The glorious come back of kiwi cricket via Aotearoa's White Ferns resulted in a 2-1 T20I series loss and then a 3-0 ODI Rose Bowl sweep over in Brisbane, none of which was ideal and yet there are still some funky aspects of White Ferns cricket to keep the positive vibes flowing. First and foremost, when Australia are celebrating their women's cricket team it should serve as a reminder of what the baseline is when promoting and enjoying women's sport - cricket in this instance.

Meg Lanning continued her ridiculous record in ODI run chases, striking an unbeaten 101 to seal a series win for Australia

Alyssa Healy was on song at AB Field in the third ODI, striking 87 runs from 87 deliveries

Consistent access to players from either team and putting plenty of effort into telling the stories, chatting technical and strategic elements of the game as well as background information to help fans engage with their sporting heroes. It was all there and while from a kiwi perspective, absorbing so much Aussie-ness was niggly, that's the baseline for women's cricket coverage and by the end of the ODI series I enjoyed a far greater understanding of how cool the Aussie team is.

Aotearoa is a bit behind and fair play, the disparity in resources plays a hefty role in this. The Niche Cache goes a bit hard on NZC and it all stems from love of cricket where we are cricket lovers who don't understand the lack of energy put behind the pinnacle of domestic cricket which is the Plunket Shield, same goes with building the context around the White Ferns. Australia leads the way and it's NZC's job to do their best to keep up.

It's no-holds-barred action in side the Australian cricket bubble in Brisbane as Erin Burns, Maitlan Brown and Beth Mooney compete for the title of the team'...

That's why the Australian women's cricket team is so good. They smoked Aotearoa in this tour and all we heard about were the various winning streaks across formats, Meg Lanning's nutty average batting second, Ash Gardner's work for indigenous communities and then Annabel Sutherland pops out as an 18-year-old all-rounder batting #3 in the final ODI. These Aussies don't win just because they are Aussies, they have established an entire system around their women's team and there is a clear push to make the women's team self-sustainable.

Unfortunately, women's sport is impacted by the success of men's sport. If the Blackcaps suck and Blackcaps revenue falls away, that's likely to have a massive impact on the White Ferns and the same goes for the All Blacks and the Black Ferns etc. The whole objective here should be to make the White Ferns a self-sustainable operation, separate from the Blakckcaps where the White Ferns are built up to bring in their own revenue and thus provide resources for women's cricket across Aotearoa.

Ellyse Perry was already showing promising signs she is on the road to recovery as the Aussies trained in Brisbane ahead of Wednesday's third T20 International

That's what is happening in Australia, it's already happened. The Australian team has legit star-power, they have a stand-alone Women's Big Bash League that isn't rolled out alongside the Big Bash League and women's cricket has a simmering popularity that helps sustain their own operations.

In Aotearoa we like to think of ourselves as super progressive, but the reality isn't quite that lovely. We are now moving beyond the 'growing stages' where drastic inequalities are all good because 'we're getting there' and I venture down this route with regards to the White Ferns getting touched up by Australia because all this was crystal clear watching those games; the only way the White Ferns climb up the international pecking order to grab regular wins against these teams is if women's cricket is treated as it's own entity, with the required respect.

The three best batswomen in the ODI series were Rachel Haynes, Meg Lanning and Alyssa Healy.

The three best bowlers were Jess Jonassen, Sophie Molineux and Wellington's Amelia Kerr.

Six spots there, five Aussies.

Kerr's leggies gave her 6w @ 22.66avg/5.23rpo in 26 overs and that was the best bowling effort by quite a margin for Aotearoa. Jonassen and Molineux, both spinners, had averages below 15 and economy rates below 4pro. Then the next four 'best bowlers' were all Aussies, meaning that six of the top-seven bowlers were Aussies.

This is reason for some low key positive vibes as the three best bowlers in this series were all spinners and apart from Kerr, two of Aotearoa's best spinners weren't in this tour - Leigh Kasperek and Anna Peterson. The White Ferns played on pitches that clearly favoured a bit of spin, reflected in those stats and Wellington's leggy Deanna Doughty was named in this squad but never played which was a bit weird given that Doughty's record in domestic cricket has been excellent.

