Despite a tricky opponent and situation to negotiate, Aotearoa's Blackcaps were too good for Afghanistan and now prepare to face England in the semi-finals. Nothing major here, just more tournament success and us plucky kiwis hope for more than a good vibe semi-final these days. In keeping with The Recipe laid out after defeating Namibia, Aotearoa's two best seamers combined for 5 wickets vs Afghanistan and while the batsmen took the baseline idea of scoring 100 runs between the top-four, raising it to scoring all 125 runs to seal the win.

In letting this simmer for a day, there is no need to over complicate what the Blackcaps are up to. Aotearoa has Tim Southee, Trent Boult and Kane Williamson as the core of their 1st 11 and for all the chat about different Blackcaps pieces, three of Aotearoa's greatest cricketers ever are the key players. It's kinda bonkers to think that ODI World Cup and Test Championship success stems from this core, now they are playing crucial roles in a T20 World Cup.

Boult is the best seamer so far in this World Cup. No, not Aotearoa's best seamer but the best seamer and no one seems to care. Boult leads Aotearoa's bowlers with 11w @ 5.84rpo/10.7sr and he is one of four bowlers who has taken 10+ wickets, with the other three being spinners (Hasaranga de Silva from Sri Lanka, Adam Zampa from Australia and Shakib Al Hasan from Bangladesh).

Boult has taken a wicket in every game, including 2+ wickets in four consecutive games. Boult's bowling strike-rate of 10.7 is ranked 9th overall, but Zampa is the only bowler ahead of Boult who has also bowled 15+ overs and Zampa's still in the tournament.

If you were tripping about warm up games like White Ferns selectors, you would have been pondering how to not select Tim Southee. Southee conceded 10.33rpo and 10.50rpo in the two warm up games and he's also taken a wicket in every game so far with 7w @ 5.70rpo. Southee is just behind Ish Sodhi's 8w and for all the intrigue about spin bowling, these legendary seamers have casually combined to take 19w in five games. Both are conceding less than 6rpo.

The weird thing is how these two got to this juncture. Boult usually kicks back when Aotearoa is playing all their T20I cricket and this year is the first year of Boult's career in which he has played 10 games. Boult played two games in 2019 and 2020, however Boult has been busy in the Indian Premier League where he joins Williamson as the only kiwis playing 10+ games; Boult's played 10+ IPL games in three of the last four years.

Southee on the other hand has been a T20I monster. Southee has played 10+ T20I games in three of the last four years, taking 12+ wickets in four consecutive years and currently chillin' in his best year of T20I bowling ever (19w @ 18.31avg/7.10rpo/15.4sr). Southee's T20I explosion came after four down years (2013-2017) in T20I cricket and Southee basically swapped his ODI form for T20I excellence.

Southee and Boult move the ball both ways. They have their natural swing, as well as deliveries that we've seen a lot of now where Southee pushes the ball into righties and Boult angles the ball across righties. Both have slower balls as well, to go with experience and knowledge sharing as to what tactics suit conditions. Think of these two as baseball pitchers with the best 'stuff' and all their funky stuff will be required to keep a lid on England's batting line up.

Under matua Williamson, the Blackcaps creep through tournaments. Boult's been excellent but he accumulates wickets and solid performances like coins in a jar. That goes for Williamson himself as he has scores of 25, 33*, 0, 28 and 40 so far in this World Cup with a strike-rate of 98.43. None of that looks sexy for a T20 tournament, in fact one could use this as a case for Williamson struggling.

42 games have been played, meaning 84 innings and a team has scored 200+ runs once (India's 210/2 vs Afghanistan). This brings the need for swashbuckling strike-rates down and Williamson's role in the batting line up is to hold things together around Martin Guptill (131.32sr) and Daryl Mitchell (134.40sr). Jimmy Neesham's doing his strike-rate mahi well (148.38sr with bat, 24sr with ball). Then we have Devon Conway (102.46sr) and Glenn Phillips (116.43) who are both under-par overall, yet Conway had his best knock vs Afghanistan with an improved 112.50 and Phillips cracked 39* @ 185.71sr vs Namibia.

Williamson cruises along, banking 20+ scores to average 42 without much fuss. Like the seamers, Williamson has shots for all conditions and all bowlers. Williamson's role is more about ticking the score over and doing matua things with his batting partner, leading the innings from the middle. I love Williamson so much, I'd go as far as saying that Williamson is in control of his strike-rate. Williamson's 2020 T20I strike-rate was 155.71, which has dropped down to 106.66 this year and there's a similar theme in Williamson's IPL mahi...

2017: 151.47sr - 10 sixes.

2018: 142.44sr -28 sixes.

2019: 120sr - 5 sixes.

2020: 133.75sr - 10 sixes.

2021: 113.19sr - 2 sixes.

Again, one can easily use all this as reason for Williamson being out of form. If we've been dealing with Williamson out of form so far, then chur because he's been pretty damn solid. What we know about Williamson is that he's a smart geezer and I'm suggesting that Williamson is well aware of the tricky batting conditions in United Arab Emirates thus the need for him to be the glue in a batting innings. England's best bowlers are spinners Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali (both have 7+ wickets and concede less than 6rpo), so I'm curious how Aotearoa's best batsman deals with this challenge given his prowess against spin and knowledge of facing spin gained over the past few months.

To beat England, Aotearoa will need other contributions. The beauty here is that Aotearoa is not short of blokes who have already chimed in with runs or wickets, or lads like Conway and Santner who have shown nifty signs but not quite hit their best work. Aotearoa's cricketing excellence is built around Williamson, Southee and Boult though and these three epitomise everything this Blackcaps team is about; skill, nous and mana.

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Peace and love.