What's if I told you that there's a 21-year-old seamer who made his debut in the Plunket Shield this season and averaged 18.14 through three games?

What about 14 wickets in three games and that this lad's rpo was only bettered by two veterans in Hamish Bennett and Neil Wagner (bowlers with 14+ wickets)?

Or that this lad then translated four-day shenanigans into T20 cricket where he's got 62 @ 21.16avg/7.93rpo?

Welcome to the summer of Ben Lister, the Auckland lefty who has enjoyed an impressive start to his domestic career. I've talked about Lister before, when his nifty stuff was on display against Northern Districts in Plunket Shield, nifty stuff that saw him dismiss Kane Williamson and BJ Watling. Regular readers will know how I love my funk and having a point of difference helps in whatever pursuit you are trying to excel at, so while most lefties are swinging the ball back into right-handed batsmen, Lister's sliding it across them with natural ease.

I highlighted that from the ND PS game where Lister moved the ball back into lefty Daniel Flynn, then caught the outside edges of Watling and Williamson. Now Lister is taking this to T20 cricket where it's just as dangerous with batsmen playing aggressive shots, to angles they don't usually deal with. The key point here is that domestic batsmen tend to struggle with anything fresh and funky - hence Lockie Ferguson's rapid in-swing is super effective - and as batsmen make notes of what Lister does, they will be prepared for his stuff.

Lister took 1+ wicket in every PS innings he bowled, then he took a wicket in his sole Ford Trophy innings and although his wicket-taking streak was broken in Super Smash, he hasn't been pinned down by batsmen. Lister has tallies of 0, 3, 0, 3 wickets in four games and his most recent outing against Otago saw Lister help Auckland restrict Otago to 147/7; Lister took the key wickets of Rob Nicol (7 off 8) and Hamish Rutherford (51 off 47).

I'm rather intrigued by how Lister rounds off the Super Smash, or more potently how batsmen handle Lister now that they have tried to attack him in T20 cricket. Lister's wicket of Nicol is an example of what makes Lister a difficult bowler to hit as Lister's natural angle away from the righty means that batsmen are swinging against that angle. Instead of middling this to the mid-wicket boundary, Nicol skied it from his outside edge:

Early in the innings, batsmen could look to play Lister through the off-side more when Lister has a new rock. Auckland aren't exactly stacked with bowlers right now either, with Colin Munro and Lockie Ferguson on Blackcaps Battlers duty and Colin de Grandhomme taking care of his whanau duties. Roneel Hira was brought back into the Auckland mix -he was lovely vs Otago (5rpo off 4ov) - and with Lister joined by import Sam Curran and Sea Solia as Auckland's only notable seamers in the team that played Otago, Lister is suddenly the borderline seamer leader.

Auckland will need Lister to turn those up and down T20 wicket-tallies into consistent wickets, with his low rpo putting pressure on batsmen to attack Auckland's spinners. That, along with batsmen getting more views of Lister will make for an interesting gauge of Lister's abilities in these coming games.

Why is Otago seamer Warren Barnes wearing that mask?

Just prior to the batsman trying to whack his delivery, Barnes' follow through results in him losing sight of the ball as his head whips down. He only loses sight of the batsman for a jiffy, but it's enough to rob him of a crucial reaction time. For a bowler with a follow through like that, a mask is a wise move.

This is the first Josh Clarkson warning folks, even though I've alluded to Clarkson's nek-level hitting ability many times before. Clarkson hit what is now a typically casual 52 off 25 balls in Central Districts' win over ND and apart from a 28*, this was his first truly notable knock of the Super Smash. With 3 not-outs in 4inns and a strike-rate of 174.19 this season, Clarkson is the ideal bloke at #5/6 and as the Stags roll through their Super Smash campaign, we can expect to see a whole lot more of this.

Clarkson is only 20yrs and in my glorious cricketing mind, he's the best hitter in Aotearoa. You'd be daft to sleep on that because in last season's Super Smash, Clarkson put up similar numbers; 6 not-outs in 7inns and 178.48sr. Clarkson has shown that his finishing ability ain't no blip on the radar and if the Blackcaps Battlers had any idea of planning for the future, Clarkson would have been given that T20 middle order spot for the West Indies series.

But hey, that means more Josh Clarkson whacking all sorts of boundaries for us domestic cricket lords.

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Peace and love 27.