The Rise Of William O'Rourke & Canterbury's Funky Seamers
Winter becomes spring and the domestic cricket season approaches with Canterbury seamer William O'Rourke emerging like a fresh blossom. O'Rourke enters his third season of domestic cricket this summer and after churning out the busiest mahi of Canterbury's Plunket Shield bowlers last summer, O'Rourke then snared plenty of wickets in two Aotearoa A series against their Aussie counterparts.
On the surface, O'Rourke's 23w @ 32.6avg/3.1rpo in the Plunket Shield last season is solid but not overly impressive. Especially when Matt Henry took his 23w @ 11.69avg/2rpo and another Canterbury seamer Sean Davey also took 23w @ 14.69avg/2.4rpo. This is reinforced by O'Rourke having the highest average of the seven Plunket Shield bowlers who took 23+ wickets last season.
Only three of these bowlers bowled 220+ overs though with O'Rourke joining hearty domestic troopers Jacob Duffy and Will Somerville. O'Rourke's 238.1 overs were the most for Canterbury bowlers in Plunket Shield last season and he was the only Cantab to churn out 160+ overs. Compare that to Henry's 134.1ov and Davey's 137ov, then stack it on top of O'Rourke's mahi in Ford Trophy and Super Smash last season.
O'Rourke was joined by Edward Nuttall in bowling 50+ Ford Trophy overs and O'Rourke finished tied with Henry Shipley as the leading wicket-takers for Canterbury in the one-day format. In Super Smash, O'Rourke also finished tied with Zak Foulkes and Angus McKenzie as the leading Canterbury wicket-takers, while joining Todd Astle as the only Cantabs who bowled 30+ overs.
All of which offers enticing stat lines and O'Rourke finished top-10 for wickets across all formats...
Plunket Shield: 238.1ov, 23w @ 32.6avg/3.1rpo - 7th
Ford Trophy: 55.1ov, 13w @ 20.7avg/4.8rpo - 7th
Super Smash: 34.3ov, 12w @ 23.1avg/8rpo - 6th
O'Rourke did get overs for Canterbury in the previous summer. This was led by 9w @ 26.4avg in Plunket Shield and while he didn't take a Super Smash wicket, O'Rourke snared 4w @ 35.5avg in the 2021/22 Ford Trophy. These foundations are notable because O'Rourke is a tall seamer which can be niggly when short-cuts are taken in development. Since leaving Auckland to move south, O'Rourke dominated the club circuit in Christchurch and he has steadily gathered experience as he grows into his physical stature.
A nifty summer for Canterbury was parlayed into O'Rourke's first NZA appearance in Lincoln against Australia A with 2 wickets in both innings of their unoffifical Test match. Every Aotearoa A game has been saluted in previous yarns by The Niche Cache and the thread of O'Rourke emerging in domestic cricket is documented in the archives. The best way to slice O'Rourke's mahi for NZA this year, including the recent tour of Australia is stating that O'Rourke took 2+ wickets in every innings bowled against Australia A.
That's six consecutive innings with 2+ wickets, stretching across kiwi and Aussie conditions. O'Rourke also took 2w in his last outing for Canterbury last season, giving him seven consecutive innings with 2+ wickets. Baggies of wickets and a sneaky leader role in Canterbury's bowling attack then became consistent wickets against Australia A.
How does O'Rourke do it? He's tall, listed at 197cm. This makes him a smidge taller than Henry Shipley who is apparently 196cm and shorter than Kyle Jamieson who is 203cm tall. Like Shipley and Jamieson, O'Rourke bowls fast enough and appears to operate between 135-140km/h. Like Shipley and Jamieson, O'Rourke nibbles the ball. This is usually evident in angling deliveries back into right-handers, but O'Rourke has shown natural out-swing and all sorts of seam movement.
O'Rourke is not from the old school kiwi seamer prototype of tame medium-pace. With a smooth action and strong wrist position, O'Rourke offers x-factor. This is exactly the same as Shipley with his whippy action catching batters off-guard and allowing him to deliver an upright seam.. Jamieson blasted his way into the Blackcaps bowling attack thanks to his unique hooping in-swing to righties, coming from an awkward height.
To lay this out further, I found the average of the three domestic bowling averages for each bowler. Add the three averages for First-Class, List-A and T20 bowling then divide it by three. This offers a basic gauge of wicket-taking efficiency and O'Rourke has the best average-of-averages in this cluster of three tall seamers...
William O'Rourke: 197cm - 25.94avg
Kyle Jamieson: 203cm - 26.94avg
Henry Shipley: 196cm - 30.40avg
Suddenly, Aotearoa has three funky seamers. They are the tallest seamers in Aotearoa and all three provide movement via swing and seam. Shipley is currently the leading wicket-taker for Blackcaps in ODIs this year with 15w @ 23.9avg/5.5rpo. The only other Blackcaps seamers averaging below 30 in ODIs this year are Daryl Mitchell (9w @ 21.3avg/6.1rpo) and Trent Boult (8w @ 11avg/5.4rpo) which highlights Shipley's quality.
Everyone knows about Jamieson's quality but he didn't crack the World Cup squad. This means that the three funkiest seamers in Aotearoa are not in the World Cup squad and this amplifies the undercover depth of Aotearoa cricket. That's lovely, although anyone from other regions will be stressing about the presence of these three in Canterbury's seam attack. Stash those emotions aside. Any hearty kiwi cricket fan should be fizzing about seeing Jamieson, Shipley and O'Rourke in the same Canterbury seam attack.
Add in Henry when he is available. Foulkes is also a funky seam prospect. Davey, Nuttall and Fraser Sheat are all good domestic bowlers. Plus, Canterbury added Michael Rae to their roster and he just wrapped an impressive stint for the NZA one-day team. Here are all the Canterbury seamers and their stats...
(FC | LA | T20)
Matt Henry
23.49avg | 26.78avg | 24.46avg
Kyle Jamieson
22.36avg | 32.58avg | 25.5avg
Henry Shipley
29.15avg | 37.22avg | 24.84avg
William O'Rourke
30.14avg | 21avg | 27.5avg
Edward Nuttall
31avg | 28.47avg | 29.36avg
Michael Rae
35.06avg | 27.04avg | 22.21avg
Sean Davey
17.6avg | 20.05avg | 65avg
Fraser Sheat
25.95avg | 43.75avg | 17avg
Zak Foulkes
26.72avg | 25.75avg | 15.33avg
Angus McKenzie
36.17avg | 35.7avg | 20avg
O'Rourke has proven himself as an exciting young seamer and yet he may not be the best Canterbury seamer in their bowling group for domestic games this season. With height and sideways movement, O'Rourke shares a similar skillset to Jamieson and Shipley which seems like the ideal development environment for Aotearoa’s most intriguing young seamer.
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