Fascination Station
Libby Cacace's Serie A Debut, White Ferns Worries, Israel Adesanya's Contract & Welly Nix Men Game Notes
Podcast
TNC Variety Show - Episode 49
The Niche Cast: Ruapehu of Bullkaka (White Ferns, Ford Trophy, Flying Kiwis)
Reading Menu
2021/22 HBJ Shield: Wellington, Northern And Ranginui Wins (Cricket)
2022 Women's World Cup: Aotearoa's White Ferns Squad (Cricket)
What Does Progress Look Like For The Wellington Phoenix Women This Season? (Football)
All Whites vs Jordan: 10 Lessons From A 3-1 Defeat (Football)
Flying Kiwis – Deadline Day Deals With Liberato Cacace & Joe Bell (Football)
Checking In On How Chris Wood Is Settling At Newcastle United (Football)
Scotty’s Word
Fascination Station…
I love being fascinated. It’s a word I use a lot and nicely sums up the feeling of intuition leading to experiment. There are three major kiwi sports stories right now that I am fascinated by…
White Ferns woes. I’ve covered all things White Ferns for a few years now, tracking their general decline and endless shenanigans. The reaction to the World Cup squad announcement was interesting as it clearly laid out the folks who A) don’t care about the WF or B) cover the WF with NZC propaganda. Take this recent yarn about the WF needing “everyone contributing during the World Cup, rather than relying on a handful of star players’.
Direct quote from Coach Carter: “There’s 12 others, who have to stand up and play their part. If they do, then the other three will [thrive too]. It can't just be left to a small few”.
Quote from yarn: “Carter was adamant they had picked the best 15 players in the country”.
Coach Carter believes he has the 15 best players in Aotearoa and his plan is to have everyone chipping in.
Why would you drop Aotearoa’s best ODI spinner Leigh Kasperek who is better for Aotearoa in ODIs than Amelia Kerr and was Aotearoa’s best ODI bowler in 2021?
Why would you completely overlook integrating the best domestic (HBJ Shield) batter for at least two summers in Kate Ebrahim?
This is where the bad juju stuff is amplified. Either Coach Carter is delusional or he is lying. Those type of vibes don’t breed success and I was intrigued that same yarn highlight Sophie Devine’s desire for more mongrel and an aggressive approach. The same player who has averaged 60+ in HBJ Shield cricket for her past three summers (Ebrahim), has the most mongrel and aggressive approach in Aotearoa.
Again, the WF communication is either delusional or straight up false. Leading me to be fascinated as to how this all plays out and what this current vibe ends up looking come the start of autumn.
Next up in the fascination station we have Israel Adesanya’s standing with the UFC. Nothing tickles my toes like a Kiwi-UFC fight week and this coming weekend with have the Israel Adesanya vs Robert Whittaker rematch, while that event also features CKB’s Carlos Ulberg’s second UFC fight and Mike ‘Blood Diamond’ Mathetha’s UFC debut.
Adesanya is the biggest UFC star right now and has been for at least a year or two. The last UFC pay-per-view was headlined by Francis Ngannou and the heavyweight champ is in a super tricky financial/contractual situation with the UFC, while the biggest UFC story (completely swept under the rug by UFC) is fighter pay. This is why UFC fighters leave the UFC and start dabbling in boxing as the likes of Ben Askren and Tyron Woodley earned far more money boxing a Paul brother than they did in the UFC.
UFC revenue sharing is horrible and fighters are shunned if they speak up. There is no fighter union and there is plenty of niggle from UFC towards anyone who does highlight the UFC’s heavy duty bullshit. There is minimal information about UFC contracts, so when Ariel Helwani repeatedly states that Adesanya’s coming off-contract this year the fascination starts to percolate.
All CKB fighters have something else going on business-wise (Youtubes, endorsements, Dan Hooker owns a gym, investments etc etc). When earning money outside the UFC, the lack of UFC money can be off-set and this is what Adesanya is doing along with Sean O’Malley (non-Champ superstar). Adesanya is smart, Team CKB are smart and with a world of opportunity I am fascinated to see how this business relationship moves through 2022.
Team CKB haven’t just played ball with UFC, they go out of their way for a smooth relationship. Kaumauta Eugene Baremen ensures that Ulberg and Mathetha get a fight on Adesanya’s card for example, Hooker fights anyone anywhere. Further amping up the fascination as Team CKB and UFC have worked well together, yet Adesanya is a global superstar who could box any celebrity or command a massive deal in various promotions.
