Exploring Another New Low For The New Zealand Women's Cricket Team In T20 Series Sweep vs England
The New Zealand Women's cricket team have executed a rare tour sweep in England where they lost all five T20 games, after being rolled in all three ODIs before that. This gives the White Ferns a 0-8 tour of England and all the ODI stuff was covered in this deep dive, now it's time to assess some T20 matters where the general tone of stinky White Ferns continues.
As always, White Ferns were reasonably competitive in each game of this T20 series. There are moments of good cricket or moments of the White Ferns playing to their ability and yet these moments are soon followed by losing mahi. Wickets are thrown away, runs are easily scored off White Ferns bowlers and the palpable lack of confidence that has plagued them ever since being shook in the ODI World Cup opening defeat to West Indies, threads through all White Ferns performances.
This provides wrinkles of positivity that captain Sophie Devine is quick to highlight and there is a whiff of propaganda that disguises how sloppy White Ferns are under coach Ben Sawyer. Our recent newsletter had lots of White Ferns review stuff and a mini investigation into coach Sawyer, who continues to take White Ferns in a downward spiral.
Sawyer had a successful start to his T20 coaching career with a stacked Sydney Sixers outfit in Women's Big Bash League. Then came a plateau with Sixers finishing fifth, fifth and eighth in his last three WBBL campaigns. In between those last three seasons as Sixers coach, Sawyer made the semi-finals with Birmingham Phoenix. There is a drastic dip in Sawyer's coaching mahi which overlaps with the start of his White Ferns career...
2021 Birmingham Phoenix: 4-4 | 3/8 | semis
2021/22 Sydney Sixers: 4-9 | 4/8
2022 Birmingham Phoenix: 3-3 | 4/8
2023 Royal Challengers Bangalore: 2-6 | 4/5
2023 Birmingham Phoenix: 0-7 | 8/8
These losing teams improved when coach Sawyer departed his role as well. Sawyer lost his last six games as Sixers coach and they then brought in Charlotte Edwards who took Sixers to the final with an 11-2 record in the next season. RCB only missed out on last spot in the 2023 WPL thanks to net-run-rate and after Sawyer departed that role, RCB hired Luke Williams who took them to the championship this year.
The quirkiest thing here though is that Sawyer's worst T20 coaching campaigns involve Devine. Sawyer and Devine start their 2024 Hundred campaign alongside Suzie Bates for Birmingham soon. Given how poor Sawyer's coaching record is in the last four years, it will be interesting to see how Birmingham perform over the next few weeks, but the damage for White Ferns has already been done.
Sawyer has dragged two T20 franchises down and White Ferns are 2-11 in T20s since the start of last summer. That's 1-9 in T20s this year, 7-15 since the start of 2023 and 13-16 since the White Ferns claimed a Commonwealth Games bronze medal. Credit to Sawyer and Devine for leading White Ferns to a victory over England in the bronze medal game, but the fact that they won that with the same group and are now being rolled in both formats vs England shows how hefty the decline has been.
Let's combine Sawyer's T20 gigs in 2023 with his White Ferns record since the start of last summer: 4-24
Devine has been involved in most of those four wins and 24 losses. As captain of the White Ferns, Devine is gathering plenty of losses and she isn't dominating in a cricket sense, nor is Devine inspiring her troops to perform or at least get better. Devine was the only White Ferns batter to score 50+ in this series but she finished with 84 runs @ 21avg/106sr, which simmers along at 22avg/116sr in T20s since November 1st 2023 (start of last summer).
That's alright batting mahi from Devine but a long way below her destructive best. Devine didn't take a wicket in the T20 series vs England while conceding 9.30 and this means that Devine didn't take a wicket in 22 overs throughout this tour..
Since the start of last summer, which includes the T20 series loss vs Pakistan in kiwi conditions, no White Ferns batter is averaging over 30. T20 cricket is all about having a whack, scoring without fear and one would assume that coach Sawyer is well versed in T20 batting, yet Jess Kerr and Lea Tahuhu are the only White Ferns batters with strike-rates over 120 since the start of last summer.
