Immediately after Aotearoa's delightful T20 World Cup win over Australia, all the attention was directed towards the Aussies. Aotearoa's performance was quickly brushed aside with the most popular cricketing nations going at each other and as Ireland defeated England prior to Aotearoa's game vs Afghanistan being washed out, the yarns drift past Aotearoa again.

Welcome to the low-key-sneaky-looming realms of Aotearoa sport. Steven Adams' mahi for Memphis Grizzlies is consistently overlooked, as is the Kiwi-NRL takeover and praise Jah that Lydia Ko's dominance is now blatantly obvious. None of this is frustrating and awareness of how Aotearoa sport is tucked under the radar allows comfort.

Aotearoa is currently perched on top of their T20WC group, with the kiwis and Afghans taking a point each from their washed out encounter. While Blackcaps softness has been evident in Test cricket for almost a year and ODI softness emerged during the recent series in Australia, T20I cricket sits at the opposite end of this vibe spectrum.

Aotearoa was 13-3 prior to this game vs Afghanistan. This gives Aotearoa the best win/loss ratio in T20I cricket this year (4.333) and excusing the no-result, no team at this World Cup has a win/loss ratio over 3. This is aligned with many Blackcaps enjoying career-best pockets of T20I mahi and the only bloke rolling out worse mahi than usual, is Trent Boult - a bloke who elevates in major tournaments.

Finn Allen: 355 runs @ 27.30avg/158.48sr
Devon Conway: 431 runs @ 71.83avg/131.80sr
Kane Williamson: 227 runs @ 32.42avg/118.84sr
Glenn Phillips: 461 runs @ 46.10avg/152.64sr
Mark Chapman: 142 runs @ 35.50avg/173.17sr
Jimmy Neesham: 245 runs @ 35avg/192.91sr
(Daryl Mitchell: 265 runs @ 33.12avg/153.17sr)
(Michael Bracewell: 183.67sr // 11.2sr)
Mitchell Santner: 17w @ 6.69rpo/16.2sr
Tim Southee: 14w @ 8.22avg/14.6sr
Ish Sodhi: 21w @ 8.34rpo/16.9sr
Lockie Ferguson: 8w @ 6.20rpo/18.2
Trent Boult 6w @ 6.35rpo/28sr

Everyone in the batting unit except Finn Allen averages 30+ in T20I cricket this year. As noted in the Blackcaps Perfection yarn, Allen is one of the best pure sluggers at this tournament and his strike-rate absorbs the slightly lower batting average. Everyone except Kane Williamson has batting strike-rates over 130 this year and Williamson's one of the craftiest batters in the world, so all good.

Peep Daryl Mitchell's stats and factor how he might fit into the team, probably taking Mark Chapman's spot. Michael Bracewell's batting and bowling strike-rates are bonkers, while the strongest bowling unit has bowling strike-rates below 20 this year - apart from Boult.

Alright, tuck the Aotearoa bias aside. Aotearoa's 13-3 record and career-best mahi from most players stems from a T20I tour of Europe in which Aotearoa played Ireland, Scotland and Netherlands. The three games against West Indies can be viewed in a similar bucket as they weren't good enough to crack the big donnie stage of T20WC, then Aotearoa hosted a tri-series that served as preparation for the major tournament.

This is where a bunch of ideas meet at a crossroads. Aotearoa made the ODI World Cup final, then won the World Test Championship before making the T20WC final. Aotearoa was the only nation to play in all three finals. Aotearoa's equity in major tournaments blends in with a sensational year of T20I cricket, which bumps into lots of games against weaker nations.

Aotearoa rolled out their depth in those games against weaker nations though, still snaring wins and impressive performances. Those wins give Aotearoa the best win/loss ratio in T20I cricket this year and with some of the greatest T20I cricketers ever, Aotearoa looms like Aemond Targaryen's dragon Vhagar at Storm's Landing. Aotearoa's next game is against Sri Lanka on Saturday and this should serve as another opportunity to grab a quiet win, as Blackcaps bask in the T20WC shadows.

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Peace and love.