Six of the eight kiwi bowlers were right-arm seamers and those six seamers accounted for 8w in the series, all of the wicket-takers averaged over 30 (Hannah Rowe and Lea Tahuhu didn't take wickets). All similar pace, all with a similar skill-set and rather mundane as far as bowling attacks go, perhaps why Australia scored runs with such ease.

The White Ferns need some funk, even a lefty seamer would offer variety. This makes me wonder about the Blackcaps where there has been a recent move away from the kiwi battler medium pace guys; now we've seen Neil Wagner flourish, with Lockie Ferguson and Kyle Jamieson emerging. Where are the kiwi wahine who bowl a bit differently? Are they being over-coached to satisfy a textbook or are their natural skills being encouraged?

That's what I'll be looking for in the domestic summer as the White Ferns will struggle to move up the international ladder if the bowling attack revolves around 110km/h right-arm seamers.

Amy Satterthwaite doesn't bat out of a coaching manual and her funky stroke-play immediately stood out as she had a nice series with 111 runs @ 37avg/85.38sr. Swipes, chips over the in-field, blazing drives and generally hitting the ball in awkward spots helped see this difference in individuality with the batting vs bowling, then comes Sophie Devine and her range of shots.

Devine finished behind Satterthwaite with 90 runs @ 30avg/64.74sr, steady for Devine. That strike-rate is super low compared to her ODI career strike-rate of 82.35 and this came after Devine had a T20I series strike-rate of 96.92 vs her career strike-rate of 125.42. Devine clearly wasn't at her best, but was solid and along with Suzie Bates who played just one ODI before suffering an injury, the positive vibes here are that the three best players all have room to improve after their first dose of international cricket since the T20 World Cup.

Maddy Green and was third in White Ferns runs for this series. Green has showed why her ODI average is 19.66 and her T20I average is 11.66 with a hearty display in the ODI series where she finished with 78 runs @ 26avg/92.85sr. No kiwi batter had a higher strike-rate and after opening in the T20I series, Green slid down the order where she looks rather comfortable in a hitting role.

Now we have WBBL where Green will again play for Brisbane Heat alongside Amelia Kerr. I've questioned Green's White Ferns work for a while, however she was excellent in a championship run for the Heat last summer and there is a good chance that Green levels-up over the next two months.

WBBL will start on October 25 and Aotearoa has Green and Kerr with Brisbane, Bates with Adelaide, Rachel Priest with Hobart, Satterthwaite and Lea Tahuhu with Melbourne Renegades, and Devine with Perth.

There have also been domestic contracts ('Domestic Player Agreements') sussed out with the local teams in Aotearoa, which in theory provides three levels of contracts; White Ferns, NZC Development, domestic contracts. Here are the players listed by their teams as being on development contracts...

Auckland

Jane Barnett Sarah Carnachan Amie Hucker Arlene Kelly Tariel Lamb Regina Lilii Roz McNeill Jesse Prasad Saachi Shahri

Northern Districts

Nada - cheers.

Central Districts

Georgia Atkinson — Manawatū Emily Cunningham — Taranaki Claudia Green — Nelson Mikaela Greig — Manawatū Melissa Hansen — Wairarapa Ashtuti Kumar — Manawatū Monique Rees — Taranaki Kerry Tomlinson . Anlo van Deventer — Wairarapa

Wellington

Jess McFadyen, Beth Molony, Thamsyn Newton, Georgia Plimmer, Maneka Singh, Olivia Boivin, Dee Doughty, Xara Jetly, Caitlin King.

Canterbury

Sarah Asmussen (Lancaster Park) Missy Banks (Old Boys Collegians) Natalie Cox (St Albans) Kate Ebrahim (Lancaster Park) Laura Hughes (Lancaster Park) Allie Mace-Cochrane (Old Boys Collegians) Frances Mackay (Lancaster Park) Jess Simmons (Lancaster Park) Gabby Sullivan (St Albans).