Glamour & Platitudes
Glamour & Platitudes
Lydia Ko winning, Football Ferns World Cup draw, Plunket Shield Notebook, Men's National League Team of the Week & heaps more
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Reading Menu
2022 T20 World Cup: Blackcaps Perfection (Cricket)
2022 Plunket Shield: The Blackcaps Mixer (Wellington vs Northern, Central vs Canterbury) (Cricket)
2022 Plunket Shield: Thorn Parkes and Otago's Win Over Auckland (Cricket)
2022 Rugby League World Cup: Three Key Trends About Aotearoa Kiwis Footy (Rugby League)
The All Whites Need A New Coach After Danny Hay vs NZ Football Reached Its Inevitable Conclusion (Football)
Football Ferns vs Japan: They Lost, But Let’s Keep It Realistic (Football)
Scotty’s Word
Lydia Ko won her second LPGA event of the year in Korea, finishing -21 and four shots ahead of the chasing pack. This was essentially a home event for Ko as she was playing in front of whanau - extra funky considering that local Korean players cruised around the Oak Valley Country Club with their own fan clubs. Ko's fan club didn't have a fancy name, just the whanau. This win puts Ko in a strong position heading into the last three events.
Ko is now first in CME Globe Season and Rolex Player of the Year. Ko is also first in Putts per GiR, Sand Saves and Scoring Average. This is Ko's third consecutive top-five finish and she has six top-five finishes in her last eight tournaments.
At the time I found inspiration in how Ko maintained a positive vibe through tough times. This has influenced every Lydia Ko Mixtape and the 25-year-old (!!) now emerges with immense mana. That mana is evident in how other LPGA players talk about Ko, especially the youngsters who view Ko for the legend she is.
A bunch of WBBL games were washed out over the weekend, leaving a nice pocket to break down Brisbane Heat and the Kerr sisters. Heat lost their first game and then won three games in a row, with Amelia Kerr cooking as one of the best all-rounders in the competition. Jess Kerr appears to have finished her stint with Heat as she was only signed to cover Indian seamer Pooja Vastraker's late arrival, with Jess taking 4w @ 5.25rpo/18sr.
Jess is good at bowling…
ODI: 25.37avg/4.19rpo
T20I: 22.41avg/5.74rpo/23.41sr
List-A: 24.92avg/4.17rpo
T20: 16.24avg/5.58rpo/17.44sr
Amelia is currently third for WBBL wickets (7w @ 7.18rpo/13.7sr) and 16th for runs (74 runs @ 121.31sr). Kerr has taken 2w, 2w and 3w in Heat's three consecutive wins. Kerr has batted twice in this run of wins, hitting 28 @ 116.66sr and 27 @ 122.72sr. These three wins have put Heat third, tied with Suzie Bates' Sixers and a point behind Sophie Devine/Maddy Green with Scorchers.
Amelia has a T20I batting strike-rate of 99.76 and T20 strike-rate of 112.31. Getting up around 120sr is a nice leap and while she is playing a slightly different role for Heat vs White Ferns, this is a funky update to her batting thread.
Glenn Phillips is the most exciting cricketer in the world. I've said this on podcasts recently and then Phillips snared an epic catch in Aotearoa's win over Australia. Phillips’ fielding is a major factor in this and we all know how G-Philly bats. A fun marker of this vibe is that Phillips can hit sixes over cow corner as well as deep cover, or at least it feels like he could bang a six anywhere. That energy is in every aspect of Phillip’s cricket.
Let the standing of Aotearoa's Super Smash vs the world of T20 franchise cricket simmer as a T20WC backdrop. Based on the amount of overseas signings, money involved and trendiness, Super Smash is among the worst T20 competitions in the world. But what happens if Super Smash is producing elite T20 cricketers?
T20 cricket is chasing desperate growth around the world - kinda greedy. Indian franchise owners are investing in Caribbean and South African leagues. Australia's Big Bash League is always being tinkered and loves to bring in overseas players. England want so much short-form cricket they added The Hundred to their T20 Blast schedule. Pakistan have a low key strong T20 league, leaving Super Smash to sit alongside Bangladesh and Sri Lanka in T20 league rankings. Not in quality of cricket but in terms of perception and platform.
