Economic Spells
Warriors vs Tigers, White Ferns vs South Africa, All Whites in FIFA Series, Wellington Phoenix Women, and more
Scotty’s Word
White Ferns lost the first ODI vs South Africa in a super fun contest. Maddy Green scored 85 runs @ 102sr as the best batter, while the Kerr sisters and Rosemary Mair took 2 wickets each.
Green has scored 200+ runs and averaged 30+ in five consecutive years of ODI batting. She had strike-rates below 90 in the first three of those years and she now has back to back years scoring over 90sr.
Suzie Bates continues to be a fascinating White Fern right now. She is averaging 14 with the bat and 41 with the ball in ODIs since the start of 2025. Bates is the only notable batter scoring below 70sr in this period which is in tune with her T20I stuff, but I’m more curious about how opposition teams counter her slow bowling.
Bates was hit for two sixes in the final over of the first ODI and didn’t seem like the best option. This was similar to her T20I bowling role and ahead of the T20 World Cup I’m pondering how teams won’t allow Bates to cruise through economic spells.
The final over situation forced South Africa to attack Bates. They may gain confidence from doing so and that will be amplified at the T20WC.
Paid subscribers can peep some White Ferns ODI stats and read all about the NZ Warriors NRL loss.
Wests Tigers and their affiliated teams won four of the five games in Auckland this weekend vs NZ Warriors. The only game NZ Warriors won was in NSW Cup and that was an impressive win given how young that group is, plus Luke Hanson returned to reserve grade to kick the winning droppie.
NRL: 14-32
NSW Cup: 29-28
Jersey Flegg Cup: 30-36
SG Ball Cup: 26-32
Harold Matthews Cup: 16-26
The funkiest thing across these grades for NZW was how the two U19 players who played in the NSW Cup win are both from Christchurch. Hornby junior Bishop Neal scored two tries late in the game as the 17-year-old continues to settle into this grade and Linwood junior Amasio Tiatia was the starting hooker.
Tiatia has only played U19s and NSW Cup this year. The three Kiwi-NRL debutants so far this season are all from Auckland but don’t let that distract you from the quantity and quality of juniors coming out of Christchurch.
Tigers don’t have much Kiwi-NRL flavour across their squads but they do have Benji Marshall as their NRL coach and he will now be joined by Kieran Foran who has stepped in to plug a coaching hole at Sea Eagles. Two Kiwis legends are now head coaches in the NRL and Marshall’s leading a vibrant style at Tigers so I’m curious how Foran’s identity filters through the Sea Eagles team.
Patrick Herbert and Bunty Afoa played for Magpies in NSW Cup. Jeriko Filipi-Talisau was starting hooker for the Magpies in U21s and he is a Manurewa junior who played U19/U21s for NZW before making the move to Sydney over the summer.
Another former NZW junior Houma Fotu is in the Tigers system but he’s playing for Balmain in U19s. Magpies teams came to Auckland this weekend and Balmain have teams linked to Tigers in those junior competitions as well.
Musical jam…
Nick’s Notebook
The last time the All Whites won after conceding the first goal against Jordan in September 2009. Conceded in the second minute, but a brace from Shane Smeltz and a Rory Fallon goal led to a 3-1 win at the King Abdullah International Stadium. From the current squad, only Chris Wood and Kosta Barbarouses had debuted before that game and neither of them were involved... meaning there’s not a single player in the current All Whites set-up who has experienced an international win after falling behind.
That might explain why things got weird against Finland after they shipped a soft one from a corner kick. There have been draws from losing positions, of course, but this was a game from which the team seemed to have expectations of more. It remains true that the All Whites just haven’t figured out how to win games against good opposition yet. But hey, maybe they’ll have better luck tonight.
I’ll write plenty about the AWs in the coming days so forgive the limited action today… but there’s some Ben Old stuff after the jump for paid subscribers (along with Charlisse Leger-Walker and Auckland FC things)
All Whites In Darren Bazeley Era
When they concede the first goal:
0 W – 3 D – 11 L (6 GF, 23 GA)
When they score the first goal:
12 W – 1 D – 1 L (53 GF, 7 GA)
When they score first, excluding OFC:
3 W – 1 D – 1 L (9 GF, 6 GA)
The game that they lost after scoring first was against Sweden, Callum McCowatt putting them up only to get smoked 4-1 by the end of it. There are also wins against Malaysia (4-0) and Ivory Coast (1-0) in there, as well as a 1-1 draw against Norway. They’ve been able to get 1-1 draws after conceding first against Congo, Ireland, and USA. There have also been two 0-0 draws in which neither happened (China & Tunisia)
The Wellington Phoenix Women appear to be stumbling at a not very opportune moment of time. The loss away in Central Coast on Wednesday pretty much spoiled their Premiers’ Plate hopes and now a 1-0 defeat at home against Western Sydney means they’ve only won 2 of their last 6 matches. Just lucky that CCM backed it up by drawing 0-0 with Canberra so that the Nix remain second with a first round finals bye in their own hands (playing away vs Adelaide next week). There’s obviously some tiredness in the squad – with the international break coming at a good time for them to refresh before finals (and in that light, not such a bad thing that Barry and Elliott dropped out of the squad).
