El Niche Cache
January 8, 2021
Reading Menu
Aotearoa vs Pakistan: Test Summer Over (Cricket)
The Welly Nix Got Back Underway With Their Annual Game One Defeat (Football)
2020/21 Aotearoa Super Smash: Update #3 (Cricket)
2020 Lydia Ko Mixtape (Golf)
The Wildcard’s Top 10 Albums of 2020 (Music)
The Premmy Files – 2020 Women’s Premiership Team of the Season (Football)
The Premmy Files – Men’s Premiership, Week 6 (Football)
Scotty’s Word
One of Aotearoa’s modern sporting tales is Auckland’s inability to hold on to first-five rugby talent. Similar yarn with how NZ Warriors can’t see, let alone hold on to Aotearoa’s plethora of NRL prospects. Such tales hold truth and are incredibly nuanced. Having watched Kyle Jamieson go from Papatoetoe Cricket Club in South Auckland to a cricket phenom, after watching Jamieson shine with Canterbury for a few years sparked up one of the key nuances in this pocket of tales.
NZ Warriors stuff isn’t a perfect for this, yet similar enough. Across a variety of sports, young players leave Auckland and do fairly well for themselves. Let’s take a look across the kiwi cricket landscape, specifically those who left Auckland early in their careers…
Ajaz Patel - Suburbs New Lynn, now CD Stags.
Brad Schmulian - East Coast Bays, now CD Stags.
Jimmy Neesham - Suburbs New Lynn, now Wellington Firebirds via Otago Volts.
Finn Allen - University, now Wellington.
Dale Phillips - Howick Pakuranga, now Otago.
Ish Sodhi - Papatoetoe, now ND Knights.
Cameron Fletcher - Waitakere, now Canterbury via ND Knights.
Chuck in the blokes like Jeet Raval and Anaru Kitchen to almost have a team. In rugby, Otago’s Josh Ioane followed the Jamieson route in placing a high value on the university factor. Ioane went from Kings College to Otago University and the Otago rugby academy, Jamieson went from Auckland Grammar to Lincoln University and Canterbury cricket. Of course there are plenty of rugby examples and this is all without too much judgement other than it being a trend across different sports - it’s not an Auckland rugby problem, it’s an Auckland problem.
Problem or just a thing. Aotearoa is the best sports nation in the world and Auckland has the highest population in Aotearoa. Makes sense for overflow and there’s so much talent, Auckland receives talent overflow. If there is a minor problem, it’s talent identification and my hunch is that receiving talent is required to cover over those talent ID mishaps at a younger age.
Super Smash sparks back up after a few days off and I’m looking forward to this tunnel of kiwi cricket. Test summer is over, we’ve gotta accept this T20 fast food diet for at least a year so might as well make the most of it. Test Blackcaps will no doubt pop back into Super Smash (Ross Taylor alert!) over the next week. Here are the top performers so far…
Monday Morning Dummy Half starts again on Monday. To start the year with the #KiwiNRL goggles on, I’ll touch on Melbourne Storm reinvention, West Tigers young kiwi push under Aotearoa Kiwis coach Michael Maguire and there are some funky kiwi twist taking over at Canberra Raiders.
Diary of An Aotearoa Warriors Fan will come soon enough. The NSWRL SG Ball does not include a Warriors team - makes sense with trans-Tasman travel etc. I highly doubt there will be any Under 18 team via Redcliffe Dolphins in the Queensland competition and feel like the squad of 30 will see those outside top-18 for game days will link up with Redcliffe to play Intrust Super Cup. Development players like Temple Kalepo and Jryis Glamuzina have moved with the squad, they will filter through to Redcliffe as well - I reckon.
Let’s go the Dolphin Warriors.
Jammin’ this while writing:
Wildcard’s Notebook
Aaaaaalrighty then. Apologies for missing a newsletter there but ya boy had to commit to his holiday. Not much point being at the beach if you’re inside on the laptop all day working and even for a relative quickie like the newsletter, mate, the energy just ain’t there. But unfortunately these things must come to an end, the time must pass, albeit reluctantly. I’m supposed to be packing the car right about now but in the interests of pursuing the art of procrastination lets ask in the summer sunshine of Aotearoa sportspeople doing amazing things.
