As the leaves dip off their trees and the chilly breeze blows in days of rain, it doesn't look like this winter will involve much Kiwi County Tour cricket. Everything is a bit uncertain with the pando lurking and at this stage only Matt Henry's deal with Kent has fallen through officially, yet with a fair amount of niggle involve I doubt that BJ Watling (Lancashire), Hamish Rutherford (Worcestershire) or Jeetan Patel (Warwickshire) will be playing much cricket in England this winter.

That is the Kiwi County Tour roster for 2020 and I always find it low key strange how few kiwi cricketers appear to be hunting County Championship gigs in England. Then again, I always zone in on what's cracking and these four lads were all going to head into the KCT bus with a fair amount of funky context.

Henry leads the funky context and intrigue, after enduring a summer in which his sporadic appearance trend continue and thus random appearances don't lend themselves to success in terms of Test wickets. Unfortunately for Henry, he is yet to genuinely rise up and snap such opportunities with the Blackcaps Test team and after suffering an injury in the Australia series, Henry then seem to be surpassed by a rather talented cricketer in Kyle Jamieson. We know that Lockie Ferguson isn't far off adding to his 11 overs of Test cricket either and suddenly Henry finds himself in this group after spending a bunch of years as the next-up seamer.

2018 saw Henry take 75 wickets @ 15.48avg/3.03rpo, in 11 games for Kent. Absolutely bonkers that and I viewed this as a beautiful opportunity for Henry to gain some confidence in returning to Kent (2019 World Cup robbed the KCT of a few lads), putting Henry in a stronger position for when the Blackcaps came calling. Unfortunately that opportunity is no longer and we are going to have to wait to see what kind of bounce-back factor Henry has.

Don't think that Henry fell off a wicket-taking cliff though. In his four Plunket Shield appearances, Henry took 17w @ 29avg/3.25rp and in his 9inns of domestic cricket bowling (PS and Ford Trophy) Henry took 1w in 8 of those innings, or slice this by saying Henry took 2+ wickets in 7/9inns. Given that Henry took 1w in each of his 3inns of Blackcaps Test cricket, Henry did manage to take a wicket in 11/12inns bowled across the whole summer.

Henry needed to do a wee bit more for the Blackcaps though and this had me curious as to how Henry would perform with Kent. All the foundations are still present for Henry in terms of being among the best seamers in Aotearoa, now we just wait and see how Henry returns either with the Blackcaps or off in the distant future when the glorious Plunket Shield sparks up the bong.

BJ Watling had 3inns of KCT action last winter for Durham and sprinkled a knock of 104* on the top of that County Championship experience. This then flowed into the Blackcaps tour of Sri Lanka, where Watling put up scores of 1, 77 and 105* before returning to Aotearoa and snaring that big-donnie double-hundy (205 and 55 vs England). That smells like pure form and Watling didn't just grab three centuries, each century he scored in that four month period came in a different country.

We all know what Watling is as a Test batsman, but to score three centuries in three different countries in less than 10 innings is rather impressive. Things quickly changed though as Watling's form fell away in Australia and across the series' vs Australia and India, Watling passed the 20-run mark in 2/8inns with a highest score of 40.

Due to link up with Lancashire, Watling felt like someone who would thrive in the 2020 KCT. Watling was apparently locked in for nine games (Henry was signed for six games) and the beautiful thing about County cricket is the flow of games, allowing players to slip into a meditative state of cricket. I reckon Watling would have loved that and while Watling's earned a heavy dose of faith with regards to his Blackcaps spot, the second half of last summer is what we are left with and I'm intrigues as to what form Watling presents in cricket's return.

Watling was rather effective in domestic cricket, bagging two 50+ scores in his 4inns of Ford Trophy as well as two 50+ scores in 7inns of Plunket Shield. Most notably, the Ford Trophy half-centuries came after the series in Australia and then Watling scored his two Plunket Shield half-centuries in the same game of Plunket Shield after the India series. While Watling was unable to kick on with the Blackcaps, he showed his class at the level below and that was reason to froth about Watling in County cricket.

I'm going to put a spotlight on Jeetan Patel, or Lord Jeetz as he's known on the KCT bus as he is the greatest cricket export of my life and deserves such recognition. That leaves us with Hamish Rutherford, who was due to play for Worcestershire where he scored a century and half-century in his 5inns last year. As far as KCT stuff goes, this winter was likely to see Rutherford stay with Worcs the whole season, in the same opening role and with the steady flow of cricket mixed with consistency of availability, Rutherford could have been an enticing batsman to follow.

Unlike 2019, when Rutherford was dragged out of County cricket to take part in a pre-World Cup series in Australia and then to make a trip to Sri Lanka for one T20I. Averaging 44 in the County Championship, Rutherford also averaged 63.40 in the Royal London One-Day cup via two centuries in 5inns. This highlights an impressive level of efficiency in Rutherford's KCT work and while Rutherford wasn't consistently on the park during the kiwi summer, he did manage a knock of 155 in his 5inns of Ford Trophy and Rutherford was 7th in Super Smash runs with two 50+ scores and a strike-rate of 173.37 in 11inns.

There isn't so much Blackcaps context around Rutherford, so now it's all about what kinda dominance Rutherford wants to lay out over the domestic circuit in Aotearoa. I was looking forward to Rutherford playing plenty of cricket across all three formats and how effective he could be in England. Now it's a case of Rutherford flexing when the Plunket Shield returns and wiggling his way into the second-tier of Blackcaps top-order mix.

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Peace and love 27.