Last in the fascination station is Sean Marks leading Brooklyn Nets. Big ups to the NBA salary cap because I reckon it’s the best in the world - easy to emulate for the NRL (but Aussies are dumb). The NBA salary cap is $112,414,000 and the Nets payroll right now is $169,833,733.
The joy of the NBA salary cap is that instead of shaming Melbourne Storm for example, franchises simply pay a ‘luxury tax’ that escalates quickly by year for repeat offenders. The Nets are own by extremely wealthy folk who may be comfy paying the luxury tax, however no NBA owner will be comfy paying year after year given how it increases.
That is to say that at some point, Marks will need to sort out his team’s payroll and he has fabulous experience in salary tricks from his leadership during the Nets rebuild prior to Kevin Durant’s arrival. Marks is also juggling James Harden business (lots of trade rumours) and Kyrie Irving can only play outside New York making him a part-time player who could miss a game seven in the playoffs for example.
While Steven Adams is the highest paid player for Memphis Grizzlies ($17mil), the Nets have four players over the $17mil mark. Joe Harris earns $17mil and hasn’t played since mid-November while Irving ($34mil), Durant ($40mil) and Harden ($43mil) are ‘max salary’ types.
The homie Sean Marks must now juggle chemistry, salaries, expectations, basketball fits and plenty more as GM of the Nets. I want kiwis to shine and I’m fascinated as to how Marks makes all this work.
Also fascinated by Kelly Slater, wahine competing at Pipeline and loved the Pipeline Pro…
Wildcard’s Notebook
Libby Goes To Italy
A momentous Aotearoa footballing occasion, friends: Liberato Cacace in there for his Empoli debut at the first time of asking, a week after signing for the club, thus becoming the very first kiwi footballer to play in the men’s Serie A division.
Niko Kirwan and Liam Graham have each popped up at Serie B before. Katie Rood played a season with Juventus in the women’s top flight in Italy. Now Libby Cacace has done so in the men’s. A milestone so poetic from a bloke with such strong Italian heritage that it almost feels like it must have been inevitable.
With that, there’s now only the Spanish Liga which has yet to feature a New Zealander of the top five men’s European leagues. Six NZers have played English Premier League (Lee Norfolk, Danny Hay, Ryan Nelsen, Simon Elliott, Winston Reid & Chris Wood). Two NZers have played German Bundesliga (Wynton Rufer & Sarpreet Singh). And Bill Tuiloma’s two brief Olympic Marseille apps did the trick in the French Ligue 1.
Sidebar: In light of a record breaking Flying Kiwis Transfer Window, just pondering who ought to move to La Liga in the summer to make it five outta five. Ryan Thomas has expressed a desire to play in Spain someday. There have been rumours in the past regarding both Joe Bell and Libby Cacace and Spanish clubs (though nothing leading up to their recent transfers). Callum McCowatt and Eli Just feel like good stylistic options if they weren’t already in an upwardly progressive club situation. Maybe Winston Reid should see what past West Ham bros he’s got around the Spanish traps? Funnily enough, one of Winston’s former teammates played against Cacace in his Serie A debut: ol’ mate Marko Arnautovic. Cacace bumped him off at one point.
Cacace got twenty minutes at the end of a 0-0 draw against Bologna. Chucked on as both teams were going to the bench to try and break open the current stalemate and that led to an exciting rest of the match, swinging back and forth. And Cacace was involved in heaps of it. Actively sought out the ball in a way that many players in his situation would not have done, getting involved at both ends and making smart decisions in possession. At no time did he look overawed by the standards around him, not physically nor emotionally. That was the twenty-minute cameo of a bloke who intends to make many more appearances before the season is through. You love to see it.
Btw, the bloke with his arm around Libby in one of those screenshots is Liam Henderson, a Scottish attacking midfielder who is onto his fourth Italian club since leaving Celtic permanently in 2018 – not a typical career arc but shout out to the risk takers. Point here being that after the dream alignment of Cacace getting to play in the nation of his father’s birth... here he was hanging out with one of the few fluent English speakers in the squad lol.
Also as to his number... his usual 13 is already taken by starting goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario so he had to stretch things out a little. 31 appears to have been free if he wanted to do the old inverted digit trick. Instead he’s taken 21 – the number that Andrea Pirlo tended to wear for Italy. Wonder if that’s a coincidence... he did borrow his thumb-sucking celebration from Francesco Totti after all.
Welly Nix 3-1 Macarthur – Match Notes
Here we are once again in the Annual Midseason Revival. The Welly Nix with a pair of A-League wins bookending their FFA Cup semi-final defeat (to eventual champs Melbourne Victory), giving them a sudden six-point boost which has shot them up the ladder. No kidding, they were last before the Macarthur game kicked off and were all the way up to seventh by the end of it. Keeping up the time-honoured tradition of this team having to (and often succeeding to) overcome a slow start.
