2020/21 Ford Trophy: Big Dawgs Canterbury Are Waiting
The three Ford Trophy finalists have been summoned and with Canterbury locked in for the super-duper final, it leaves Northern Districts Knights hosting Wellington Firebirds for a trip down to Christchurch. The play-in final is tomorrow in Hamilton, then the final is on Saturday and there's a sneaky rivalry brewing between Canterbury and Wellington that the Knights will be trying to flex all over.
Wellington won the Super Smash, but they came up against a heart Canterbury unit that didn't even have Henry Nicholls or Tom Latham on deck. Wellington took the direct route to the Super Smash final, while Canterbury did a snatch and gap job in Auckland to take their place in the Super Smash final. The doosra in this is the Plunket Shield, where Wellington sit at the bottom of the ladder with three losses and a draw from their four games. Canterbury on the other hand are 1st, with three wins and a draw.
Post Super Smash action in the Ford Trophy has seen two rounds played, with teams playing back to back games against the same opponent. Four games for Canterbury, three wins and three Blackcaps leading their band of nifty role-players. Henry Nicholls' last 10 games of cricket...
Plunket Shield: 87.
vs West Indians: 76.
FT: 43*.
Tests: 7, 174, 56, 11, 157.
FT: 33, 113, 49.
Nicholls put up two scores in the last two games vs Auckland, both of which were wins. Meanwhile, Tom Latham has jacked up scores of 63, 36, 30 and 118 in this stint of FT games headlined by his 118* coming off 75 deliveries @ 157.33sr. Seamer Matt Henry continues to steadily grab wickets with hauls of 3w, 3w, 1w and 1w in the last four games which takes Henry to 15w @ 19.13avg/4.28rpo.
The key nugget for Canterbury though are their other players, all quality performers in their own right and for a bloke like Will Williams there is a greater yarn to explore as he's snaring wickets in every format he plays. In this FT context, Canterbury have been enjoying great contributions from players who led the way when the Blackcaps were busy prior to the Super Smash and with Nicholls and Latham returning, even Daryl Mitchell; these lads become the extra spice sprinkled on top.
Ken McClure is 2nd overall for FT runs. McClure hit a 96 @ 95.05sr vs Auckland as Nicholls was cruising to his century and for kiwi cricket fans who have been frothing over domestic cricket like myself, McClure's work this summer is a major yarn to tap into.
Ford Trophy: 2nd, 7inns, 388 runs @ 64.66avg/88.58sr, 2 x 100, 2 x 50.
Plunket Shield: 5th, 5inns, 246 runs @ 61.50avg, 1 x 100.
Other batsmen around Aotearoa have more hype, although McClure is is the undercover lad to celebrate. Just as Williams is doing the same thing with the ball and he's leading all wicket-takers, while Henry and Sean Davey are also in the top-five.
Will Williams: 1st, 18w @ 17.50avg/4.23rpo.
Sean Davey: 5th, 15w @ 20.26avg/5.18rpo.
After making his T20 debut with Northern Districts, Tauranga's Davey has played his role perfectly in the Canterbury seam attack. Between Williams, Henry and Davey they have all played the last four games and of their 12 innings bowled, there is only one with no wickets (Davey's last game)These three have combined to take 19 wickets across the four games.
Wellington have been in a nice groove, winning three of their last four games. The funk here sits with Finn Allen, who continues to whip up a frenzy with his slugging and that's important because when Allen isn't slugging, he ain't scoring. Against ND, Allen had a 0 off 3 balls and was then pegged down to 7 off 12 balls; now ND will swing back around for the knockout game.
Then Allen exploded and it seems like an expression of freedom for Allen, perhaps coinciding with a slightly weaker Otago Volts bowling unit (see the ND notes below). Allen whacked 46 @ 219.05sr and 128 @ 216.95sr in back to back games, which saw Allen slide back into Super Smash mode. This is all rather interesting as there is a clear difference between Allen in Super Smash mode and how Allen plays the other formats.
