Cyclical History
White Ferns icky vibes, Football Ferns rehearsal, Blackcaps vs England, Warriors squad tinkerings & plenty more
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Reading Menu
Kiwi-NRL Spotlight: Trials Notebook #2 (Rugby League)
Football Ferns vs Portugal/Argentina: Squad Yarns & Preview (Football)
The Brooklyn Nets Blockbuster Era Is Over, Now Sean Marks Can Get Back To What He Does Best (Basketball)
The Breakers Have Rediscovered Their Mana, Aotearoa Rejoice (Basketball)
How Northern Brave Won Back To Back Super Smash Championships (Cricket)
Five Standout Prospects From The Wellington Phoenix Academy's Class Of 2022 (Football)
Scotty’s Word
White Ferns face Bangladesh in their third T20 World Cup game on Saturday morning and for all the stinky vibes from the opening losses, two wins against weaker teams would bring WF back to par. WF usually lose to Australia and apparently also South Africa now in World Cups, with games against Bangladesh and Sri Lanka offering a better assessment of WF vibes.
Those vibes were iffy against Australia and South Africa. Everyone on the sidelines looks scared whenever the camera cuts to them. WF didn't just lose either, they were rolled for 76 and 67 in pursuit of reachable targets. Players look stuck in the headlights, coaches look tense and Morne Morkel's wondering wtf he got himself into. Gratitude that WF should win some games though.
WF mana is a notable topic because cycles seem to be repeating. Check out our previous work if you want to deep dive into the icky WF vibe. The doosra here is WF winning a Commonwealth Games bronze medal, where Sophie Devine and Suzie Bates were excellent and coach Ben Sawyer was riding the wave of his fresh approach.
Players from the Com Games have been overlooked for the T20 WC. Brooke Halliday played all five games and is yet to play at the T20 WC. Izzy Gaze was flicked aside for Jess McFadyen who was flicked aside for Bernadine Bezuidenhout in the wicket-keeping ranks. Hannah Rowe was a legit all-rounder in Birmingham and played as a batter last week?
I'm still most intrigued by Sophie Devine who must be playing injured as she isn't bowling at the T20 WC. Devine bowled against Bangladesh earlier in the summer and bowled in two Super Smash games. Devine finished as Wellington's most efficient bowler with 5w @ 8.4avg/6rpo. Devine is one of the best T20 bowlers in the and she was second best to Hayley Jensen for most WF wickets at Com Games.
Amelia Kerr and Lea Tahuhu have been impressive with the ball so far at the T20 WC. Jess Kerr, Eden Carson, Hayley Jensen, and Fran Jonas (9.2rpo!) haven't been as effective. No Devine means opposition batters can target a weaker bowler and coach Sawyer seems highly unlikely to give Rowe overs.
Devine has a batting strike-rate of 59 which is equally as weird as Jonas being tonked. Devine and Bates opened against Australia, combining for 0 runs. There was a strange shift for the South Africa game as Devine dropped down to bat five, with Bezuidenthout joining Bates for another opening combo of 0 runs. Why is the Bates/Devine opening combo being tinkered with?
Devine's injury is lingering like those storm clouds over Bay Oval on Thursday evening. WF shouldn't be as reliant as they are on Devine (or Bates who has no runs in two games), but they are thanks to their own selection policy (potential over winning). WF desperately need their leader to perform and it's a hefty burden for a player who seems to be battling the dark arts.
Blackcaps are in a tricky spot vs England and I want to highlight Neil Wagner's last few weeks. You probably know the Northern Super Smash championship contributions from Wagner as he won four games in a row, snaring plenty of wickets in his first Super Smash season since 2018/19.
Wagner had 10w @ 24.6avg/4.48rpo for Northern in the Ford Trophy as well. Now he has 4w in the first Test against England and Wagner is coming off his worst year of Test bowling since 2018, only his fourth year since 2012 averaging 30+ in Test cricket. Keep an eye on Wagner as he averaged 23.47 under Kane Williamson's captaincy, well below his 31.3avg under Brendon McCullum. Now we wait to see how Wagner's mahi under Tim Southee's captaincy look.
In Ford Trophy, Canterbury face Otago today with the winner moving into a final against Central. Brett Randell (18w @ 14.27avg/3.71rpo) and Brad Schmulian (383 runs @ 42.55avg) have been sizzling for Central. With so many rained off games it is tricky comparing stats, so I'll focus more on these finals fixtures and how players perform.
HBJ Shield will also be played this weekend with games on both days. Lots of rained off games here as well, but two things stand out. Otago's Kate Ebrahim has 337 runs @ 112.33avg as she chases her fourth season in a row averaging 60+ (eight seasons averaging 40+). The best Super Smash bowler Gabby Sullivan has 11w @ 10.36avg/3.12rpo for Canterbury; Sullivan averages 23.15 in List-A cricket and 16 in T20 cricket.
NZ Warriors have recently promoted Taine Tuaupiki and Demitric Sifakula to their top-30 squad. A few weeks ago, Bunty Afoa and Tom Ale had their contracts extended. The two Andys (Webster and McFadden) have already laid out some impressive recruitment and development mahi since they took over.
