2020/21 Ford Trophy: Aotearoa Cricket Chaos and Alignment
If you've dabbled in deep excursions into the Aotearoa cricket mangroves, this summer appears to be the perfect period to take that to a nek level as there are all sorts of enticing yarns to be had. Flowing on from last summer's low key transition and transformation vibe with Aotearoa's Blackcaps, this summer has already amplified that notion and we haven't even seen a game of Test cricket yet. Of course, we're here to suss out Ford Trophy business and while that's the headline act, various factors above the Ford Trophy are adding immense funk to the kiwi cricket landscape.
The summer started with injuries to Colin de Grandhomme and Ajaz Patel in the Test group, now BJ Watling is under an injury cloud. As noted in yesterday's Blackcaps vs West Indies T20I series wrap, Martin Guptill was the only top-four batsman from last summer's T20I series vs India who played vs West Indies and part of that involves Colin Munro and Adam Milne taking up Big Bash League opportunities.
We also have an abundance of Aotearoa 'A' fixtures, with squads ranging from fairly legit fringe-Blackcaps/second tier lads to deep cut domestic cricketers who have shown a splash of promise. Two interesting and counter-intuitive ideas apply here at the same time as it is a bit weird knowing that NZC hype up the Super Smash while limiting the pure talent that can partake in the Super Smash, then NZC also have all these Aotearoa A fixtures that take the best players out of Plunket Shield and Ford Trophy cricket.
What that does do however is lay out some sort of structure to the tiers of kiwi cricket and open spots up at the lower levels for different lads to get opportunities in domestic cricket. This means that we have to tinker with how we view Ford Trophy, Plunket Shield and Super Smash when there are also Blackcaps games and Aotearoa A games going on at the same time. This reflects the relative chaos we are now seeing with the Blackcaps after numerous summers of incredibly settled squads and everything feels a bit all over the place, which then produces doses of funk as the whole landscape is being purged and awakened.
There was a young tinge to the best performers in the Plunket Shield first stanza and that has continued, perhaps even grown in the Ford Trophy. Various experienced lads are present such as Matt Henry returning for Canterbury to take 3w @ 3.85rpo in 7 overs vs Wellington Firebirds, while Hamish Rutherford, George Worker, Michael Bracewell and Todd Astle form the bulk of the top-six batsmen after two games.
Quick note on Rutherford, who I have written about a fair bit in recent weeks as he is the type of player that the Blackcaps T20I unit ignores despite Rutherford being among Aotearoa's best T20 batsmen. I've laid this out previously, but Rutherford's start to Ford Trophy requires further focus...
2019/21 Super Smash: 7th in runs, 29.30avg/173.37sr.
2020 T20 Blast (England): 9th in runs, 39.11avg/160sr.
2020/21 Plunket Shield: 4th in runs, 31.37avg/50.06sr.
2020/21 Ford Trophy: 1st in runs, 79.50avg/184.88sr.
The Plunket Shield stuff is there only to show that Rutherford's performing well across various formats, otherwise it's all about Rutherford scoring enough runs with hefty strike-rates. Across last summer's Super Smash, this year's T20 Blast in England and starting the Ford Trophy (Otago Volts vs Central Districts Stags was limited to 24 overs yesterday), Rutherford has been among the leading run-scorers with strike-rates of 160+. That's a bit bonkers and while I'm not calling for Rutherford to be an automatic call up to the Blackcaps, this is an example of the layers of intrigue around kiwi cricket.
Northern Districts Knights' Katene Clarke and Canterbury's Leo Cater are two younger batsmen who I'm following closely after how they started the Plunket Shield. Clarke struggled in the longer format and then had scores of 63 and 42 in the Knights' two wins over Auckland Aces, with an overall strike-rate of 134.61. This is reflective of Clarke's career as his seven First-Class games have produced 20.16avg and his 12 List-A games have Clarke averaging 32.66 with a nifty strike-rate of 99.49.
Should Clarke be able to continue to perform in the Ford Trophy, his effortless stroke-play will ensure that the runs come quickly and along with Central Districts Stags' Bayley Wiggins (27.50avg/152.77sr after two games) these two are low key sluggers to keep an eye on. Same with Leo Carter, although Carter has a strong Plunket Shield first stanza behind him and a rather unique ability to smack sixes.
Carter had scores of 0* and 60 over the first two games (two wins vs Wellington), hitting 2 fours and 3 sixes. That's not overly impressive by itself as Wiggins, Broom, Worker and Rutherford have all hit more sixes than Carter after two Ford Trophy games, but when we slide back to the Plunket Shield, only Doug Bracewell and Glenn Phillips had hit more sixes than Carter's 6 sixes. I'm keeping tabs on Carter and his sneaky six hitting as it's a trend that is spread across the three formats and Carter is capable of mingling sixes with steady batting.
Sixes per innings in First-Class: 0.41.
Sixes per innings in List-A: 0.41.
Sixes per innings in T20: 0.57.
For context, Rutherford averages 0.38 sixes per FC innings and 0.95 sixes per LA innings while Worker averages 0.18 in FC and 0.72 in LA. Just a wee example there of Carter's somewhat unique style and this swings into even more funk as none of Carter's strike-rates suggest that he's a monster slugger, which tells us that he often deals in sixes over fours. For what it's worth, here is how Carter has started this summer: 20, 87, 50, 49 (Plunket Shield), 0*, 60.
Here are the best bowlers after two games...
Brett Randell (ND): 25 years, 20 LA games, 7w in 16ov @ 7.85avg/3.43rpo.
Sean Davey (Cant): 27 years, 2 LA games, 6w in 14ov @ 10.33avg/4.42rpo.
Travis Muller (Otago): 27 years, 13 LA games, 6w in 7ov @ 10.83avg/9.28rpo.
Ryan Harrison (Auck): 21 years, 2 LA games, 4w in 9.5ov @ 12avg/4.88rpo.
Joey Field (CD): 19 years, 2 LA games, 4w in 8.2ov @ 20.50avg.9.84rpo.
All of those lads have played 20 or fewer LA games and all of them are seamers, with Auckland's Louis Delport the best spinner thus far with 2w @ 13avg/2.60rpo. All of this is to be absorbed and noted without clinging as rain played a huge factor in the first cluster of games, along with the small sample size and I'd suggest that the leading the Ford Trophy batsmen after two games are mostly experienced lads who were better equipped to deal with the funky game scenarios.
I lay out those bowlers merely to highlight how funky domestic cricket is right now considering many kiwi cricket fans would have no idea who those seamers listed above are. Davey, Harrison and Field all made their LA debuts to start this Ford Trophy campaign, then when we venture over to the leading Plunket Shield bowlers (all seamers again), it's the same young vibe only with lads who are a few notches above these young Ford Trophy lads; Will Williams, Kyle Jamieson, Jacob Duffy and Fraser Sheat.
Williams and Sheat have had good starts to the Ford Trophy themselves, part of a group of six bowlers who have 3w so far. Yup, the group with 3w also skews younger/up and comers with Sheat, Matt Henry, Jake Gibson (23yrs/3 LA games), Williams, Ed Nuttall and 23-year-old CD Stags all-rounder Josh Clarkson in the mix as well. That means that there are 11 bowlers with 3+ wickets and the oldest of those bowlers are Matt Henry and Will Williams who are both 28-years-old.
As the Ford Trophy games get churned out, things will settle down and various blokes will start to put themselves ahead of the rest. After two games though, we are starting to see the young wave that was already present in recent summers starting to grow and that is in alignment with all the selection/availability chaos that is taking place at the higher levels.
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Peace and love.