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Aotearoa 'A' vs West Indies: The Squad (Cricket)
Having A Geeze At Aotearoa's T20 Landscape (Cricket)
Sounds of Aotearoa: Mid-November 2020 (Music)
The Quotable Steven Adams – 2019-20 Edition (Basketball)
Whipping Up A Welly Nix 2020-21 Depth Chart (Football)
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Scotty’s Word
Only one place to start and well, any long form chat with Brandon Smith is always going to be good.
Suzie Bates and Sophie Devine injured?
Bates re-injured her shoulder in her first game back for Adelaide Strikers in WBBL and has returned to Aotearoa, while Sophie Devine injured her back for Perth Scorchers on the weekend. These two have held the White Ferns together for the past few years and if both are out injured, the White Ferns face a niggly summer ahead. Plenty of opportunities for younger players and to sort through that talent though.
Meanwhile Rachel Priest smacked 92* on the weekend for Hobart Hurricanes and now has 286 runs @ 47.66avg/126.54sr. Devine is the best kiwi batswoman with 304 runs @ 43.92avg/122.08sr, while Amelia Kerr is the best bowler (Brisbane Heat) with 11w @ 15.54avg/5.63rpo.
Colin Munro joins Adam Milne in BBL.
Covered most of this in today’s ‘Having A Geeze At Aotearoa's T20 Landscape’.
I’ll add some stats here to back up my thought that Munro is in the Blackcaps T20I 1st 11…
T20I: 31.34avg/156.44sr.
T20: 29.21avg/144.32sr.
Munro’s T20I record is also the best with Kane Williamson as captain…
With Williamson as captain: 36.27avg/167.17sr.
With Brendon McCullum as captain: 11.66avg/112.90sr.
With Tim Southee as captain: 27.66avg/141.27sr.
Comparing two kiwi sports domestic comeptitions…
On the one had there is the ISPS Handa Premiership where myself (as a non-football joker) can follow and understand the tournament with all required information laid out.
On the other hand is the Premier Hockey League that has minimal information provided. No team lists, results table and general information.
Wildcard’s Notebook
Apologies for going AWOL on Friday but I’d been up all night yacking my guts out so I had to call in a very rare sickie. So it goes. Which also meant I never got around to finishing my NFL picks which was a pain in the arse. I got about half of it written, as well as all the base picks, so you’ll just have to trust me when I tell ya next week how I did (I’m 4-2 after the early games thanks to Matt Prater’s very long boot). I’ll try cheat and re-use some of what I’d already written but I do wanna share this much... a few mid-season awards predictions, what do ya reckon?
Most Valuable Player: Russell Wilson... but he’s let his lead slip with a flurry of interceptions in the last few weeks. Patrick Mahomes is very much on his heels with some incredible numbers, same goes for Aaron Rodgers. And while he’s playing from behind I wouldn’t rule out a Dalvin Cook run over the back half of the season if he can somehow get the Vikings into the playoffs.
Offensive Player: Gonna go with Dalvin Cook for this one, followed closely by Alvin Kamara who in the absence of Michael Thomas has had to be a force in both the passing and running game for the Saints. Davante Adams is in the mix along with DeAndre Hopkins also.
Defensive Player: This is basically just the Aaron Donald award and he’s winning it once again at this halfway stage. Myles Garrett is the closest challenger while I’ll also chuck TJ Watt in as the best player on the best defence for Pittsburgh.
Offensive Rookie: At the moment it’s still Joe Burrow. He’s got the numbers on the board and he’s usually his team’s best player whether they win, lose, or tie. But Justin Herbert is closing in fast despite not having been the week one starter. It’ll be a contest to watch over the back nine. Gotta shout out the wide receiver rookie crew as well with dudes like Justin Jefferson, CeeDee Lamb, Tee Higgins, and Chase Claypool.
Defensive Rookie: Umm... less to choose from here but let’s go with Chase Young for Washington. He’s been good. PFF’s highest graded rookie defender and the second overall pick in the last draft. Seems fair enough.
