Expanding Horizons
Tall Blacks victory, Israel Adesanya, Future Warriors, Shaun Johnson, 2023 FIFA World Cup quals, Blackcaps Test spinners, Marco Rojas' next move & more
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Podcast
Reading Menu
2022 Aotearoa Kiwis Mana (Aotearoa vs Tonga Debrief) (Rugby League)
The Wahine Rugby League Takeover (Aotearoa vs Tonga Debrief) (Rugby League)
Kiwi-NRL Spotlight: The Rise Of Christian Tuipulotu (Rugby League)
Flying Kiwis – June 28 (Football)
The Quotable Steven Adams: 2021-22 Edition (Basketball)
Scotty’s Word
In Monday's email dispatch, I covered Israel Adesanya's niggle with Aotearoa. Coach Eugene Bareman was on Ariel Helwani's MMA Hour yesterday and when asked about Adesanya's stance on fighting in Aotearoa, Bareman offered this response...
"I think his mind's made up on that. I think he's making the wrong decision, I'm entitled to that opinion. The thing about Izzy is he is quite easily blinded, when you get a certain frame of mind you can't get out if it. There's a few people in New Zealand who have been really critical of him but there's millions that haven't ... it's a pity to let those few people who have been highly critical of him basically win."
City Kickboxing is full of really smart folks, led in this instance by Adesanya and Bareman. It would be fascinating to sit in on similar conversations and soak up their insights. This also shows the balance of working with folks who have different ideas and how different opinions shouldn't impact a relationship.
Aotearoa Warriors return to Mt Smart and we have even more emotional Shaun Johnson content. In true Warriors fan fashion, not many fans know about the Future Warriors vs Tigers Cubs fixture that will be played prior to the NRL game. For those going to the NRL game there is reason to pop long early to catch this game at 1:30pm and this will also be shown live on Sky Sport.
This serves as another reminder to tap into junior Warriors mahi. Don't be the guy complaining about Warriors juniors and not knowing anything about it. The funkiest aspect of this Under 18 Future Warriors team is that it features Sefanaia Cowley-Lupo, Eric Va'afusuaga, Ali Leiataua, Tamakaimoana Whareaorere and Jacob Laban who have been playing with Redcliffe.
Most of those lads dabbled in Redcliffe U21s and are now named for a Warriors U18 selection. Va'afusuaga is low key named in the Redcliffe U21s team for this weekend's game but he obviously won't play, while the Kepu twins, Zyon Maiu'u and Lleyton Finau are also named in Redcliffe U21s and likely to stay there. Xavier Tito-Harris is named in the halves for Future Warriors and he's a key joker to watch out for after impressing in the local scene in league and union via Kelston Boys High School.
What does a good Shaun Johnson look like?
Everyone has an opinion about SJ7 and the fetish for Johnson was on display as all the Aotearoa Kiwis selection news revolved around Johnson's absence. That falls into alignment with the wider idea of Kiwi-NRL vs NZ Warriors and I've also been pondering what Johnson's best/better footy looks like right now.
All of Johnson's general halves mahi is aligned with previous seasons but success in NRL and most relevant sports depends on being direct (north/south, easiest route to goal). The best players and teams take up the easiest route to score first, if that's unavailable then they go sideways or backwards. Kiwis halves Jahrome Hughes and Dylan Brown are runners, who will also straighten their run when they get the footy ... then step sideways or pass.
That first step can't be measured, but it's crucial. Even if you're catching a pass and moving sideways, straighten up before doing anything else. Running metres are measured and this tells a very basic yarn about NRL halves...
Average Run Metres per Game
Shaun Johnson: 52m.
Jahrome Hughes: 93m.
Dylan Brown: 129m.
Play direct, engage defenders in the middle and then pounce on space out wide. Johnson’s lost some speed though and while he show flashes of footwork, plus a willingness to run, there isn’t much zip to his running game. Johnson is still good at kicking, organising and distribution but needs to either straighten up, or Warriors need more speed around Johnson.