As well as those NRL squad moves, Warriors have recruited a bunch of solid fringe-NRL/reserve grade talent to their NSW Cup squad and assembled a strong SG Ball squad. In promoting Tuaupiki and Sifakula as well as backing Ale to kick on, the Andys have shown NSW Cup/SG Ball players what is possible with an efficient pipeline.
In this breakdown of the Warriors forward pack, I noted that Ale averaged over 9m/run in each of his four games last season. In two of those games Ale averaged 13.25m/run and 11.6m/run. Anything around 10m/run is fabulous and I reckon Ale will shine in this role of efficient oomph.
Sifakula is even funkier than Ale. After his impressive performance on an edge vs Tigers, I have pondered how Sifakula's NRL opportunity may come through the middle. Sifakula started at prop in the Redcliffe U21s grand final team, as an 18-year-old. Sifakula has played a bunch of positions in both league and union at a high level. This pedigree and variety of skills will serve him well in adapting what the NRL team needs him to do.
Big match up in SG Ball with Canterbury's K-Ci Newton-Whare (Riccarton) starting at prop for Storm and Tanner Stowers-Smith (Halswell) starting at prop for Warriors. Newton-Whare left Christchurch for Queensland during the pandemic years and popped up in Burleigh teams while attending Coombabah State High School. Newton-Whare played centre, edge and middle forward for Burleigh U18s last year, now he's starting prop for Storm U19s.
Storm also have Matthew Logopati (Linwood), Karauria Stokes-Mahara (Northcote), Dickie Terepo (Otara) and Bishop Walker (Otahuhu) named to face Warriors. The Warriors team didn't plast last weekend so we'll keep learning with more footy.
Newton-Whare and Stokes-Mahara played together with Burleigh last year, before they moved south to Storm. Logopati was playing in Queensland after leaving Christchurch and he's also moved south to Storm.
Felix Fa'atili (Hornby) also moved south from Wynnum to Sharks.
Three Kiwi-NRL players from the Souths Logan U18 team last year have moved south. Turangawaewae junior Te Hurnui Twiddle went to Eels. Pikiao junior Harry Durbin returned to Warriors. Marist junior Tre Fotu joined Fa'atili in moving to Sharks. Ellerslie junior Nathaniel Tangimataiti seems to still be in the Broncos system although he may shifted to Wynnum.
Musical jam...
Wildcard’s Notebook
Apologies for going missing on Monday, had the ol’ power knocked out by that pesky cyclone and it still ain’t back yet so it’s been a mission to get any work done at all. My gratitude to the fine library establishments across Aotearoa for their social servitude, allowing me to at least finish off a couple articles I’d already been working on.
As for Flying Kiwis this week, it just wasn’t possible. Luckily there’s an international window coming up for the ladies so I’ll be able to do a double-banger round-up next week... as long as the power is back by then. It’s too much work to get done on library hours alone. We cannot fight mother nature though, gotta deal with what She serves up.
The Football Ferns have three games coming up over the next week. International window goodness. Game one is 7pm tonight against Portugal in Hamilton, then they face Argentina at 7pm on Monday also in Hamilton, followed by a second game against Argentina in Auckland (Mt Smart Stadium) at 7pm on Thursday. It’s almost a full-strength squad that’s been selected, just a few injuries ruining that ideal. And that makes this an important time to tap the sign again…
It’s quite silly when people fret about the Ferns losing as often as they do without taking account of the fact they play the majority of their games against better teams. Better opponents mean more likely to lose. The FIFA rankings may be extremely flawed but as a generalisation they’re trying to tell a realistic story: some teams are better than others. That doesn’t mean the Ferns aren’t capable of being more successful. That doesn’t mean the Ferns still don’t have problems with scoring goals. But there are levels at play, here.
The word out of the Ferns camp is that they’re treating this three-game series like a World Cup rehearsal. Three games in seven days. See what kinda points tally you can gather up (Ali Riley even spoke about getting “the three points” in the pre-game presser which was telling since, you know, friendly game and all).
Key thing for fans to ponder: Combinations. This series is all about getting the best eleven out there together, as has so rarely happened for Jitka Klimková for a variety of reasons, and letting them figure out how to play together as best they can. It’s not only a new coach since the last World Cup. There’ll be a new striker combo. New central defensive pairing. Probably a new midfield. A new goalkeeper too.
Injuries mean they aren’t quite all in on that quite yet, no Vic Esson or Ria Percival for example. Rebekah Stott’s missing the games with a “minor” knock which costs her some valuable reps in the challenge for a starting CB spot. But otherwise expect maximum capacity going full tilt for wins.
Wrote a few words about the Brooklyn Nets and Sean Marks the other day. One idea I only had room to allude to in that was the effect that whole saga will have on the rest of the league. Sean Marks really went all in on Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant back when. They didn’t try to mould those two into the existing team, they promised them the world and then tried to reshape that world to their desires. They took things further than any other team had ever gone, rivalled only by later era LeBron James teams. Then they blew it up three and a half years later with only one playoff series win to their name.
