For the next 15 overs, Northern Districts made decent progress, but it was clear that much rested on the partnership between the Tsar and the King, who, with Mitchell, comprised the bulk of their team’s experience.

At 86 for two in the 21^st over it was pretty even, but Devcich’s slog-sweep to long on was the first of six wickets to fall in the next 12 overs, with just 44 added to the total. The last two wickets added a further hundred, with Randell, Gibson and (especially) Bocock striking the ball well and with spirit. But the rate required expanded throughout, so for those of us who stayed, the experience of the last hour was akin to knowing that your car has passed its warrant (= MoT for UK readers) but having to hang around for the paperwork to be completed.

With four for 34, Hamish Bennett was again outstanding. Nofal took three with his slow left-arm, with the word “occasional” now deleted from that description.

With four of ten rounds completed, Wellington were top of the table. The winner of the group stage hosts the final with second and third playing off for the other place.

Three days at the Plunket Shield

Wellington v Central Districts, Basin Reserve, 17 – 20 March 2018

Over the two weekends before I went down to Christchurch for the test match, I was able to watch three days of Plunket Shield cricket, New Zealand’s equivalent of the County Championship. They turned out to be decisive in deciding the winner of this season’s competition.

Like first-class competitions the world over, the Plunket Shield is the discarded novel of the cricket calendar. Put down at the end of the November, it is picked up again at the beginning of March, without anybody having any clear memory of the plot or the characters.

I was at the Basin for the first of two days of the game between Wellington and Central Districts in the eighth of the competition’s ten rounds It began with Wellington leading the table with Central second, so a home win would be a large step to Wellington’s first title since 2004.

I have preached before about the necessity of getting to the cricket on time. This is doubly the case for cricket at the Basin where the pitch awakes vigorously with the dawn chorus before settling down by lunchtime for a four-day snooze. Returning readers may recall that earlier this season, Auckland were 12 for seven early in the piece and that Wellington were 246 without loss by the end of the day.

Central put Wellington in. Adam Milne, once more of Kent, opened the bowling to Michael Papps:

·        1^st ball—edged between third slip and gully for four.

·        2^nd ball—diving catch in the gully. Steven Murdoch is in.

·        3^rd ball—edged to second slip, keeper caught the rebound, Murdoch is out. Four for two.

Luke Woodcock and Michael Bracewell survived the rest of a testing opening spell from Milne, resolutely leaving on length, even with the ball almost brushing the bails. Jesse Ryder was the surprise choice to replace Milne. Kent people who have seen Ryder regularly run through the county’s order would spot the danger here, but Bracewell did not and lashed out at the first ball, well wide of off stump, to be caught behind. He was a soldier who survived battle but who then succumbed to a dodgy prawn sandwich on the way home.

New Zealand is as replete with young South Africans as English cricket is. Two were important here. Willem Ludick was on first-class debut. The final day of this game was his 21^st birthday. He is well on the brisk side of medium and took two wickets as Wellington were reduced to 99 for five by early afternoon.

This brought in Malcolm Nofal, a 26-year-old left-hander from Johannesburg, on first-class debut for Wellington having played a handful of games for Gauteng, the last four years ago.

He joined Luke Woodcock. Has anybody ever seen Woodcock and Darren Stevens in the same room? Both are balding and tending to the portly, yet perform rescue operations of Tracy brothers proportions as a matter of routine. In the morning, Woodcock was a fortress, holding ground that others were conceding. In the afternoon he began to make forays into opposition territory and by the evening was advancing on all fronts.

Woodcock and Nofal put on 247 for the sixth wicket before Woodcock went for 147 near the end of the day. I made a note that it was a long time since I had seen so many cross-bat shots in one day, a measure of the predictability of the Basin pitch, and how the Central attack flagged. 226 of Wellington’s 365 for six for the day came after the halfway point.

Nofal continued to bash away on the second morning, with enthusiastic assistance from Nos 8, 9 and 10—Patel, Newton and McPeake respectively—who bludgeoned 119 between them. Wellington were all out for 530. Nofal was eighth out for 175, which, as we will see, left the Wellington selectors less impressed than might have been thought.

Nineteen-year-old slow-left-armer debutant Felix Murray had begun with ten from his first nine overs while Wellington were still in defensive mode, but conceded 79 from his remaining nine. Murray had stepped into the shoes of Ajaz Patel (who had been called up for the test warm-up in Hamilton), or possibly into Patel’s shirt and trousers, both of which appeared to be three or four sizes too big for him.