As discussed in our Niche Cast podcast, the recent Ajaz Patel/Blackcaps selection stuff falls into the big bucket of Aotearoa cricket fumbling spin development. This type of idea is often revolves around kids bowling spin and how to encourage children who do bowl spin, yet Aotearoa has never had issues in creating spinners. The issue and poor trend sits at higher levels when these spinners enter the Blackcaps mix.
No one seems to know how to best deploy Ajaz Patel and there are multiple examples about this, mainly when playing in Aotearoa. Remember that Patel wasn't selected for the Bay Oval loss to Bangladesh, fresh after bagging big wickets in Mumbai. There are multiple examples just with Patel, let alone sporadic use of Todd Astle and Will Somerville. Ish Sodhi was thrown into Test cricket as soon as possible and there was no development plan in place, hence Sodhi fell out of the mix. Had Sodhi stacked up Plunket Shield seasons like Patel prior to Test debut, his development may look different.
Each of those frontline spinners would have liked more consistent opportunities and that helps the team build around them. Aotearoa has a Johnson-like fetish for spinning all-rounders and the fact that Mitchell Santner is no longer in the Test mix again highlights a lack of development. Then we have this weird situation in moving from Santner, to Rachin Ravindra and now Michael Bracewell. As much as I like Ravindra and Bracewell, this feels like a move down the depth chart.
Santner and Ravindra were both identified, then given decent opportunities. Santner didn’t command more opportunities and Ravindra was quickly ushered out of Test cricket after his small window of opportunity. Bracewell will soon be given the same treatment.
There is such a lack of development and understanding of spin bowling in Aotearoa that batters are now eager to bowl spin because it helps their selection case. Glenn Phillips is the latest example and again, I love his skillset but his rise as a spinner is due to a lack of spin development. If any of the spinners named above were being deployed in tune with best practices, there is no need for Phillips' spin.
Of course someone is to blame. I'm just curious about this at the moment and while we can dive deep into this development hole, Aotearoa won a World Test Championship during all this spin mayhem. A hint of over-confidence/arrogance and complacency is evident here.
Kiwi County Tour round up...
Will Williams (Lancashire): 26ov @ 2.11rpo, 19ov | 1w @ 1.26rpo.
Jacob Duffy (Kent): 24ov @ 6.58rpo.
Glenn Phillips (Gloucestershire): 19 runs | 3ov @ 3rpo.
Women’s Hockey World Cup…
Such a busy pocket of Aotearoa sport means that things slip by and the Black Sticks wahine World Cup campaign has snuck under the radar to start tomorrow in Netherlands and Spain. Aotearoa face China in their first game before playing England and India in their remaining pool games. The team who finishes 1st in their pool goes straight through to quarter-finals, then the 2nd and 3rd teams play cross-over games to qualify.
Aotearoa could win the pool of course, although a more likely outcome is 2nd and then 3rd. The World Cup is a far better gauge of Aotearoa hockey than the Commonwealth Games and as hectic as the sporting calendar is right now, I’ll find a way to cover this over the next week.
Haka, lots of haka…
Wildcard’s Notebook
Tall Blacks Win Big vs Philippines
Always a joy to have international basketball upon our own shores and business was taken care of by the fellas at Spark Arena in Auckland last night. A 106-60 victory emphatically ensuring a perfect record through the first round of World Cup qualifying for the TBs. Four wins from four against The Philippines and India.
The crowd was absolutely nuts... and it was overwhelmingly in support of the visitors. Kinda crazy that in the past week we’ve seen the Tall Blacks host the Philippines and the Aotearoa Kiwis host Mate Ma’a Tonga and on both occasions the atmosphere was incredible but the crowd may as well have been for an away game. Fantastic for sport in New Zealand to have those kinds of crowds though.
The crowd did seem to have an impact early on as the Tall Blacks perhaps let the energy affect them, playing a bit too quickly to stay in control. But not for long. Corey Webster’s passing ability got things started and the TBs took an 8-0 lead that they never relinquished. Wasn’t always pretty as jump shots were clanging left, right, and centre for both teams but offensive rebounding ensure the kiwi side were able to pad that lead. Free throws helped too – the Tall Blacks didn’t miss a FT until midway through the third quarter and their physical dominance made sure they kept making those trips to the stripe.
