Domestic Cricket Daily: Ford Trophy First Stanza Bowling Notes
The end of last week's Ford Trophy extravaganza in Christchurch also marked the end of the 2019 Ford Trophy first stanza as the domestic cricket planets make way for the Death Star overlord T20 thing. I'm going wrap up the first stanza for both runs and wickets, today is all about the bowlers and there won't be any game recaps so go scroll through some scorecards if that's your buzz.
There is a distinctly kiwi look to the top of the wicket-taker rankings as medium pace dominates. Wellington Firebirds' Ollie Newton leads all wicket-takers with 13w @ 17avg/4.70rpo and Newton has a strong case as the most consistent bowler, seeing as his 13w were spread out through the campaign. Not only did Newton take a wicket in every game he played, he took 2+ wickets in every game; 3w in each of his first three games, then 2w in the last two.
Newton does look quite lively, appearing to be a heavy-ball server who can nibble it around when such offerings are available. The funky thing about Wellington, is that their next three best bowlers are all spinners as Malcolm Nofal and Jeetan Patel have 5w each and Rachin Ravindra has 4w. Logan van Beek took 4w @ 45.50avg in four games and Ben Sears took 3w @ 31.33avg in the two games he played.
No Firebirds seamer apart from Newton averaged under 30, in fact no other Wellington bowler averaged under 30. This puts Newton's efforts in leading the Firebirds attack into some context and all of this is aligned with Newton's List-A career as he's cruising around Aotearoa average 20.08/4.68rpo after 19 games.
Another who has quietly put together an impressive List-A record to star their career, is Auckland Aces lefty Ben Lister. Lister now has 13 LA games, averaging 25.80/5.46rpo and sits 2nd in Ford Trophy wickets, taking 11w @ 15.36avg/5.04rpo. Lister and Aces homie Lockie Ferguson are the only bowlers who have taken 5w in an innings so far, although Lister has a nice spread to his wickets; 5w, 1w, 1w, 2w, 2w.
A lot is made of Auckland's batting unit, as they are poised in 1st spot at 4-1. Auckland have batted first in three of the five games, putting 300+ on the board in their last two games and 271 in the other. This immediately puts a splash of pressure on the opposition batsmen and one of the games in which Auckland bowled first, they conceded 344/5 vs Wellington, so I'm not going to go hundies on celebrating the bowlers when this is a lovely mix that leans towards the batting contributions.
This has influenced the bowling performances, with Lister, Will Somerville, Lockie Ferguson, Sean Solia and Kyle Jamieson all taking 5+ wickets so far - Jamieson's the only one from that group averaging over 30. Lister is only joined by Solia in playing all five games and has emerged as a focal point of the Aces seam attack with 6 of his 11 wickets being top-five batsmen, while another 4w were tail-enders; gotta wrap up that tail boss.
Central Districts Stags have again been served well by Seth Rance, who is 3rd with 11w @ 16.90avg/4.74rpo. The Stags are dead last, 1-3 from their five games with a no result and it's been low key interesting to see CD roll out bowlers from deep in their system as they have been ravaged by injury - piling the wicket-taking duties on Rance. Willem Ludick has 5w, giving the Stags two bowlers with 5+ wickets but Rance is the only Stags bowler averaging under 30 and that's how you don't win many games.
Having been in and around Blackcaps squads sporadically for the past few years, Rance is the most Blackcappy bowler in this upper-tier of Ford Trophy wickets. Averaging 24.38 in LA cricket after 50 games, this is exactly what we have come to expect from Rance and apart from the no result vs Canterbury, Rance has taken 2+ wickets in each of the next four games.
There's one last intriguing seamer here, in a pool of seamers who have done pretty well. In the first stanza of Plunket Shield cricket, Nathan Smith hit a centuy for Otago Volts but didn't take any wickets in the 4inns in which he bowled. Smith hasn't exactly dominated with bat or ball in Ford Trophy, however there is a continuation of positive signs for Smith's all-round ability.
Smith is the leading Otago bowler in Ford Trophy, taking 9w @ 18.66avg/4.34rpo and in 5inns, Smith went without a wicket just once. Among three single-digit scores, Smith hit a 32 and 43, doing so with 91.56sr and that's the steady all-round contributions I'm keeping an eye on moving in Super Smash. Having moved through the formats nicely - super dominant but solid - Smith is one to keep an eye on in the T20 competition.
Finally, how about these spinners? There have been sound contributions from the all-rounders in Dean Foxcroft and Michael Rippon (Otago), Malcolm Nofal and Rachin Ravindra (Wellington), yet for those sniffing around the Blackcaps, only Will Somerville has done anything of note. Somerville has 8w @ 24.50avg/4.90rpo, which has him ranked 6th and here are the others in the same bracket...
Ish Sodhi: 50ov, 4w @ 58.75avg/4.70rpo.
Todd Astle: 26ov, 3w @ 51.66avg/5.96rpo.
Ajaz Patel: 20ov, 1w @ 73avg/3.65rpo.
Let that simmer.
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Peace and love 27.