*Unofficial* New Zealand Black Caps Thread

[Howsie]

It just won't happen.

New Zealand cricket needs to introduce a rookie scheme or something to that effect for the six first class teams. Three players per team, Under 20 (?) given or shell I say paid 10,000. Too many players give cricket up at that 17-18 range, get some money involved, give them time to actually train to be a professional cricketer.

 

[Athlai]

Nah, NZ cricket should have a Wellington scheme, where the entire XI are in their 30s, and half of them you thought retired in 2010.

 

[Kippax]

Which is where Fergus Hickey/Hawke Cup cricket comes in handy for ND. Club cricket is a pretty poor standard in all but the Bay of Plenty competition, but all six district associations ( Northland, Counties, Hamilton, Waikato.Valley, Bay of Plenty and Poverty Bay) play against each other over the course of th summer. Most coache and selectors for those teams aren’t just looking at the club stat sheet and picking the team like that, it doesn’t work like that unfortunately. From there you’re going ND A, which even then might not be the better performing players at the Fergus Hickey level and then obvs ND and first class cricket.

Anyone selecting or not selecting players based on club form IMO is an incompetent moron.

Which batsmen would you say ND rescued from middling and unremarkable club cricket returns and gently promoted up into very high echelon cricket, though? Watling?

I know Williamson would reliably average a lazy 80 or 90 when he'd make a token appearance at the NZC age group tourney or a NZ U19 tour, playing guys years older than him. Significantly better runs hauls than Ravindra managed. No 25th placing on the runs leaderboard at the U19 nationals with KW, to my recollection.

 

[Kippax]

Hopefully not another Auckland beast who'll one day tell us all he doesn't even enjoy the longest format very much.

 

[Kippax]

A good illustration of how KW will just quietly and masterfully take 24 off a T20 over these days it seems, putting those shockers he laid on last winter for the Barbados side well behind him. A good batting surface or a tricky one, it's become like vintage Ronnie O'Sullivan putting on a potting masterclass on a snooker table, suddenly.

 

[Flem274*]

colin munro moaned for ages about getting no chances in tests kippax

i don't think phillips is as good as him though. he looked well out of his depth against amir

 

[nzfan]

I know Williamson would reliably average a lazy 80 or 90 when he'd make a token appearance at the NZC age group tourney or a NZ U19 tour, playing guys years older than him. Significantly better runs hauls than Ravindra managed. No 25th placing on the runs leaderboard at the U19 nationals with KW, to my recollection.

On the contrary, KW barely tickled the scorers in the Malaysia WC. His highest was 37 and didn't get a 50. He was ranked at 31 and scored all of 124 runs in the entire tournament. I should know given I had some involvement with rep cricket at that point in time. He was well and truly talked about as a solid player. He was the best player in the bi-lateral series vs India under 19s and vs England U19s in England. I followed him, Corey and Harry Boam very closely. Corey probably was the best of the lot then given his size. He was like a grown man already. Southee picked up 17 wickets, the second highest like Ravindra picking up 14 wickets. Boult was 4th or 5th on the list with 11 wickets. Both Southee and Boult picking up wickets in those conditions was amazing. Similarly, Ravindra picking up 14 or 15 wickets in these conditions was amazing too. As a Kiwi I won't be short selling Ravindra. He could probably be the best ever player for us with the bat and the ball now that most cricket is played outside of NZ where there is always going to be scope for players that can play spin well and bowl spin as well. He may even end up the best ever in the world ala Jacques Kallis.

Steve Smith scored all of 114 runs with a highest of 39 in the 2008 U19s WC. This is the reason I don't necessarily trust runs and wickets at rep cricket. They are not a good barometer. Style of play and competency is more important. To be fair Ravindra debuted at u19s when he was barely 16 and the first game I remember scoring 80s I think with sixes as well. He opened with Glenn Phillips then. A 16 year old that plays against Pakistan (literally under 25s) in his first gig and in Dubai scoring runs taking wickets you knew you had a winner in him. Won't bother comparing a KW with RR, they are different players. Dare may I say Ravindra's skills are way higher than any rep cricketer I have come across in NZ cricket. Whether he can transfer those skills into performances at the highest level is a million dollar question. I hope he does and we will have one of the ATGs from NZ.

If you were speaking of Nationals I think Ravindra was at the top of the list when he was 16 in the first gig along with loads of wickets and top of the bowling list in the second gig in nationals. I wouldn't say he was rescued, he was way ahead of time and one of the brightest. I'd say Ben Sears was one guy that Wellington cricket helped through and never did his figures ever look good but we all know he's the one with the future. Canterbury does it best when pushing their players, they back their players to the hilt. TBH if a player is very good they need no push. It's not like we are brimming with talents left right and center.

 

[Kippax]

Nah I'm just never going to be convinced Ravindra's got the full Test opener toolkit until I see him stump up with truckloads of dominance and runs somewhere tbh. People who say 'oh him nicking off like that doesn't matter, it's such low stakes, pre-pub cricket he was doing that in' are probably just sweeping really fundamental things under the rug there. Inconvenient to the narrative they've set their hearts on.