All of which was handy for a team that shot 3/16 in the first half from triples. Then again, Philly shot 4/26 from deep for the entire match and only scored 8 points in the second quarter, which was about when things became unassailable. Certainly some frustrating phases in there but with the Gilas unable to score consistently there was no real jeopardy and eventually the TBs figured it out with those screen and rolls and getting the ball into the paint. It was 47-21 at the half and the lead only grew from there.
Coach Pero Cameron mixed his rotations up pretty swiftly. By the half, 11/12 players in the squad had taken the floor and the only bloke who hadn’t was... his son. Flynn Cameron. Who would eventually made his international debut with about eight mins left in the game and play out the remainder. On his birthday, no less. Cameron was the only TB player who got less than 11 minutes on the floor. Nobody got more than 23 mins. Spreading the love around.
Dion Prewster top scored with 15 points, hitting 3/6 from deep. Finn Delany (14pts/7 reb), Jordan Ngatai (12 pts), Ethan Rusbatch (12 pts), Corey Webster (11pts/5ast), and Shea Ili (10pts/4stl) joined him in double figures. Tom Vodanovich led the way with 9 rebounds, with ten NZers grabbing multiple boards and six of them at least four. It was a 47-32 overall rebound difference between the two teams.
Loved how Corey Webster played. His shot wasn’t quite there, missing all five triples, but his vision and passing was huge in getting the Tall Blacks rolling in both halves. Shea Ili was typically menacing on defence and was the only other kiwi apart from Prewster with multiple threes. Prewster shot the ball nicely. And Jordan Ngatai clearly deserves a shoutout for a pair of compoundingly magical dunks.
All good yarns. A tidy win.
2023 FIFA World Cup Qualifying
The Football Ferns don’t have to worry about these things because they’re already guaranteed a spot at the 2023 World Cup as co-hosts. But the qualifications for that tournament are really beginning to take shape now. By the end of July we’ll know the bulk of the teams that will be travelling to Australia and Aotearoa for the tournament.
The Asian spots were sorted back in February with the Asian Cup. We’re down to the last dozen candidates in Africa with the women’s AFCON set to begin shortly. North & Central America and South America are also about to begin their major tournaments so we’ll know who advances to the WWC from all those confeds by the end of the month. Oceania too. They get an extra direct spot thanks to Aotearoa being hosts. Sweet as.
Meanwhile Europe will take until October to figure things out. That’s because UEFA is the only confederation doing separate qualifiers. Everybody else is using their championships to determine who gets those berths but UEFA are keeping their separate. Euro 2022 also begins imminently (seriously, so much great international wahine footy coming up in July, mate) but there have been some more qualifying rounds in recent weeks and a small handful of teams have already clinched first place in their groups.
Then in February next year there’ll be a huge intercontinental playoff thing going on (fingers crossed some games get hosted in New Zealand). Not one-off games like the All Whites and Socceroos played recently either but a ten-team tournament to decide three spaces. Those ten teams being drawn from all of the confederations (two each for AFC, CAF, CONCACAF & CONMEBOL; one each for OFC & UEFA). The top four teams will be seeded based on FIFA rankings, then everyone gets split into three groups.
Groups one and two have three teams with the seeded team automatically into the final and the others playing off to see who faces them for a qualification ticket. The third group has two seeded teams and four overall so it’s just straight semis (with the seeded teams avoiding each other initially). According to plans, Australia and New Zealand will play friendlies against the teams in the first and second groups, presumably meaning a bye week game against the seeded team whilst the semi-finals are taking place. Also seems to suggest that they’ll each host their respective group. Dunno what happens to the third group... maybe a different part of Aussie or maybe just send ‘em to Qatar again, we’ll see.