Gotta think now that Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant have done their bit to scale back the idea of ‘player empowerment’... or to better define it, perhaps. It’s hard not to sympathise with players in a league where you can wake up and check your phone one day and find out via a Shams/Woj tweet that you’ve been traded to the other side of the country all of a sudden. But there’s also a limit to that where maybe, just maybe, it’s not the best idea to have dudes within the team acting like they can make decisions over the careers of their teammates.
The Nets weren’t swimming against the tide though. Players having increased recognition of their worth to a franchise, and those franchises being willing to indulge those players as a result... that’s the direction the entire NBA has been heading in since at least the LeBron/Heat Big Three (probably since Michael Jordan’s commercial emergence, actually). But the Nets took it further... and it didn’t work.
Those blurred lines between players and management didn’t help them win. In fact it mostly helped to cause chaos and carnage. Maybe that was down to the specific players they partnered with, a couple of notoriously difficult personalities (one in particular)... but then LeBron’s tinkering with trades and such with the Lakers hasn’t exactly led to magical results – even accounting for the championship that they won (people really seem to forget that the Lakers won a ‘ship with LeBron, aye? Bubble still counts mate).
It’s a frisky one, as players still need to feel engaged in the process somehow, especially star players. But maybe, just maybe, being a general manager of a basketball team is a really difficult full-time job and that people are hired to take on that gig because they’re qualified and capable so folks oughta let them get on with their work? I dunno I’m just thinking aloud here.
Here’s a cricket yarn... that Blackcaps bowling effort on day one was a bit tragic at times there with the jerry Ben Duckett flirting with a hundy prior to lunch. The English opener punished the full stuff in particular as he banged his fifty inside the twelfth over of the day and was well on course to become the first Englishman to ton up prior to lunch on day one. First in the long history of English cricket, bloody hell, but nah he couldn’t get there. Ben Tickner popped up with his first Test wicket to see that threat off.
For some reasons, listening to the radio commentary in the library with my phone on charge making use of the free power as well as the free wi-fi, I was thinking that Brendon McCullum had tonned up before lunch once for the Blackcaps. Turns out he didn’t. The innings flickering in my memory was his 195 against Sri Lanka in the 2014 Boxing Day Test but he actually batted at five in that match. Did score a hundy in a single session but it was the second session of that match so there ya go.
I also remember being conflicted that day about how McCullum was on track to beat Nathan Astle’s iconic fastest Test 200… but then he got out one hit shy and that felt about right. Like when Mark Taylor allegedly declared on 334no so as not to surpass Don Bradman’s Aussie record (technically he declared to chase a result but don’t let the truth get in the way of a good yarn).
Turns out there have only ever been six instances of an individual hundred before lunch on day one. Shikhar Dhawan did it against Afghanistan in 2018, that’s the most recent example. David Warner did it against Pakistan in 2017. Then you’ve gotta go back forty years to find Majid Khan doing the deed against New Zealand in 1976 at Karachi. Prior to that it’s a trio of Aussies all in Ashes Tests: Don Bradman (1930), Charlie Macartney (1926), and Vic Trumper (1902).
The reason I bring this up: all the chat about English cricket and this unprecedented aggression in this batting since Brendon McCullum took over as coach but people don’t realise that in the old days those jokers used to cut loose too. People have this assumption that things move with incremental progress, with every generation a little less prudish than the one before. Or, in this case, batting a little more freely as the years go by. Especially with the influence of T20 cricket.
And yet that’s not the case. History moves in circles. Don Bradman used to put a bad ball to the fence same as anybody (and he did so without the use of tree-trunk-width bats). Technology advances. Records are broken sequentially. But human nature has remained the same throughout all the generations and always will do.
Some Observations From Listening To English Radio Commentary:
“It’s all about the Ashes” for some reason, still, no matter what else is going on in world cricket
Folks keep pronouncing it as “Ta-Wrong-Gah” like it’s an Australian zoo
The idea that you can watch Test cricket at a grass-banked boutique oval is considered an exotic delight to the Englishfolk (this one I really like and it’s something we probably take for granted in NZ)
Everyone’s aware of the Scott Kuggeleijn court case ickiness
Nobody’s used to that insane Joe Root reverse ramp shot thing yet (particularly when it gets him out lol)
Frankie Mackay & Daniel McHardy were the kiwi presences on the TalkSport coverage offering a helpful balance to proceedings. Mackay’s always good but extra credit to McHardy because he’s also done some National League and Welly Nix Women football commentary lately and he’s really good. Underrated NZ commentary talent, that bloke. So many of the best telly commentator have big experience in radio – something that cricket broadcasters seem to understand better than most
TalkSport also have Jarrod Kimber hanging around to every now and then pop up with some analytical stat chat which was super interesting and added a different angle to the usual ball by ball stuff
Mackay was also at one point asked about how the nation now moving to embrace Maori culture/language after a historic mistreatment and the legacy of colonialism… with seemingly zero recognition that it was the British Empire that kickstarted that process, lol
Also, Steve Harmison is a good bloke. I like Steve Harmison