Aotearoa Blackcaps vs Australia: T20I Series Preview
Aotearoa's Blackcaps have dusted up West Indies and Pakistan in home T20I series this summer, whipping up a minor frenzy with how different lads performed. In hosting England late in 2019 and then India early in 2020, the Blackcaps T20I unit played 10 games with two wins, three Super Over losses and five straight up losses. This splits everything up rather nicely in typical Blackcaps fashion as they can smoke weaker teams, then encounter speed bumps against better teams.
Three Super Over losses stem from three tied results at the end of regulation. These are obviously close games, so it's not as though the Blackcaps were horrible but this does highlight one probing issue to keep an eye on against Australia; death bowling and winning.
All but one of the losses to England and India in this period were also by hefty margins...
vs England: 7 wickets and 76 runs.
vs India: 6 wickets, 7 wickets and 7 runs.
Another note on those series is that the best Blackcaps performers aren't required for this series vs Australia or out injured in the case of Lockie Ferguson. Against England, Mitchell Santner was the best bowler and then Ferguson was next best. With the bat against England, four kiwis scored 100+ runs in the five games and Martin Guptill is the only one named in this squad to face Australia. Ross Taylor, Colin de Grandhomme and Colin Munro are chillin.
Against India, Ish Sodhi and Hamish Bennett were the best bowlers and they re-up to face Australia. The best batsmen against India were Munro and Taylor.
Yesterday, I previewed the White Ferns ODI series vs England. As the White Ferns have played 12 ODIs since the start of 2019 and lost 11 of them, there is intrigue in whether the best players in Aotearoa are rolled out to right that wrong or if a selection shake up is required. If the best players in Aotearoa churned out 11 losses in 12 games, then there isn't much to warrant future selections and that's balanced by the fact that younger/fringe players aren't at the same level.
For the Blackcaps, there is a similar vibe. The best players from the series vs England and India couldn't help the Blackcaps win games and series'. They were the best players in a team that apparently struggled though, giving them value.
Now we have a series against Australia and there's a slight caveat to suss out here as Australia initially named two separate squads - a Test squad to tour South Africa and a T20I squad to tour Aotearoa. Cricket Australia didn't want a bar of touring South Africa though with their Test squad currently playing domestic cricket, so none of the following players will be play in Aotearoa: Tim Paine, Sean Abbott, Alex Carey, Pat Cummins, Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Moises Henriques, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Michael Neser, James Pattinson, Will Pucovski, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Mark Steketee, Mitchell Swepson, David Warner.
Most of whom are familiar names to kiwis. As always, Australia have plenty of lads who are good at cricket and will still roll out teams that will test the Blackcaps. This isn't the strongest possible Aussie unit though and that's a key nugget to store away for this series helping frame your observations. Partly because the Blackcaps have funneled their best players down into a squad that feels close to the strongest possible group right now.
Ferguson is a beautiful figure for kiwi cricket fans as he is another nugget stored away in all our back pockets. We'd much prefer he plays and isn't injured, although we can roll through all sorts of Blackcaps cricket with knowledge that Ferguson is fizzing to get back on the park. Other than Ferguson, personally I'd have Daryl Mitchell in my squad and depending on your funk, you may have Ross Taylor, Colin de Grandhomme or Colin Munro in the mix. Maybe you want the Super Smash's leading wicket-taker Blair Tickner in, ahead of Hamish Bennett?
Let alone the fact that this will be an experiment of the Test bowling trio doing T20I things. There is a distinct T20 flavour to the batting line up on offer, while Trent Boult, Tim Southee and Kyle Jamieson are likely to form the seam bowling unit for most games vs Australia. This will enticing to see how these three go, perhaps using local tricks to defend the smaller boundaries in Aotearoa and all the skills we have seen on display in Test cricket. Boult, Southee and Jamieson were all good in the Super Smash.
Ish Sodhi and Mitchell Santner are again the spin duo. Sodhi only played two games after suffering an injury vs Pakistan and has three T20 games without a wicket, which stretches out to a run of eight games (five T20 games, two First-Class games and another T20I vs West Indies) with Sodhi not taking more than 1 wicket.
Santner did play five Super Smash games, taking 2w @ 82avg/9.11rpo.
13 bowlers conceded less than 7.50rpo in the Super Smash, of which nine were spinners (including Sodhi's 6.42rpo) and Santner finished up well down the charts in this regard. Seamers dominated the Super Smash wickets, spinners dominated economy rates. Sodhi bowled 42 deliveries without a wicket, but was economical. Santner didn't take many wickets and was not among the economical spinners. So ... who knows what they'll do vs Australia.
Here's how the Blackcaps batsmen went in the Super Smash...
Finn Allen: 512 runs @ 56.88avg/193.93sr.
Devon Conway: 455 runs @ 65avg/135.82sr.
Tim Seifert: 281 runs @ 28.10avg/115.63sr.
Mark Chapman: 219 runs @ 43.80avg/162.22sr.
Glenn Phillips: 156 runs @ 17.33avg/162.50sr.
Kane Williamson: 113 runs @ 137.80sr (wasn't dismissed - classic Kane)
Jimmy Neesham: 89 runs @ 17.80avg/115.58sr.
Mitchell Santner: 73 runs @ 18.25avg/146sr.
Kyle Jamieson: 56 runs @ 28avg/147.36sr.
Martin Guptill? Guppy scored 46 runs in his four games and across his last seven games, all of which are T20s, Guptill has two 20+ scores with a high score of 29.
Meanwhile, Finn Allen has the highest T20 career strike-rate on planet Earth.
Chris Harris has the best T20 average ever (70.66) and Auckland's Rob O'Donnell is 2nd (44.68). That's all pretty bonkers, which is then amplified considering that those all-time T20 averages are based on players with 20+ innings and Allen only has 13 innings; Allen's 48.81avg would have him near the top of the all-time averages depending on all the other sub-20 innings jokers around the world.
This series is all about Aotearoa. Of course, the trans-Tasman funk will feature heavily but remember that you can make an almighty T20 team of the Aussies who aren't in Aotearoa for this series. The Blackcaps on the other hand have cut the (perceived) fat from their T20I unit with no Taylor, de Grandhomme, Munro, Mitchell, Kuggeleijn, Tickner, Doug Bracewell, Todd Astle, Jacob Duffy or Matt Henry. All of whom have played recently.
Consider this a case of the Blackcaps selectors giving us a strong indication about how they view the best Blackcaps T20I squad. We'll all have little ins/outs, yet part of this is trying to understand what the selectors are doing and this series will be immense in sorting through the fallen leaves.
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