Nothing about Finn Allen's knock vs Australia was surprising for kiwi cricket fans who love Super Smash. Allen formed a lovely opening combo with Devon Conway for Wellington in recent summers and they have parlayed that Super Smash mahi into a T20WC. Both have spent time in the IPL and that development bump tends to revolve around training, not playing. Kane Williamson and Trent Boult are the only kiwis who get consistent IPL game time.
Most of these T20I Blackcaps play in England and around the world, providing valuable experience. All of which starts in Super Smash. Super Smash used to lure overseas lads into the competition, but has quietly shifted into a more local flavour. I don't think Super Smash is celebrated or respected to any great extent in other countries, yet Super Smash is where the world's best T20 cricketers come from.
Plunket Shield notebook...
Auckland
Sean Solia opened the batting and bowling for Auckland. Solia took the most wickets for Auckland (6w @ 2.82rpo) in their loss to Otago with batting scores of 24 and 3. Auckland's young-ish seam attack doesn't have the same oomph as Canterbury for example. Solia is among the best domestic players and toured India with Aotearoa ‘A’ which provides a funky layer to Auckland’s cricket.
Northern Districts
Bharat Popli (75, 127*), Henry Cooper (56, 90), Jeet Raval (54) and Tim Seifert (69) all scored runs for Northern in their loss vs Wellington. Joe Carter was the best batter for Aotearoa 'A' in India as well. This is a solid batting unit for Northern and each of these lads have flexed all over Plunket Shield at some stage in their respective careers. I'm less excited about 'Wagner Watch' though as Neil Wagner has quietly hit a plateau and I'll be tracking him closely in coming games.
Central Districts
No point yarning about Ajaz Patel and Test selection in Aotearoa if Patel is not commanding selection. This yarn came from last summer and while I'm hopeful that Patel can gather wickets with regular Plunket Shield game time, it's no certainty.
Here's one to ponder...
First-Class Bowling Average
Will Somerville: 29.40
Ajaz Patel: 32.43
Ish Sodhi: 33.72
Mitchell Santner: 47.22
Wellington
Tom Blundell and Rachin Ravindra scored runs for Wellington, but Wellington success depends upon Luke Georgeson, Troy Johnson, and Tim Robinson. These three should play all formats for Wellington and have flashed their potential in domestic cricket. In a fairly young Wellington outfit, these lads will need to score runs and all three had slow starts against Northern. Georgeson is an all-rounder who would have given Ireland’s T20WC squad a nudge if he followed that route. Johnson averages 40+ in FC and LA early in his career. Robinson’s batting looks the best and he’s a low key must-watch when Super Smash is on telly.
Canterbury
Ed Nuttall and Henry Shipley are currently playing for Canterbury 'A' (against Otago 'A'), two lads who missed the first Plunket Shield game via injury or whatever. Canterbury's first up bowling unit of Matt Henry, Fraser Sheat, Will O'Rourke and Sean Davey is among the best in Aotearoa, which could be boosted by injections of Nuttall/Shipley.
Nuttall is the only lad here averaging over 30 in FC bowling and he's a whiff away (31.19avg). Will Williams (21.51avg) dropped out of Canterbury's group to move full-time to Lancashire and without Williams, Nuttall, or Shipley, Canterbury still rolled out a seam attack all averaging sub-30.
Otago
Which young Otago batter will emerge ahead of the pack this season? Thorn Pakes started nicely, while Jacob Cumming, Dale Phillips and Dean Foxcroft will score runs at some point. Remember that Otago Sparks have a top-tier development system and aligning this with the blokes stuff will give Otago a funky bump this summer.
Aotearoa Kiwis grabbed a 68-6 win over Jamaica. I'm easing up on any conclusions from these kinda wins, aside from not comparing how contenders defeat the weaker nations. Don't even bother with that kind of World Cup mathematics, especially when two different spine combinations and 22 players have been used.
Spine vs Lebanon: Joseph Manu, Dylan Brown, Kieran Foran, Brandon Smith
Spine vs Jamaica: Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad, Joseph Manu, Kieran Foran, Brandon Smith
Everyone played 15+ minutes in the first game, then all four players on the bench played 40+ minutes against Jamaica. Don't cling to how the team is performing in these games. Coach Michael Maguire may have a best-case plan for minutes and game time through the group stages, although injuries will likely dictate these plans. Flow with this stage of RLWC and enjoying the festival of international rugby league. Then the intensity will ramp up for epic knockout footy.
