2020/21 Plunket Shield: Otago Volts Recruitment/Leo Carter
Following Plunket Shield and domestic cricket closely over the past few years would have been a prickly task for Otago Volts fans. Various Plunket Shield campaigns stuck to the bottom of the ladder, chuck in a couple high profile departures and now the Volts are 0-2 this season. None of that sounds like an intriguing group to keep tabs on and while better performing teams, let alone teams that enjoy mandatory headlines thanks to their Blackcaps stocks grab most of the attention, there is plenty of funk in the Otago Volts if you know what you're looking for.
On the first day of the Volts round three game vs Wellington Firebirds, Dale Phillips scored 65 batting #3 and that Phillips replaced wicket-keeper Max Chu is the crux of my intrigue with Otago cricket; Phillips moved from Auckland to Otago in recent seasons, while Chu is a local junior.
Phillips is currently ranked 27th in Plunket Shield runs after that knock of 65 (as of Friday morning) and of the 26 batsmen who have scored more runs than Phillips this season, only Colin de Grandhomme has a higher strike-rate than Phillips' 79.26 (CDG's is 98.14). That basically translates to Phillips scoring freely in his first up stint this season and that made for moments like this where Wellington seamer Ollie Newton piped up...
Newton soon dismissed Phillips with a big ol' in-shaker...
And Newton was chuffed...
My antenna was lit to a bit of a trend last season as Nick Kelly left Northern Districts Knights and Dean Foxcroft left Central Districts Stags to both join Otago. Two young cricketers who were likely to be stuck behind more senior players in the Plunket Shield format and their best opportunity for consistent red ball cricket was with Otago. Sure, some of this could be viewed as cricketers who aren't good enough to crack their team, although all it takes is a geeze at the Knights and Stags squads to see that they are rather well stacked for top-tier domestic talent.
Similar case for Phillips and Auckland Aces. The younger brother of Glenn, Dale could have battled through the Auckland set up and patiently waited for his chance, or pursue more game time with Otago. Phillips scored a century for Otago A last week and scored nifty runs in his first Plunket Shield appearance of this season after playing a few games across all formats last summer.
Phillips, Kelly and Foxcroft all showed last summer that they are worthy of steady Plunket Shield cricket and it looks as though Foxcroft is stuck in South Africa due to 2020 antics hence he is yet to play this season. Mitch Renwick made the move down from CD Stags to Otago Volts a couple years ago as one of the earlier pieces to this recruitment puzzle.
The Volts have also picked up Jarrod McKay from CD Stags, along with 26-year-old Netherlands veteran Max O'Dowd who is from Auckland and tends to be busy getting through his 36 T20I games and various other international fixtures; O'Dowd and Michael Rippon have played together in T20I and ODI cricket for Netherlands.
The local junior aspect is also important and we can't pretend like Otago don't have talent of their own. Chu is a 20-year-old settling into FC cricket, while the likes of Camden Hawkins and Michael Rae are locals on the rise, then there's the hearty group of Otago Volts stalwarts in Hamish Rutherford, Nathan Smith, Jacob Duffy and then Anaru Kitchen may as well be considered an Otago stalwart at this stage.
Otago haven't exactly had much luck with their recruits from Auckland and that's where most of the funk sits. After enjoying the services of talented youngsters Shawn Hicks and Warren Barnes, two South African-Kiwis from Auckand for a few seasons, Hicks stepped aside due to concussion and Barnes stepped aside due to injuries. The good folk at the Otago Daily Times reported that another talented youngster and local junior Josh Finnie has opted not to play red ball cricket this summer as well, all of which ends up as a big pile of 'bummer' for Otago cricket fans.
Don't buzz, you can buy Josh Finnie's photos...
Leaning so heavily into young cricketers is always going to make winning Plunket Shield games tricky as other teams simply have more talent. My fascination in what Otago Volts have done in the last five years is in team building and recruitment, with clear strategies that we don't tend to see in domestic kiwi sport. A different example that I have been pondering is Tasman Makso rugby as I've seen Tasman develop as a major player in Aotearoa rugby by building their local pathways and being able to recruit numerous Super Rugby level players to Tasman from around Aotearoa.
Otago have clearly identified players from other teams who they believe can contribute at the FC level, providing them with an opportunity. This allows a bit of wiggle-room as the Volts bring in their local juniors and after watching established domestic players retire, leave for other teams or stop their careers short due to health, Otago are slowly building a domestic cricket system that can be competitive asap and thus make it easier to bring through their local juniors.
For fans, this is again a funky team building situation and learning about team building is great. On top of that, I'm tuned into Volts cricket because in the case of Kelly and Foxcroft last season, Otago has space for talented youngsters to play cricket. Personally, checking Otago Volts scorecards and season stats is crucial in building my kiwi cricket landscape as the Volts have the low key up and comers who wouldn't be playing elsewhere.
Last year it was Kelly and Foxcroft who flourished with greater opportunities. This year Kelly's building on his CPL campaign and Dale Phillips looks eager to settle into regular game time, then lads like McKay and O’Dowd may pop up in the coming months.
Quick Leo Carter notes...
In today's email newsletter, I dropped some Leo Carter six hitter stats...
The six hitting prowess is currently part of the Canterbury batsmen starting to stack up runs and Carter hit 50 on the first day of Canterbury vs Northern Districts Knights. This came after Carter hit 87 in the round two game vs Wellington Firebirds and as of Friday morning, Carter has 157 runs @ 52.33avg/74.05sr. Despite his slugging work, Carter's best format is FC cricket where he has a career average of 32.11 after 30 games and his last three seasons have been rather nifty...
2018/19: 7inns, 279 runs @ 39.85avg.
2019/20: 9inns, 287 runs @ 71.75avg (high average via his 226*).
2020/21: 3inns, 157 runs @ 52.33avg.
What's crucial here is that Carter has already hit two 50+ scores and while his stats from those previous two seasons are nice, Carter hit two 50+ scores in 2019/20 and then his double-hundy accounted for most of his runs last season as it was his only 50+ score in 9inns. This season at least, Carter has started with some consistency and by the looks of his batting, if Carter's able to score with any sniff of consistency, it may be fun to watch.
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Peace and love.