2021/22 Plunket Shield: Who Are Bayley Wiggins and Troy Johnson?
Day tahi of Aotearoa's Plunket Shield was rolled up and smoked by Central Districts Stags debutant Bayley Wiggins, while Wellington Firebirds batter Troy Johnson also throw his name into the 'check his stats mixer'. As one would expect in late October, seamers had a jolly old time in both games as Otago Volts were dismissed for 207 with 9 wickets taken by Wellington seamers and Canterbury's seamers accounted for all 9 Stags wickets of the Wiggins party.
Matt Henry did what he does best in gathering wickets for Canterbury. Henry finished the day with 4w @ 2.92rpo in 25 overs and his first couple of wicket were beautiful. First Henry wiggled the ball into Greg Hay who was probably expecting Henry's natural swing/nip away and got his off-stick hit. Then Henry did nip a delivery away from Brad Schmulian to have him caught behind...
Henry wound up dismissing Wiggins, after he had hit 133 @ 96.37sr. The stars aligned for Wiggins to pop up in CD's 1st 11 as they were without Ross Taylor and Will Young. Wiggins is also a wicket-keeper but with Dane Cleaver holding down that role, Wiggins slid into the #7 spot and that's a handy spot for a 23-year-old bloke who averages 47.87 in List-A cricket after nine games.
Wiggins popped up to play Ford Trophy early in 2020 and his nine games in the 50-over format have produced a century (103 @ 109.57sr), plus two halfies. With an overall LA strike-rate of 105.8 and a logical T20 strike-rate of 123.52, Wiggins is clearly a smooth operator. Chuck in the fact that Wiggins hit 10 sixes (152 balls faced) in last summer's Ford Trophy and the only other lad with at least 10 sixes from less than 200 deliveries was Finn Allen (15 sixes from 171 balls).
Wiggins hit 3 sixes in this innings. Wiggins also has the basics of a decent batsmen sussed as he was busy punching off the back foot through the off-side, pulled short deliveries and whether pouncing on over-pitched deliveries or using his feet to Canterbury's spinners; Wiggins effortlessly pinged boundaries from the front foot. Wiggins now has Ford Trophy and Plunket Shield centuries having played less than 10 games in both competitions, with five Super Smash games left to tick that off the list.
As long as Wellington are rolling out a top three of Luke Georgeson, Rachin Ravindra and Troy Johnson - I'm tuned in. Georgeson was the surprise here, even though I've highlighted his excellent mahi plenty in recent months and he put up a big duck to celebrate his opening gig. Georgeson didn't bowl for Wellington and Firebirds coach Glenn Pocknall probably has him zoned in on that the niggly October opening role.
Georgeson is 22-years-old. Ravindra is 21yrs. Johnson is 24yrs.
Johnson is not-out overnight on 52 and for a bloke who averages 45 in FC and 41 in LA, this shouldn't be a surprise. Johnson finished last summer's Plunket Shield with scores of 1, 30, 114, 3, 58*, 46* and 39* which were the only four games Johnson played. Johnson was coming off a sizzling Ford Trophy campaign where he finished 6th and was the leading run-scorer for Wellington in his first 10 games of LA cricket.
Wiggins and Johnson appear to be very different in their methods - as obvious as that sounds given their different roles. Wiggins has a pure attacking instinct with the skills to execute while Johnson seems more classical, more patient in waiting for a loose delivery and the bulk of his 10 boundaries yesterday came from leaning on drives through the off-side.
The funky thing here is that neither Wiggins nor Johnson are factors for even semi-hearty Plunket Shield observers. Wiggins is part of a stacked CD outfit and Johnson is a young batter in a Wellington group jam-packed with young talent. Neither would have been 1st 11 certainties to start the summer as Wiggins took his chance in the absence of Taylor and Young, while Johnson or at least someone in that Wellington top-three benefits from Devon Conway's absence.
Big ups to Nathan Smith as well. 3w @ 3.15rpo in 19 overs against his former team.
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Peace and love.