Not sure I love how Bev Priestman has managed these past couple games though. The only rotating she’s done was giving Makala Woods half a game off in Central Coast... which didn’t help anything. Woods had five goals and five assists in her first eight matches for the club but has nothing in the past three. Barry, Walker, Van der Meer, and Nunn have started every single game while Esson and Jale have only missed one each. Pristman is a Win Now kinda coach and that means minimal rotation, so it goes, but that’s two tired performances in a row from her team.
Subbing on Daisy Brazendale for Emma Pijnenburg when they needed a goal was odd. Putting Zoe Benson (a forward) at RWB with Lucia Leon (a RWB) on the left side was odd. Sending Ellie Walker forward as a makeshift striker was less odd but failing to get the ball into the area for her often enough was odd. And at a time when Emma Main (2 goals/1 assist in 649 mins) has fallen out of the matchday squad entirely, we keep having to watch Mackenzie Anthony (1 goal/0 assists in 380 mins) fail to catch up with passes over and over whilst cramming out the areas where Makala Woods does her best work.
WahiNix when Anthony starts: 3 losses in 4 games
WahiNix when Anthony doesn’t start: 3 losses in 15 games
In happier news, the Nix announced on Friday that import defender Ellie Walker, arguably the most influential player within the best defence in the A-League this season, has re-signed for next season. That’s the third import they’ve been able to retain for next season already and this one isn’t even done yet. And that doesn’t include Sabitra Bhandari who signed an initial two-year contract so she’s on board too. Although... those shenanigans with her ACL surgery do put her in a murky place.
The short version is that Samba held out on seeing a local specialist because she wanted to go to Qatar where she had her previous ACL surgery done. Crowd funded the money (since that went beyond what the Nix’s insurance would cover) thanks to the generous Nepalese community. But then couldn’t get it done because of the war going on in the Middle East so she ended up back at a kiwi specialist after all. Only finally got that surgery done last week – and still plans to hear to Qatar for further rehabilitation once she’s and the wider global situation are settled enough to travel. She tore the ACL on 3 January. She finally had surgery in late March, almost three months later. It’s a 9-12 month recovery for an ACL tear so she might not return until late next season. The Phoenix have every right to be rather pissed off at how this has gone down. Unless, that is, the Qataris turn out to be the geniuses that Samba thinks they are… in which case we need to send Alyssa Whinham and Tessel Middag there too.
So while they technically now have 4/5 imports under contract, it might be that Samba doesn’t play next season and they sign another injury replacement. That’d mean there are two spots left. That decision doesn’t have to be made for a while yet.
The Phoenix have never had an import stay for multiple seasons before... now they’re going to have at least three repeat in 2026-27. Keep in mind that Brooke Nunn, Makala Woods, and Ellie Walker have all signed one-year extensions - not coincidentally matching how long Bev Priestman’s current contract runs for. Doubt we’ll see Coach Bev stick around beyond that time with the jobs she’ll be able to command (especially if she can win a championship with the Nix) but that’s good encouragement that she won’t gap it after one year with her reputation restored.
Under Contract for Next Season:
Brooke Nunn, CJ Bott, Sabitra Bhandari, Ellie Walker, Emma Main, Tiana Jaber, Marisa van der Meer, Macey Fraser, Pia Vlok, Makala Woods
Off Contract After This Season:
Vic Esson, Tessel Middag, Lucia Leon, Grace Jale, Lara Wall, Mack Barry, Alyssa Whinham, Aimee Danieli, Ella McMillan, Ella McCann, Manaia Elliott, Daisy Brazendale, Ela Jerez, Emma Pijnenburg, Mackenzie Anthony, Zoe Benson
Flynn Cameron (Adelaide 36ers) in 2026 NBL Finals:
G1 (L): 28 MIN | 2 PTS (1/8 FG, 0/5 3PT) | 2 REB | 2 AST
G2 (W): 32 MIN | 17 PTS (5/13 FG, 4/7 3PT, 3/4 FT) | 5 REB | 1 AST
G3 (L): 29 MIN | 12 PTS (4/8 FG, 2/5 3PT, 2/2 FT) | 6 REB | 7 AST
The only other kiwi involved is Keanu Rasmussen, a development player for ADL, who got six minutes in the thrashing in game one but hasn’t featured in the two games since (as is normally the case for DPs in the playoffs).
2026 International Football Calendar
March – All Whites in FIFA Series vs Finland & Chile (NZ)
April – Women’s OFC World Cup Qualifying Finals (NZ)
June – Men’s FIFA World Cup
July – Men’s U16 Oceania Championships (Papua New Guinea)
September – Women’s FIFA U20 World Cup (Poland)
September – Men’s U19 Oceania Championships (Samoa)
September – Women’s U16 Oceania Championships (Solomon Islands)
October – Women’s FIFA U17 World Cup (Morocco)
November – Men’s FIFA U17 World Cup (Qatar)
Musical Jam...