Wildcard’s Notebook
I wrote a preview of the World Cup draw in Friday’s effort, now gotta write the review of that draw after FIFA brought all the glitz to Aotea Centre in Auckland. All the glamour and platitudes were a bit hilarious given FIFA’s other proclivities but whatever. Mostly I was paying attention to that draw in order to see a) who the Ferns would play, and b) which other teams would end up in Aotearoa.
And there it is.
Groups A, C, E & G are based in New Zealand which is quite amazing – welcome to the US Women’s National Team... who will face the team they beat in the last World Cup final during the group stage, welcome to Netherlands.
There are no groups of death in this tournament because the tournament has been expanded from 24 teams to 32 teams so there are quite a few first-time appearances going on. The distance between the top seeds and the fourth seeds in each group means there aren’t any where feasible upsets might occur. Maybe group G could be a sneaky one. That’s the closest bet, anyway. But there are some amazing players who’ll be rocking up to Auckland, Wellington, Hamilton, and Dunedin next year.
More importantly the Football Ferns have been handed an enticing set of games. Not as good as it could have been. Norway from the second pot were probably somewhere in the middle in terms of preferred selections. Switzerland from pot three are a bit tougher than hoped. Philippines from pot four are better than average. So it balances out at around average.
Can the Ferns get a win from that group? Absolutely. They played the Philippines in a friendly recently and beat them 2-1 in a solid enough performance despite missing several key players. The line-up that day was:
Nayler | Anton, Moore, Bunge, A.Riley | Bott, Hassett, Chance, Hand | Satchell, I.Riley
The Philippines could potentially have improved by next July but the Ferns will definitely be a stronger team. Hopefully they’ll be able to inject the likes of Ria Percival, Abby Erceg, Hannah Wilkinson, Vic Esson, Katie Bowen, and Rebekah Stott into that team, all of whom missed that last meeting. The Fernies already beat this team when they weren’t at that level so this is as good an opportunity to win as we could ever have hoped for at a World Cup.
We also played Norway recently (back in June) and lost 2-0 so that’s going to be a tough one to overturn. They’re not a team completely beyond our reach but it’ll take quite an upset to beat them. How much value does home field advantage hold? Hopefully heaps but we can’t possibly say right now. If the Ferns could sneak a draw in that opening game though it’d put them in an incredible spot.
The Ferns did beat Norway 1-0 in a friendly prior to the 2019 World Cup. Norway have Ada Hegerberg back now so they’re a tougher proposition but you never know. Again, that game could’ve been much worse. We could’ve been handed Netherlands or Canada or Brazil or Japan.
Can the Ferns make the knockouts from that group? That all depends on how they go against Switzerland. Can’t say I know too much about the Swiss team. Alisha Lehmann is a teammate of Anna Leat’s at Aston Villa. Ramona Bachmann used to play with Ali Riley at Rosengård a few years back. Ria Percival played a few seasons with FC Basel in the Swiss league.
There’s no doubt that the Swiss are a stronger team than us, especially looking at the pedigree of some of their players (Noelle Maritz & Lia Wälti at Arsenal, Ana-Maria Crnogorčević at Barcelona, Bachmann at PSG, etc.). But as a team they’ve only recently gotten things churning. 2015 was their first World Cup qualification, beating Ecuador 10-1 before losses to Japan and Cameroon. They still made the knockouts as a best third-placed qualifier (a pathway that no longer exists in a 32-team tournament) but lost 1-0 to Canada in the round of sixteen.
Switzerland failed to qualify for the 2019 World Cup but won 9 of 11 qualifying games to make it to the 2023 edition. Finished second in their initial qualifying group behind Italy (whom they beat 2-1 away but lost 1-0 at home). Romania, Croatia, Lithuania, and Moldova were the other teams in that group. Switzerland then beat Wales 2-1 after extra time in a playoff to book a place in the main event. New Zealand drew 0-0 with Wales in the same tour as that Norway match. The Swiss also went out in the group stages of the 2022 Euros, drawing 2-2 with Portugal before losing 2-1 to Sweden and 4-1 to Netherlands.
Basically, if the Footy Ferns can get good enough to beat Switzerland then they can make the knockouts. If not then probably not. At least we now know where the high jump bar is set.