These 2021-22 Nixers had 4 points from their first 6 games. Last season they had 5 points from their first 8 games. The season before that it was 1 point from their opening 5 matches. And the one before that it was 5 points from 6 matches. But each time they’ve gotten a roll on once they finally turn the corner. The final draw of the 5pts/6gm start under Rudan was a draw that kickstarted a then-record 9-game unbeaten streak. The final draw of the 1pt/5gm start to Talay’s tenure was also the beginning of a 9-game unbeaten streak. And while it took them longer to find consistency after they started churning out wins last season they did finish it on an 11-game unbeaten streak (missing the finals by a single point). Apparently this is just what they do.
Jaushua Sotirio, aye? An absolute enigma of a player. Wonderful at getting into great scoring positions and then terrible at finishing from them... but you give a fella with decent quality enough bites at the apple and eventually he’s gonna get his teeth around one. Or two as the case may be. Sotirio’s big misses were the story of the first half but the bloke kept on going, making those same incisive and aggressive early runs in behind the Macarthur defence, and ultimately scored a decisive brace. That’s the guy in a nutshell. Consistently inconsistent but goddammit he does a job.
His inconsistency (and Australian citizenship) make him a frisky selection ahead of someone like Ben Waine amongst the fanbase but Ufuk Talay almost always has a great sense for which games to unleash Sotirio in. Usually that means that the Nix are up against a high or immobile defensive line. Ideally both. That was definitely the case against Macarthur – a couple of hefty centre-backs who were gonna win all the physical stuff (especially sans-Gary Hooper) so the plan instead was to move them around. Sotirio is fantastic at that... sure enough all them big chances kept coming his way. Five total shots for Sotirio, 8 total shots for the entire rest of the Nix squad. The two he got on target were the two he scored.
Damn shame for Finn Surman, getting caught down a blind alley and giving up the ball leading to that Uli Davila equaliser (before the Sotirio magic). But credit where it’s due because other than that... Surman was solid as a rock. Surman didn’t get to play a heap for the WeeNix last season as he flew off to be with the A-League team midway through the South Central Series but I saw heaps of him in the last Premiership season and the impression was of a genuine top level defensive prospect, especially once he builds into his tall frame as he gets older, but one who at that stage was pretty error prone. He was the only player that season to both get a red card and score an own goal. Obviously he’s had more than a full year of development since then including a heap of exposure with the senior squad... but gotta say it’s super impressive how much further along he now. Huge potential in this bloke. He’s still only 18 years old.
Speaking of academy talent, I’m always banging on about how we can’t forget that Sam Sutton is a central midfielder first and foremost (he finally got a sneaky run there earlier in the season) but tell ya what that was as natural as I’ve seen him look at left-back yet. Making great decisions, looking to attack (especially first half), really quality positional awareness... all three traits that always stood out from a young(er) Libby Cacace, just quietly. Set up two of the three goals.
Tim Payne at right back is a funky one. He’s the best right back at the club but he was also the best centre-back prior to Scott Wootton arriving. Wootton’s presence can’t be overlooked in Payne sliding out right though... Talay framed it as wanting to reward Surman for a fine effort in the FFA Cup but also it does feel like he was greasing the wheels for when Wootton’s available – which will hopefully be on Wednesday night against Melbourne Victory. Or at least keeping that option open. It would mean that they can keep the right/left foot combo going with Wooton and Josh Laws although Payne slid over to the left when Steven Taylor returned last season with no dramas. He played LCB for the All Whites against Jordan too. Tim Payne can play anywhere.
Welly Nix Solidarity:
Oli Sail was immense on return from injury. Flawless performance from him. Must be next level for those defenders though when Oli’s at the wheel, never averse to a dose of road rage that bloke. God knows the way that the Nix have defended this season that they deserve a verbal serve now and then – there were some very messy moments late in the first half and yeah that goal they conceded was not flash.
One aspect that they seem to struggle with is their midfield coverage. Midfielders drop too deep to compensate for a vulnerable defensive line and then there’s open pasture on the edge of the area for the blokes who the CMs are supposed to be marking. Having said that, I thought the recently maligned Rufer/Lewis combination was very good here. Rufer was back to his imposing physical self while Lewis was finally gambling a bit more with his passing game. He clearly got the memo about Sotirio’s early runs. Do still worry about him being too left-foot dominant at times, closing off options by turning the wrong way, but the key thing is that he needs to be more expansive in possession and he began to flex that here.
Lowkey Steven Adams Yarns...