In this period, Bates is the only bowler averaging below 20 and while Bates was celebrated as a spin bowling option last summer, Bates didn't bowl in England. No White Ferns bowler is conceding less than 5rpo since the start of last summer while Eden Carson and Molly Penfold are the only bowlers conceding less than 7.5rpo.
Two players of note in this context are Maddy Green and Jess Kerr.
Green is in the midst of a pesky batting slump, although this seems more like a return to the Green status-quo after a couple good years. Green blasted 38 runs @ 9.5avg/88sr in five innings against England after scoring 37 runs @ 12avg/60sr in the ODIs. Here's how the last few years of Green's T20I batting look...
2021: 15.71avg/107sr
2022: 30.7avg/117sr
2023: 30.8avg/118sr
2024: 10avg/78sr
That looks like a tough phase of form, although Green averaged below 16 in all eight years of T20I batting prior to 2021. 2022 and 2023 are the only years of Green's T20I batting career in which she averaged over 16, which isn't good enough for a senior batter in a losing team.
Jess Kerr has flourished as the most consistent hitter for White Ferns, perhaps sneaking past Lea Tahuhu as the best hitter. Unfortunately for J-Kerr she took one wicket in 21 overs of this England tour and the Kerr sisters combined to both average 40+ while conceding over 8rpo in the T20s vs England. Here's how J-Kerr's T20I bowling career looks...
2020: 27.5avg/5.5rpo
2021: 35.2avg/6.5rpo
2022: 11.8avg/3.6rpo
2023: 44avg/7.5rpo
2024: 95.5avg/7rpo
Georgia Plimmer (13avg/70sr) and Izzy Gaze (5avg/59sr) took backwards steps in the T20 series vs England, after they averaged 6.5 and 10 respectively in the ODIs. Their career mahi reflects the sad state of White Ferns cricket...
Georgia Plimmer
ODIs: 11.6avg/60sr
T20Is: 10.1avg/85sr
Izzy Gaze
ODIs: 13avg/70sr
T20Is: 13.2avg/103sr
The series sweep defeat vs England featured White Ferns shenanigans with the dubious selection of Lauren Down, then the strange role Down played batting down the order with bowlers. Given all the woeful batting performances of a team that was smoked 0-8 in England, it is beyond baffling that Mikaela Greig didn't play on this tour of England.
Greig is a mature cricketer who has done far more than many White Ferns batters have in Aotearoa's domestic cricket circuit. Greig can add value to the White Ferns and yet she couldn't get game time in a team that was brushed aside by England. In isolation, this is a niggly case of selection shenanigans. In the context of strange White Ferns decisions, this is the latest example of how goofy White Ferns matters are.
Strange White Ferns decisions have added up over the past five years, adding the weight of bad juju to the whole White Ferns set up. Zoom in on 2024 and there are three clear examples of White Ferns antics that make one question how this current regime can continue.
Greig not playing is one. The whirlwind of Down's selection and her baffling role is another. Then there is Kate Anderson being shunned from White Ferns which was covered in the preview of this England tour. White Ferns would be a better in both formats with Greig and Anderson in the 1st 11, while Down has 1t 11 batting talent in ODIs - as long as she is batting the the top half of the line up.
Over the last five years, players who can help White Ferns compete more consistently and win games in both formats, have been overlooked. These players are better suited to playing with freedom, being aggressive and standing up to the challenge offered by opponents. Not only have these players been overlooked for selection, they have been treated with disdain.
Next up is the T20 World Cup. The White Ferns last made a T20 World Cup semi-final in 2016 and have missed that mark in the last three tournaments, also missing the semi-finals in the last two ODI World Cups. Perhaps the White Ferns can rally to surprise folks with T20 World Cup success, however the reality is that the New Zealand Women's cricket team is far more comfortable with losing and it would take a drastic culture shift to rectify these woes.
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