This whole Brownlie thing is a bit pointless isn't it? As far as I'm aware he came here in search of an opportunity to play a higher level of cricket, did a lot of hard work with Bob Carter, got his chance and has so far made the most of it. Good on him but I don't think that really gives an indication of where the NZ domestic scene sits in relation to Australia. Given that Aus has a greater population of cricketers it should be no surprise that they produce a higher number of players in the good/very good brackets. I'm sure they produce far more absolutely rubbish club cricketers too, simply because more people play the game. However, the very nature of top level sport seems to indicate that just having more people playing the game doesn't result in more great players.
So the way I see it is that, for example, the Sydney grade competition is obviously far superior to any club cricket in NZ. Perhaps one or two of the best players in each team here would make it over there, whereas probably the whole team and most of the seconds would succeed in club cricket here. At the next level (FC) the gap gets smaller because, despite Australia having more good and very good players, the step up can still only be made by a small proportion of those - regardless of numbers. So, the Australian domestic competition is better than NZ, but not by anywhere near as much as the difference between the level below. And finally, at the international level, the gap is smaller again because simply having more good/very good players doesn't always produce more great players (see India). Australia, assuming their domestic structure remains conducive to producing good cricketers, is always more likely to have more great players at any one time but because there are a variety of factors that lead to any great player making it, this isn't always the case. See the difference between the respective test teams of Aus and NZ in 2006/07 and now. Australia were clearly vastly superior then. Now they're still superior but there is far more chance of an upset like Hobart. That's how I see it anyway. NZ probably punches above its weight somewhat but when it comes to top level sport the gap between two teams of players who've made it all the way from junior, club and FC cricket is never going to be as big as it is a couple of levels down.
BTW for the purposes of this argument good means decent club player, very good means decent FC player and great means decent international player (not great in the ATG sense).
