Plunket Shield takes a break over the festive period and after offering the five best Ford Trophy players from the first stanza, now it's time to dive into the best longform cricketers from the first four games. It's too tricky to narrow things down to five blokes in Plunket Shield though so let's start with major salutes to the best cricketers overall this season.

Henry Nicholls stands alone as the best player in Ford Trophy and Plunket Shield. After being the leading run-scorer in Ford Trophy and the only bloke with 300+ runs from five games, Nicholls is now third for Plunket Shield runs as one of four batters with 400+ runs. Nicholls hit two centuries in Ford Trophy and three in Plunket Shield, giving him five 100+ scores in 10 innings this season.

This includes a double-banger in Canterbury's most recent Plunket Shield game and no scores between 50-100 runs. If Nicholls is scoring over 30 runs he is flowing into century territory and keep in mind that Nicholls' last Test knock was a 150* in Zimbabwe prior to the kiwi summer. That means that Nicholls has six centuries in his last nine games.

There are a couple other 'best on the domestic circuit' contenders but they fit into the five best Plunket Shield players below, so let's focus on giving Josh Clarkson some more aroha. Clarkson is the leading wicket-taker in Ford Trophy as the only bowler with 13+ wickets and of the 15 bowlers who have 7+ wickets in Ford Trophy, Clarkson is the only one averaging below 15 and with an economy rate below 4rpo.

Clarkson hasn't quite been as efficient in Plunket Shield but he is still the leading wicket-taker for Central Districts and he is ranked seventh overall. With 13w @ 25avg/3.6rpo, Clarkson is the only bowler in Aotearoa with 10+ wickets in both competitions and he is averaging 2.6 wickets per innings bowled this season.

Henry Cooper is the leading run-scorer in Plunket Shield and the only batter with 500+ runs after four games. Nicholls is the only other batter with a 200+ score in Plunket Shield and while his 206* accounts for almost half of his 509 total runs, Cooper only has one innings of less than 40 runs in his seven innings batted.

The Northern Districts batting mahi men deserve a special spotlight as they have four batters with 300+ runs and all four are averaging 40+. Cooper is joined by Joe Carter, Bharat Popli and Jeet Raval in this group with Raval being the only batter not to hit three 50+ scores so far, although Raval is the only one in this group who has two centuries.

Another mature batter Brad Schmulian is second for Plunket Shield runs after being fifth for Ford Trophy runs. Schmulian is averaging 50+ in both competitions this season and he has 40+ averages in both formats through his career. He has a 50+ score in three consecutive Plunket Shield games and started the campaign with 46 runs, so he wasn't far off scoring a halfie in every game.

Curtis Heaphy should be in the top-five but I've rolled with two bowlers and an all-rounder in the other three spots, but Heaphy deserves a special mention because he is the best young cricketer in Aotearoa right now. Heaphy is also in the mix for multi-format wizardry as he is averaging 60+ in both compettions but he only had two Ford Trophy innings so he wasn't at the top of the run-scoring charts there.

Heaphy did have a a knock of 58* in Ford Trophy and is averaging 93, which is aligned with his List-A career average of 52.8. The 22-year-old is fourth for Plunket Shield runs and the only other batter with 250+ runs who hasn't played all four games is Nicholls. Heaphy has two centuries and two 50+ scores, making him one of three batters who have four 50+ scores in Plunket Shield.

With a First-Class averaging now approaching 50 (46.71), Heaphy is in rare air of hovering around 50avg in FC and LA. No other emerging batter in Aotearoa is close to this mark and his wave of scores stretching back through the NZ-A tour of South Africa tell the story of Heaphy's form; 35, 30*, 32, 36, 190, 13*, 35, 58*, 5, 132, 119, 17, 65, 81.

Two lefty finger spinners are leading the wicket-takers in Plunket Shield with Auckland's Rohit Gulati on top with 22 wickets and Northern Districts' Tim Pringle on 19 wickets. Funnily enough, Gulati got game time for ND last season with Pringle missing the season due to injury and Gulati's move to Aucklnd was probably due to Pringle coming back into their team, so it's lovely for both to be the best bowlers so far.

These two are the only bowlers who have had 150+ overs in Plunket Shield and their busy workloads come with low averages. Gulati is on 22.6avg/2.8rpo and Pringle is on 25.5avg/2.5rpo, with both taking 4+ wickets in an innings three times.

Gulati has wickets in six of his seven innings bowled and he is averaging below 27 in all three formats early in his domestic career. He also took 4w @ 18.5avg/3.7rpo in Ford Trophy and Auckland have had two specialist spinners in most games this season as Gulati has been selected alongside leggy Adithya Ashok.

Pringle has wickets in seven of his eight innings bowled and his FC average is now in the low 30s (33.9) which is the same region is most of Aotearoa's best spinners. Having played international cricket for Netherlands, Pringle's List-A average of 42.7 is high thanks to his 1w @ 221avg in ODIs, but Pringle was also steady in Ford Trophy with 5w @ 24avg/3.7rpo. ND operate with Pringle as the leading spinner but also have Raval's leggies and Cooper's offies doing plenty of spin mahi.

Simon Keene is having an excellent season and like Heaphy, he's flowing on from a strong NZ-A tour of South Africa with the bat. Keene wasn't as effective with the ball in South Africa but he scored 67 runs @ 167sr in his two longform innings and 114 runs @ 57avg/128sr in the one-dayers.

Keene didn't score many Ford Trophy runs but he is ranked fourth for bowlers as Auckland's leading wicket-taker and has divine alignment in also being fourth for Plunket Shield wickets, as Auckland's leading wicket-taker. He has a century and a 50+ score in Plunket Shield with 46.5avg and Keene's also rolling in divine alignment with strike-rates of 81.5 in Plunket Shield and 81.8 in Ford Trophy.

At 24-years-old, Keene has FC batting and bowling averages of 30-ish. He averages below 35 in all bowling formats and 20+ in all batting formats, as part of a funky trio of seaming all-rounders for Auckland alongside Jock McKenzie and Ryan Harrison, as well as an expansive group of seaming all-rounders on the rise around Aotearoa.

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Peace and love.