Most Goal Contributions in the Men’s National League (after four rounds)...
Jack-Henry Sinclair – Wellington Olympic - 7 (4 goals, 3 assists)
Emiliano Tade – Auckland City – 5 (2 goals, 3 assists)
Jesse Randall - Wellington Olympic – 5 (5 assists)
Garbhan Coughlan – Cashmere Technical - 5 (3 goals, 2 assists)
Lyle Matthysen – Cashmere Technical – 4 (1 goal, 3 assists)
Gianni Bouzoukis – Wellington Olympic - 4 (4 goals)
Sam Burfoot – Birkenhead United - 3 (1 goal, 2 assists)
Mika Rabuka – Christchurch United - 3 (1 goal, 2 assists)
Joe Lee – Auckland United - 3 (1 goal, 2 assists)
Strong Man Steven Adams...
Men’s National League - Team of the Week #4
GK – Scott Basalaj (Wellington Olympic) – Fair play, Scotty Bass has kept three clean sheets in a row. All wins. There have been changes in the defensive trio in front of him each time but Basalaj has gotten the job done. In a massive game against Birkenhead he was a perfect mix of calming experience and quality shot-stopping. Good keeper, this dude. You may have heard of him.
RB – Jordan Vale (Auckland City) – Might as well, he scored a goal after all. Jordan Vale is one of those players who is always going to serve up at least a 7/10 performance. Never lacks for effort. Defends well. Gets forward even better. It’s easy to lose sight of essential guys like him within Auckland City’s footballing elegance.
CB – Alex Palezevic (Wellington Olympic) – You could pick a Greeks defender most weeks for these things, they all just take turns being the standout each match. This week was Palezevic’s turn. Sliding into the middle of the trio with Ben Mata absent and doing a slick job of it in another clean sheet victory.
CB – Ross Haviland (Auckland United) – Genuinely wasn’t sure whether to go with Haviland or Kurtis Mogg... but Mogg’s already had one TOW so that’ll do. Share the love. Haviland came back from suspension and looked excellent in a really strong AUFC back line. The both games he’s played ninety minutes, his team have kept clean sheets. Not a coincidence.
LB – Lucas Mauragis (Wellington Phoenix) – Week one saw Alex Paulsen and Ben Old drop down for game time. Week four saw Lucas Mauragis do the same while the ALM team took on his parent club Newcastle Jets. Mauragis wasn’t allowed to play that one so instead he caught a flight to Christchurch and attempted to dribble past as many defenders as possible. Didn’t always work but the intentions were cruel, which is what you want to see from a pro dropping down. Got one assist. Could have had a few more if his teammates finished better.
CM – Michael Den Heijer (Auckland United) – Another bloke getting TOW honours partly due to muscling up against Hamish Watson. MDH had no reservations with that task. He also didn’t shirk his other responsibilities with a wonderful CDM performance full of tackles, interceptions, and smooth passing.
CM – Tor Davenport-Petersen (Wellington Olympic) – Birkenhead had scored multiple goals in all three games prior... they got blanked by Welly Olympic. Already highlighted Basalaj and Palezevic’s efforts now here are some midfield exploits too. TDP’s another one who makes sure he does his defensive work above all else and doesn’t ever shy away from a challenge. Always good value.
CM – Matthew Sheridan (Wellington Phoenix) – Sheridan’s played right back for three weeks but with a few others missing (including a couple with the A-League team) he was unleashed in midfield... and scored a beautiful goal in a fine performance full of attacking intent.
FW – Emiliano Tade (Auckland City) – Man, what else can you say? The National League’s top Kiwi-Argentine continues to play like he can see through the matrix. Against Napier City he scored a penalty and set up two other goals. Carrying on beautifully from his last-minute equaliser last week.
FW – Garbhan Coughlan (Cashmere Tech) – GC is always great to watch with his clever touches and precision movement but against Melville he went next level. Two goals and an assist, all of them beautifully achieved. He was a magician.
FW – Joseph Lee (Auckland City) – The young fella in an attacking group that includes names like Tade, De Vries, Manickum, Kilkolly... but Joe Lee was the star of the show in ACFC’s 3-0 win over Napier City. A goal and an assist. When he angles in on that left foot it’s danger time every time.