Tucked away behind Test cricket and any other cricketing fluff, has been Super Smash shenanigans and now we are approaching a T20I series vs India where the relevance of Super Smash activity explodes. This feels like we are on the Kingsroad, approaching the Inn at the Crossroads where the various highways of Westeros meet for a dash of hot pie and a spliff, before embarking on the next phase of their journey.

A bunch of different routes and Game of Thrones characters venture into the Crossroads Inn and that's where we reside in our little kiwi cricketing world. The Blackcaps are coming off a Test series and some players from that will wiggle into T20 mode, there are also two recent T20I series (Sri Lanka and England) that sprinkle context into the matter. We have the arrival of the big donnies India, far too cool for the Crossroads Inn but like Aotearoa, the Crossroads Inn is a nice place to get what you need and possibly exploit.

Our gaze is cast towards our destination and as someone who is partial to the Stark whanau, let's say we're heading south to make a couple deals and possibly fuck some stuff up in King's Landing. That's the World T20 tournament - right now though, we need to gather some resources, enjoy the hospitality and try not to get murked at the Inn.

Here are the players who have been used in the Blackcaps series in Sri Lanka and then hosting England, sorted by their involvement...

Both series

Tim Southee - 3 games vs Sri Lanka/5 games vs England.

Colin de Grandhomme - 3/5.

Martin Guptill - 2/5.

Scott Kuggeleijn - 3/2.

Daryl Mitchell - 3/3.

Colin Munro - 3/5.

Mitchell Santner - 3/5.

Tim Seifert - 3/5.

Ish Sodhi - 2/5.

Ross Taylor - 2/5.

One Series

Trent Boult - 2 vs England.

Todd Astle - 1 vs Sri Lanka.

Tom Bruce - 1 vs Sr Lanka.

Seth Rance - 3 vs Sri Lanka.

Hamish Rutherford - 1 vs Sri Lanka.

Jimmy Neesham - 3 vs England.

Trent Boult - 2 vs England.

Blair Tickner - 2 vs England.

Lockie Ferguson - 3 vs England.

That paints a rather clear picture about the crux of the Blackcaps T20I crew and to some extent, what we can expect moving forward. In trying to forecast a possible squad to face India, we have to explore the vibe for this series and what the aim is; rolling with the settled group and giving them reps, or seeing who else can step up and giving them a crack for World T20 selection.

And I have no idea what the Blackcaps will do, because no one really knows how selections are made. What I can bring into this equation, are some Super Smash factors and these are led by a bloke who won't be able to play any Blackaps cricket this summer in Devon Conway. As I wrote earlier in the week, Conway is the best batsman across all formats on the domestic circuit and as of Saturday morning, he is chilling with 425 runs @ 70.83avg/149.12sr in the Super Smash. Or perhaps his career record of 38.94avg/124.43sr tickles your toes and that makes for interesting reading compared to other Blackcaps T20 batsmen and their T20 records (not T20I, just general T20)...

Conway: 38.94avg/124.43sr.

Munro: 28.94avg/145.20sr.

Guptill: 33.15avg/130.90sr.

Seifert: 24.44avg/137.80sr.

Phillips: 31.70avg/136.11sr.

Williamson: 29.75avg/123.58sr.

Taylor: 31.27avg/132.69sr.

http://www.news24.com/Archives/Witness/A-bright-future-for-Devon-Conway-who-should-be-in-the-national-team-sooner-rather-than-later-20150430 A Bright Future for Devon Conway 06/11/2010 By Ray White IT is sad indictment of the state of South African cricket that the two most significant innings played by a young batsman since Jacques Kallis made his first-class debut were watched by a pitiful crowd of less than 50 and attracted no mention at all in either the print or electronic media.

Rather impressive from the bro Conway huh? This complicates matters immensely because the Blackcaps will move through T20I series, with a rather hefty elephant in the room in terms of knowing that Conway probably should be there when things get serious. Also complicating matters is the fact that Williamson hasn't played a T20I since February 10th, 2019 and we've all got rather lovely memories of Williamson opening alongside Guptill in T20I cricket.