Like how about Steven Adams yesterday? First career triple-double (not to mention the 9 screen assists he also supplied). And it was against the Thunder too. Quite poetic.
Only drama was that they still lost as the Pellies spend this yearly part of the season still adjusting to the way that Stan Van Gundy is trying to get them to play. There’s been a big emphasis on fixing this team’s defence but so far it’s been trouble finding consistency on offence which is costing them. It’s important to remember that there wasn’t really a proper preseason for these fellas and with a new coaching regime in place to go with Steven Adams and Eric Bledsoe coming in as new starters that’s a lot of adapting that needs doing in a short space of time. Teams in that kinda position are obviously disadvantaged early on. Though SVG seems to at least have one dude he trusts and relies upon...
Through 8 games the Pelicans are 4-4. They’re the fifth best team in terms of points allowed but 25th in terms of points scored. Excellent on the boards but pretty poor shooting so far. And for all the worries about Adams limiting the team’s spacing next to Zion Williamson and all that... Adams has an offensive rating of 121 (best on the team) and a defensive rating of 102 (best among the starters). The team’s offensive rating is 21 points better (per 100 possessions) when he’s on the court versus when he’s on the bench. So he’s doing alright. Just gotta get those guards to drop a few more shots and they’ll be sweet.
The holiday break also included a Flying Kiwis hiatus. But to be honest the week before was only a half-effort anyway because of all the players on mini-winter breaks. This weekend most of those lads and lasses return to action so it should be a bumper edition of Tuesday (or Wednesday if it’s really that stacked – writing time is always a factor, support us on Patreon if you appreciate the efforts). But that ain’t to say that there’s been nothing happening in the meantime. For example, Paige Satchell’s taken to the W-League like she was merely kicking a ball around down at the beach...
Meanwhile she missed out on the actual award as the voting trended elsewhere but Meikayla Moore, having only just broken in as a starter for Liverpool, was pretty much immediately nominated for Championship Player of the Month in England. Outstanding work there.
Or how about the sneakier one of kiwi youth international George Stanger getting out on the park for Hamilton Academical in the Scottish Premiership? Not once but twice in fact. He’d been a regular face on the bench for the Accies most of this season – his 14 mins off the bench in a 0-0 draw against St Johnstone came on the ninth occasion he’d been named in a matchday squad. Then a few days later he was out there after just 20 minutes against Motherwell as the captain Brian Easton had to be replaced hurt. No dramas there... the Accies went on to win 3-0 against those fellow relegation battlers to lift themselves off the bottom of the table after their first game of the new year. This wasn’t Stanger’s Premiership debut as he got one start last season, though it’s clearly a bit of a breakthrough for the 20 year old.
Also, the NFL playoffs are about to begin. Not kiwi sports related but it does relate to me doing my picks every week. I don’t get in on the predictions for the playoffs because those bad boys are best simply enjoyed with as few hangups as possible... but I did sneak in with a 12-4 week to close the regular season, leaping me up to a cheeky 170-85-1 on the season. Not fantastic... but topping that 170 mark is a nice milestone. Didn’t think I was gonna get there after a couple dud ones in week 16.
To put that in some context, ESPN have an Expert Picks feature thing and were I competing against those jokers I’d have have finished fourth out of ten ‘Experts’ (graciously including myself, lol). Mina Kimes and Matt Bowen well ahead with 175 correctos. Jason Reid also serving up a mean 173. But fine folks like Dan Graziano, Mike Clay, Laura Rutledge, Damien Woody... sorry ’bout it.
Here’s your NFL Playoff schedule in Aotearoa timings...
Buffalo Bills vs Indianapolis Colts, Sunday at 7.05am
Seattle Seahawks vs Los Angeles Rams, Sunday at 10.40am
Washington Football Team vs Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Sunday at 2.15pm
Tennessee Titans vs Baltimore Ravens, Monday at 7.05am
New Orleans Saints vs Chicago Bears, Monday at 10.40am
Pittsburgh Steelers vs Cleveland Browns, Monday at 2.15pm
And of course what better way to close off a celebratory email dispatch than with a little bit of this...
Yeah... that was special.