In these two games vs Otago, Allen scored 174 (@ 193.93sr) of his 217 FT runs. That leaves 43 runs in four games prior and Allen will be enticing viewing in the Plunket Shield second stanza as he's got 40 runs in 6inns @ 6.66avg. In the Super Smash and when taking Super Smash mode into Ford Trophy, Allen is excellent. When batting like a regular cricketing pleb, Allen has struggled. Fascinating.
Peep how late Allen moves around the crease. In both shots, Allen only wiggles a leg as the bowler is releasing the ball…
Wellington have also tinkered with their squad. Troy Johnson was the captain in the last four games and he's had scores of 66, 6, 58 and 12. Again, there's the sexy hype cricketers and those who chip away with runs/wickets to keep their team in competitive spots. Johnson is Wellington's leading run-scorer and along with Michael Bracewell and Jakob Bhula; they're the blokes consistently chiming in.
Troy Johnson: 5th, 9inns, 353 runs @ 44.12avg/87.81sr, 1 x 100, 3 x 50.
Michael Bracewell: 6th, 7inns, 341 runs @ 56.83avg/89.26sr, 4 x 50.
Jakob Bhula: 14th, 9inns, 273 runs @ 34.12avg/80.29sr, 2 x 50.
Bhula was part of the same Aotearoa Under 19 team as Allen and Ravindra, but didn't play any Super Smash. Ollie Newton didn't play any Super Smash either after being on Hamish Bennett's hip as the leading wicket-taker in the previous summer, now Newton and Ian McPeake step in as Ford Trophy seamers. Similar vibe here to Canterbury as Newton, McPeake and Logan van Beek are consistently solid around the Ben Sears x-factor.
First thing about Sears right now is that he's averaging below 30 in First-Class and List-A cricket, below 20 in T20. These are all good markers of a quality bowler and in four FT games Sears has 8w @ 23.87avg/5.43rpo, to go with his 9w @ 16.77avg/6.86rpo in the Super Smash. In the last four games, Sears has taken 3w twice and 0w twice, which makes those lads who grab a wicket or two every game that much more important.
Northern Districts won five of their first six games. Now they storm into the knockout game vs Wellington with three losses in their last four games and who knows what that will mean come kick off. Wellington have Sears, ND have Mathew Fisher who is emerging as a hectic wee seamer who made his FT debut earlier in the summer and has 10w @ 19.30avg/4.82rpo. The Knights will take their pick from, or roll out all of this seaming group...
Brett Hampton: 2nd, 17w @ 23avg/4.81rpo.
Brett Randell: 6th, 15w @ 23.66avg/5.63rpo.
Anurag Verma: 8th, 13w @ 8.46avg/4.96rpo.
Mathew Fisher: 10w @ 19.30avg/4.82rpo.
Scott Kuggeleijn: 7w @ 24.42avg/4.58rpo.
This seam attack vs Wellington's line up of Allen, Blundell, Bhula, Bracewell and Johnson will be fun. A key factor for the Knights will be how their forward pack trio of batsmen perform; Joe Carter, Henry Cooper and BJ Watling.
Jeet Raval and Katene Clarke are likely to open again, with Raval 3rd in FT runs but coming off a 0 and 9 vs Central Districts Stags. Raval's actually in the midst of a low key solid summer, which when packaged alongside the free-flowing Clarke sets up the Knights innings. Their engine room though, the blokes doing the mahi up the guts is the Carter/Cooper/Watling trio and compared to Raval who has played all 10 games with steady scores taking him up the charts, Cooper's played seven games while Watling's played five and Carter's only played four.
Cooper hit 51 in his last outing. Carter is coming off scores of 58 and 71. Watling's coming off 68 and 43*. All three of these lads have played all of the last four games and we'll only be graced with a timely Colin de Grandhomme slugging session if these lads hold it down in the middle order vs Wellington.
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Peace and love.