That bit does affect the Footy Ferns as it’s a really handy and convenient chance for a friendly against a team from the lower ranges of World Cup qualification. You know, same as themselves. Same as they just had against Wales. Exactly the standard of game that they need to play as much of as possible in order to level up.
At which point it shouldn’t go unmentioned that the Women’s World Cup is expanding from 24 teams to 32 teams from 2023 onwards. That’s massive for the Ferns. Not because it makes a difference to their own qualification but because it means there are eight more teams who wouldn’t have otherwise been there, one for each group in the tournament. Whomever that team is in the Ferns’ group is likely to be the most beatable opposition that they’ll get to face. Plus also being co-hosts they’ll be seeded in the top group and will thus avoid the likes of USA, Sweden, and Australia... which was their exact group for the Tokyo Olympics. Quiiiiite a big difference, there. As it stands Netherlands, France, Germany, and Canada are the other teams who’ll go into the top pot. That still leaves ruthless ties against the likes of England, Spain, Brazil, and a few others on the cards... but at least it won’t be them and one of the top pot.
The draw for the World Cup group stage will be done on 22 October 2022 and hosted at the Aotea Centre in Auckland. That’s before the Intercontinental Playoffs (same deal with the men’s comp – we already knew who Costa Rica/New Zealand would face weeks before that game).
2023 World Cup Qualified Teams:
Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, China, Philippines, Vietnam, Sweden, Spain, France, Denmark
Another Oceania team will go directly through thanks to Aotearoa’s automatic entry. Chinese Taipei and Thailand have already booked spots in the Intercontinentals. There are a few European teams that are already at least guaranteed a playoff spot to keep themselves alive. Top place in each of the nine European groups gets an automatic spot. Second places all go into the playoffs. Top two from there also go through and third enters the Intercontinentals. Just gotta wait for everything to play out first.
Marco Rojas to Chile?
That’s the chat. Marco Rojas is apparently all set to join Chilean top division side Colo Colo having wrapped up his latest stint with the Melbourne Victory – who appear to be signing former Portugal & Man United forward Nani to replace him.
You really don’t see a lot of kiwi players transferring to South American leagues so this would be quite the novelty. But of course Rojas is of Chilean heritage so it’s like a cultural homecoming for him as much as was the case with Liberato Cacace (and Niko Kirwan) moving to Italy.
This is a strong team he’s preparing to join too. The current leaders of the Chilean Primera Division after 15 matches (there are three teams tied for first on 29 points as it stands but Colo-Colo have the best goal difference). They also just had an impressive 2-0 win over Internacional of Brazil in the Copa Sudamericana round of sixteen. The Champions League of South America. That was the first leg at home so they’ll have to deliver a repeat performance on Wednesday in Brazil to get into the quarters but they’re in a quality position. Also into the third round of the Chilean Cup. Lots to play for. Lots of reason why they need a few more reinforcements.
Wouldn’t bet on him immediately playing a huge role for them giving it’s a midseason move to a very strong team and there’ll have to be a period of adjustment from the A-League. That’s for sure. Fascinating deal though if this gets over the line. Always funky to expand the Flying Kiwis horizons.
Ryan Thomas’ Injury Recovery
There was a bit at the end of the most recent Flying Kiwis write-up about Thommo. He’d done an interview with the Dutch press speaking about his gratitude to PSV for allowing him to continue his recovery from knee surgery with their medical support and facilities even after being released, talking about how he understands the decision not to offer him a new deal, and most importantly reiterating his complete desire to continue playing football at the highest level possible.
That article was annoyingly paywalled... but it’s been a few more days now so the quotes have been aggregated elsewhere. Kinda savage how that goes but whatever. Here are some words from the man himself...
“This came at a very unfortunate time but luckily at home we have always been careful with the money I’ve earned. A part of my salary has always been put away for later or for unforeseen circumstances. PSV kept in close consultation with me about the contract, through John de Jong. Roger Schmidt really cared about me too. It has of course been a business decision for the club not to continue and I completely understand the reasons. Ruud van Nistelrooy has also checked in with me a number of times, I think that's really neat of him. PSV want to help me move forward again and I really appreciate that.”