 

[Athlai]

How dare you inconvenience my heart's narrative

 

[nzfan]

Nah I'm just never going to be convinced Ravindra's got the full Test opener toolkit until I see him stump up with truckloads of dominance and runs somewhere tbh. People who say 'oh him nicking off like that doesn't matter, it's such low stakes, pre-pub cricket he was doing that in' are probably just sweeping really fundamental things under the rug there. Inconvenient to the narrative they've set their hearts on.

Fair enough, yours is a bit of an old school that you need to score heaps of runs before progressing, nothing wrong with that. That said there are very few players i.e. very few players you know when they hold a bat or ball are no mortals. Ravindra is one of them for me. He's got something in him. There's not a player I haven't seen nick off even the best. Remember he has never played 4 day game and who knows his best cricket may come there. I believe his technique is very water tight and suits long format very well. It's just a matter of application. You can't nit pick one dismissal or one false shot among many. Put an entire inning and then I will show you how much better he probably is in comparison to others. Mention a batsman that you think is best and I will show him nick off. Moreover he's 18

I do believe he's not ready either to open given lack of experience but I trust NZC to make the right call. The guys that are making these decisions are experts. You'd think Hesson knows a thing or two about picking the right horses. It is not easy to be 18 and get picked for NZ A unless he has something special to offer. It'll take time for him to mature no doubt but to me he seems like a bloke born to play cricket.

I wouldn't wager a dollar whether he's going to be successful international or not, that's because I'm going to lose that dollar surely.

Perhaps he won't open, will bat at no.5 or no.6 and bowl heaps. I'd rather be excited than be apprehensive. I haven't been as excited since one Mr.KW played for Black Caps. Next I'd look forward to Finn Allen and Ben Sears. These two also have plenty to offer.

 

[nzfan]

While we are talking about newbies Grant Elliot calls it a day. The best import NZ ever had, great guy too. Had a chance to catch up with him few times.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/cricket/106467716/from-joburg-to-birmingham-grant-elliott-retires-from-all-cricket-at-39

 

[nzfan]

Domestic schedule released, thoughts?

https://www.nzc.nz/news-items/doubl...uper-smash-as-nzc-domestic-schedules-released

 

[Fuller Pilch]

While we are talking about newbies Grant Elliot calls it a day. The best import NZ ever had, great guy too. Had a chance to catch up with him few times.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/cricket/106467716/from-joburg-to-birmingham-grant-elliott-retires-from-all-cricket-at-39

Great player and great memories, but I'd say Twose (ODIs) and Wagner (tests) are our best imports. I wouldn't count Watling as an import as he came over as a kid

 

[Hicheal Michael]

09' was the last great Chappell-Hadlee series imo

i recall more from that series than any of the more recent ones

 

[Fuller Pilch]

09' was the last great Chappell-Hadlee series imo

i recall more from that series than any of the more recent ones

The amazing 2015 CWC pool match was for the CH, but wasn't a series.

McCullum's final ODI series with the controversial Matt Henry c&b off Mitchell Marsh to turn it around was pretty memorable.

 

[Hicheal Michael]

Australia have been sending weakened teams down here in the last few years, either Smith and Warner or Starc and Hazlewood get rested. Hard to invest in, personally.

The '09 series had the successful chase on that dodgy Perth pitch, the controversy that ensued after the Broom 'dismissal', the crowd going crazy after O'Brien knocked over Clarke for 98, the successful chase in that same game at the MCG, Elliot 100 at the SCG, and the chase at Brisbane that was unfortunately curtailed by rain.

Elliot top scored for Nz that series, hence the initial citation following news of his retirement.

 

[Kippax]

Great to see a better NZ A schedule.

Interesting they taking Ravindra. If they taking him I seriously would have taken Finn Allen too.

Yeah this was a very good thought actually, SeamUp. Why wouldn't you want to use a developmental tour of the UAE to find out how much of Allen's sweeping strength was to do with the U19 spinners being a bit tame, or whether he really has a Latham-style weapon there, one that will buff him on certain tours.

Tom Bruce would've made way for me to put Allen in that squad, I think. A strong chance we'll look back on that and think they were putting a lot of blinkered and small worldy faith in Bruce eventually polishing up his 'clothed for six' Pukekura Park strike-rates, make them translate to the world's better attacks and bigger stages.

 

[Howsie]

Bruce is terrible, somebody in the NZ setup is on crack if they think he’ll make a decent international player.

 

[Kippax]

Yeah I see both Bruce and Chapman are now being paid to not take the park for their employers.

Pretty swift rejection of Chapman. Hopefully the rumours I started about knocking his block off hasn't led to a freefall in confidence in all other departments of his game.

 

[SeamUp]

Yeah this was a very good thought actually, SeamUp. Why wouldn't you want to use a developmental tour of the UAE to find out how much of Allen's sweeping strength was to do with the U19 spinners being a bit tame, or whether he really has a Latham-style weapon there, one that will buff him on certain tours.

Tom Bruce would've made way for me to put Allen in that squad, I think. A strong chance we'll look back on that and think they were putting a lot of blinkered and small worldy faith in Bruce eventually polishing up his 'clothed for six' Pukekura Park strike-rates, make them translate to the world's better attacks and bigger stages.

Some serious power sweeps. Could not help but be impressed by him from what I saw.

Looks like him, Ravindra & Fisher are the 3 professionally contracted from the last u19 CWC which was expected.