Outside of managing the workload of Williamson, the skip should be in every Blackcaps T20I squad. We've seen the value of Taylor down the order in the Blackcaps T20I line up and in terms of tactical stuff, having two classy batsmen in Williamson and Taylor surrounded by hitters seems like a decent idea. Whether we see the Williamson/Taylor combo vs India will be interesting, as there is a need to start building these combinations juxtaposed against Mr Know It All Simon Doull telling everyone how tired Williamson was/is.

Guess who hasn't played T20I cricket since November 4th, 2018? Glenn Phillips. That doesn't align Phillips being an all-format monster and Phillips joins this group alongside Conway and Williamson of lads who will be injected into the T20I team, at some stage.

Tim Seifert, Martin Guptill and Tom Bruce are all putting up solid numbers in the Super Smash and that's more than enough to keep them in the equation. Add Jimmy Neesham into the mix as he's jacking up excellent all-round numbers in the Super Smash (17.25avg/8.53rpo with the ball and 51.75avg/131.84sr with the bat), suddenly everything is rather cluttered.

This muddles the batting group, excessively. Colin Munro is under immense pressure and may not even be selected in the squad to face India, if Williamson and Phillips come back into the fold. Colin de Grandhomme's move up the order now clogs the line up even further, possibly keeping the likes of Seifert, Phillips and Bruce out of a 1st 11.

I can't see how Todd Astle, Scott Kuggeleijn, Seth Rance or Hamish Rutherford get into the Blackcaps T20I team again. While I believe Ish Sodhi is on a similar cusp to Munro in terms of trending in the wrong direction, continuing with Sodhi and Santner as the tweakers is a fairly steady approach. Moving away from Sodhi at this point would be rather dramatic and I'd lean towards giving him a full series against India to state his case.

We haven't seen Astle play thus far in the Super Smash, which is niggly and may be a route for him to squeeze into the Blackcaps squad as the selectors may favour his apparent batting prowess. Niggly because Ajaz Patel is the best spinner in the Super Smash right now and there are rather compelling numbers backing up Patel's T20I inclusion - we don't have anything for or against Astle though.

Between Southee, Boult, Ferguson, de Grandhomme and Tickner, space is lacking in the seamer group. Tickner has backed up his recent promotion with a solid Super Smash (24.81avg/10.11rpo), which has Tickner heading the opposite direction to Kuggeleijn (49avg/9.80rpo) and Rance (45.75avg/9.15rpo).

Wildcard seamers could be Ollie Newton or Kyle Jamieson. Newton is tied with Patel at the top of the wicket-taking list, but more impressive is his career T20 record of 21.96avg/8.39rpo. Jamieson missed a chunk of Super Smash via his Test cricket excursion and as with many Blackcaps, Jamieson was called up in a weaker format; T20 average of 18.41 vs First-Class average of 27.93. Both Newton and Jamieson could be slid into the Blackcaps squad to see how they fare.

The last note is that if de Grandhomme stays in the top-order, the battle between Neesham and Daryl Mitchell is bloody intriguing. These two were essentially rotated vs England, after Neesham was strangely left out of the series in Sri Lanka and it was Mitchell who won a Test call up in the specific all-rounder role. Cast your mind back a few years to when we fizzing at the Neesham/Corey Anderson battle and combo, now we're in a spot where Mitchell has moved past both of them in the pecking order.

Anderson? He's doing alright for Auckland with 21.50avg/120.56sr - not enough to surpass Mitchell or Neesham and he's kinda only playing T20 cricket at the moment.

Mitchell vs Neesham in the Super Smash

Ball

Mitchell: 10w @ 15.50avg/9.68rpo.

Neesham: 8w @ 17.25avg/8.53rpo.

Bat

Mitchell: 179 runs @ 29.83avg/144.35sr.

Neesham: 207 runs @ 51.75avg/131.84sr.

That translates to rolling with both in the squad and alternating again, or your personal preference as to who you'd want to see in the squad. Which then, encapsulates this Blackacps T20I squad selecting conundrum because well, we're at the Crossroads Inn where the good, bad and ugly are coming together, entry and exit routes in all directions and a blend of skull-duggery and the delightful.

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Peace and love 27.