Coach: Mike Tomlin. Look, the Steelers are 8-0 with an incredible defence and an arsenal of offensive weaponry but Tomlin deserves a heap of credit. This is a team whose 36 year old QB is coming back from season ending injury, which he’s still clearly nursing the scars of a little. They’ve been absolutely clutch when needed, winning on their off days as well as their on days. Tomlin’s been kinda underrated in the past and he’s due his spotlight. Also worth a mention are Brian Flores for turning an abysmal Dolphins team into a pretty competitive unit all of a sudden and also Sean McDermott for what he’s doing with the Bills.
Cool, man. Now I dunno how many other people out there managed to watch all four Men’s Premiership football games over the weekend but I did (please, no need to applaud, it’s all part of the job). Got one of the Women’s games in too and will catch the other two hopefully this evening if time allows (before they start deleting them on Wednesday morning... not sure why they do that). Premmy Files will be published imminently but in celebration of the first round of action, here’s a little Team of the Week for ya...
GK: Cameron Brown (Auckland City) – On debut, with the clean sheet, and making three or four fantastic saves along the way. Danyon Drake was equally good on the other side but Brown got the win which tips things... that and the eye-popping save he made off Reid Drake late on to preserve the win. Pretty stink for the rest of the league that Auckland City’s third string keeper (Zubikarai, it seems) is probably better than a lot of starters.
RB: Jack-Henry Sinclair (Team Wellington) – Although the TeeDubs did win they left it very late against the WeeNix and it was far from a vintage performance. Yet throughout the game it was JHS who was involved in most of their best moments and of course it was JHS in the 89th minute who popped up with the winner when they needed a moment of magic to break the stalemate. Picking up where he left off last season.
CB: Brian Kaltak (Auckland City) – Such a dominant game from this dude, the Vanuatu international made a goal-line block and won all sorts of challenges as well as having to slide into the middle of defence after Mario Bilen was injured where he also flexed some very ambitious passing range.
CB: Brock Messenger (Hamilton Wanderers) – Could’ve been him or his CB mate Tino Contratti as neither of them seemed to miss a tackle all game against Hawke’s Bay. Utterly composed and controlling game from the HW defenders.
LB: Adam Davidson (Hamilton Wanderers) – Young fella who emerged last season after being a part of the NYL group that so nearly won the title in 2019. Davidson looked great with that experience under his belt. A good athlete getting up that wing, really good left foot, ideal positioning. Really solid game from him (winning a toss up between him and Kelvin Kalua of ES for this spot).
CM: Mario Barcia (Team Wellington) – On a windy day in Wellington (naturally) when his team didn’t quite have it going, Barcia was a rare sight hurling himself around the park, disrupting the WeeNix and trying to make things happen for the TeeDubs. No shocker it was his assist for the winning goal.
CM: Josh Signey (Hamilton Wanderers) – A couple goals on debut for his new club against his old club. A couple fantastic finishes as well to go with a swarming performance in an impressive HW midfield. Could be a brilliant signing for the Tron Wands if he keeps up this kinda showing.
CM: Gerard Garriga Gibert (Waitakere United) – Would’ve been easy to give this to Sam Burfoot but fair play to GGG. The Spaniard’s influence on the Waitaks is often slept-upon yet check some of the vision he brings to their passing game and it’s clear how much he offers. Scored a goal too, nice work.
FW: Alex Greive (Waitakere United) – Player of the entire round in my eyes. Greive is back from uni in the States where he’d been dishing up goals and assists like he was working at the soup kitchen and against the Cantabs there were plenty of plates to go around, Greive scoring the first and helping create two more in a 4-0 win. His ability to pick out teammates in space in those attacking areas is amazing. For sure gonna be one of the most exciting players in the comp this season.
FW: Tommy Semmy (Hamilton Wanderers) – Didn’t score one even though he probably should have, but after a down season last time in which he only scored four goals it was a sight for sore eyes to see Tommy Semmy cannoning at full pace towards defenders and causing utter carnage. Set up the third goal for good measure.
FW: Emiliano Tade (Auckland City) – Wasn’t really sure where to go with this one as not a lot of the strikers were at their best but Tade did score the decisive penalty, he hit the crossbar from a free kick, he drew a couple good saves... he was the focal point for ACFC as he will be all season and you get the sneaking suspicion there’ll be a lot more goals where this one came from.