Ben Smith fell early in the Central reply, lbw with bat raised. It looked a bowler’s decision, but as Arthur Jepson used to say “there’s a reason tha’s got a bat in thy ‘and”.

The highlight of the rest of the day was Jesse Ryder’s 69 from 85 balls, with two sixes. I wonder how much longer he’ll stick around. He is good enough to carry on making runs for another ten years, but can he be bothered with everything that goes with it? Watching him bat has been one of this season’s greatest pleasures.

Central were 226 for three when my two days at the game ended. Unlike Wellington, nobody kicked on to a century and they were 107 behind on first innings. They made no attempt on the target of 372, focusing instead on stopping Wellington for collecting the 12 points for a win, which they achieved with just two wickets to spare. With two rounds to go, Wellington now led Central by eight points.

One other unfortunate curiosity to emerge from the second day was that, though there were no more than 100 watching the game, one of them was ejected for bad behaviour, trespassed no less, with police officers called. Is this the smallest crowd to have one of its number expelled? I suppose we should be grateful that the Plunket Shield still evokes such passion.

Wellington v Northern Districts, Basin Reserve, 25 – 28 March 2018

A week later I was back at the Basin for the first day of round nine. Northern Districts were the visitors. Tom Blundell returned from New Zealand A duty and Wellington chose to go in with an extra bowler, Alex Ridley. So Wellington’s seventh-wicket partnership was Newton and Ridley. There’s a Rovers Return joke in there somewhere.

The selection meant that Malcolm Nofal’s 175 was not enough to keep him in the side. Wellington’s scorer Ian Smith (no relation to the keeper-commentator of the same name) was prompted to recall that as a boy he had seen Dickie Bird’s famous 181 not out for Yorkshire against Glamorgan at Bradford, after which Bird was dropped as we have heard so often since.  

The spirit of HD Bird was certainly with us today. Twenty-five minutes in, Wellington, put in by Northern, were 15 without loss. It was as uneventful an opening half-hour as we have seen at the Basin for a long time, the pitch offering none of its customary early-morning spite. Then Anton Devcich slipped on the opposite edge of the square to the pitch and it was all on. Umpires Dempsey and Gillies stood over the damp patch with the solemnity of statesmen dividing a small country. The players were sent back to the rooms while deliberations continued.  Dempsey has recent form in the cricket-prevention stakes. He was officiating at Rangiora the week before, when the game was abandoned on the second day because of a pitch so dangerous that Canterbury had scored no more than 485 for six declared a few hours before.

Umpires and groundstaff stood around the quagmire doing nothing that might affect the situation beyond blocking out the sun. Nevertheless, twenty minutes of this did the trick and play resumed. Cricket, eh?

Michael Papps followed one down the legside to be caught behind, but otherwise Wellington proceeded to 90 for one shortly before lunch with no reason to think that the pitch wouldn’t offer up the easy runs that are the norm on the first afternoon at the Basin.

We were unprepared for Ish Sodhi destroying Wellington’s season in a couple of hours. In my view Sodhi should not have been in Wellington; his proper place was in the test team in Auckland rather than Todd Astle, who is a fair leg-spinner, but who could not have treated us to the masterly display of the art that Sodhi offered us here. Bowling unchanged from the southern end, he took seven for 30 from 15.3 overs.

Sodhi didn’t just get the Wellington batsmen out; he made them look hapless and clueless, children bewildered by a magician at a birthday party. He was magnificent. The last nine wickets added only 47.

By the end of the day Northern were 168 for four. Corey Anderson made 61 of these from 65 balls with three sixes. He is a wonderfully clean striker of a cricket ball, and if Somerset can lay their hands on sufficient cotton wool to wrap his fragile physique in between games he will be a real asset in the T20.

I wasn’t there on the second day, which was all Northern needed to wrap it up. Jeetan Patel took five, but Northern still had a lead of 186, which Wellington couldn’t match second time round. Sodhi took five more. Meanwhile in Napier, Central were beating Canterbury by an innings to takeover at the top of the table. Wellington were beaten in the last round, so a draw was enough to secure the Plunket Shield for Central Districts.

Those two hours of magic from Ish Sodhi had cost Wellington the prize. I saw Sodhi play again later that week, in the test at Christchurch. I thought that Kane Williamson might have given him longer spells. His match-saving 56 not out should ensure that his batting will no longer be a negative factor at selectors’ meetings.

As we in New Zealand embark on our annual endeavour to winter well, we hand the responsibility of serious cricket watching over to our friends in the north.