Domestic Cricket Daily: Wellington Firebirds Preview
She's a tough ask staying away from those silly politricksters mate.
With each domestic cricket preview, I'll make a wee video to go with it for Patreon. We''ll be getting knee deep in domestic cricket this summer and there will be some bonus, exclusive stuff on Patreon as well. All you gotta do is sign up for $1 a month and tu meke.
Here's the link for the Wellington Firebirds preview video.
If you want to sound smart when you're talking sport or business with your homies, you only need inject the word 'pivot' into your vocabulary. Pivot is a fantastic word and in a sporting context usually means how a sports team or franchise has avoided a complete rebuild, to pivot in a different direction. Take Wellington Firebirds for example as they were the oldest, grizzliest (and one of the best) domestic cricket squads in Aotearoa, which did however mean that at some stage they would need to reinvigorate their squad with some fresh faces.
Instead of ushering in youngsters right now, Wellington went out and recruited two experienced, youngish cricketers who themselves needed a slight re-fresher. Michael Bracewell moved up from Otago and Logan van Beek left Canterbury to join Wellington, thus giving Wellington a slightly younger tinge while also maintaining their identity as a grizzly group. Both Bracewell and van Beek were part of a talented wave that entered domestic cricket a four-five years ago, although neither has really seen their domestic cricketers soar past the 'solid geezer' stage.
Otago have plenty of depth in their batting line up; Brad Wilson, Hamish Rutherford, Rob Nicol, Josh Finnie, Anaru Kitchen, Derek De Boorder, Christi Viljoen. This ensures that Otago can absorb the loss of Bracewell and his move is probably beneficial for all parties involved while Canterbury will lose van Beek's all-round ability, but van Beek was mainly a bowler who could bat and the Cantabs are building a low key exciting bowling attack; Andrew Ellis (GOAT all-rounder), Kyle Jamieson and Edward Nuttall will take on the majority of the seam duties and then they can roll out a spin attack of Todd Astle, Tim Johnston and Cole McConchie.
Point being that Otago and Canterbury can cover the holes by losing Bracewell and van Beek. Wellington get a batsman who simply needs runs and Bracewell will be hungry to perform to his potential, with opportunities likely to come at No.4/5 with Hamish Marshall set to be his middle-order homie. Van Beek's best work last summer came in Ford Trophy cricket where he averaged 28 with the ball and when you consider that Hamish Bennett and Anurag Verma with tied-2nd for FT wickets (16) and both averaged 20, Wellington have added a strong-performer to their already hectic FT bowling attack.
Van Beek will likely compete with Verma and Iain McPeake for the second and third seamer spots behind Bennett in Plunket Shield cricket. Grabbing van Beek will take some pressure off Bennett as well, with van Beek cut from a similar cloth in terms of his hustling-heavy-ball style of bowling - Scott Kuggeleijn is a fair comparison.
In pivoting towards two experienced youngsters, Wellington have also added cricketers who perhaps got a bit stale with their old teams. We see this all the time in sport where a player moves to a different team and starts to perform to their potential, for no reason other than they needed a change of scenery. Bracewell and van Been probably want to take their domestic careers to greater heights and perform consistently, so this season will be full of funk as the change of scenery experiment will be live and in full effect.
Wellington benefit because they have plugged holes with blokes who know all about the grind of domestic cricket and fit their grizzly culture. The Firebirds could roll out; Papps, Woodcock, Murdoch, Bracewell, Marshall, Blundell, Taylor, van Beek, Patel, Verma, Bennett. That's full to the brim with domestic veterans, Matt Taylor's the only new-ish bloke there and Wellington can add in leggy Peter Younghusband or seamer McPeake depending on conditions. Depth, bases covered and experience yo.
All the other domestic previews had me highlight individuals who interest me and here I've done it with Bracewell and van Beek, yet they are part of Wellington's bigger picture. Yeah bloody oath it'll be fun to see how the change of scenery works for Bracewell and van Beek, but I'm also fascinated by how Wellington as a team perform and how their team looks for each game. There are so many different options available for different scenarios, including if other players such as Malcom Nofal or Fraser Colson demand selection.
I might have to spark up a Firebirds Selektah Watch or something because I'm definitely going to be intrigued by who plays and what role they are given. With so much experience, everyone understands how team sports work and everyone will be eager to slot in, do their job and ensure the team's success. That's why I love sport and the intricacies of the Firebirds season will feed my sporting nerd belly.
Peace and love 27.
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