Inspired Incumbents
Kiwis in NRLW, FIBA U17 Men's World Cup, All Whites progressions, Blackcaps on tour, Flynn Cameron, and more
Scotty’s Word
The NRLW season starts this weekend with a crazy amount of women from Aotearoa involved. The NZ Warriors vs Bulldogs game on Sunday sums this up perfectly as Bulldogs are the most active NRLW team recruiting from New Zealand and their teams below NRLW usually have a majority of players who played junior footy in Aotearoa, specifically Mangere East.
Eight of the top-17 named for Bulldogs are NRLWahine. Of those eight, Kiwi Ferns forward Angelina Teakaraanga-Katoa is the only one I can’t find a junior footy connection to Aotearoa for. There are a bunch of NRLWahine named for Bulldogs in NSW Women’s Premiership as well, which shows the investment Bulldogs have made in recruiting talent from New Zealand.
Bulldogs have players like Moana Courtenay, Daynah Nankivell and Monica Tagoai who they recruited at the NRLW level. Courtenay and Tagoai were part of the Bulldogs’ entry to NRLW and Nankivell will make her NRLW debut. They also have players like Shaquaylah Mahakitau-Monschau and Mary-Jane Taito who have worked through the Bulldogs system as Bulldogs have had NRLWahine at all levels (U17, U19, Women’s Premiership) in recent years.
All NRLW teams have wahine from New Zealand. Then there’s the first NZ Warriors team of the season that only has one Aussie in the top-17 in Emmanita Paki, although Jasmin Huriwai is from Aotearoa and played rugby union for Australia before switching to NRLW. Switching from rugby union to rugby league or going from playing both to just rugby league is a common theme here and it’s something to track because mainstream media don’t seem to care ... yet.
Take that Bulldogs trio named above. All three joined NRLW from rugby union with Courtenay moving from the Farah Palmer Cup level, Nankivell played Super Rugby Aupiki and Tagoai has played for Black Ferns. This is the norm and the majority of NRLWahine have played rugby union at some point, while many have snapped up better career pathways in NRLW.
The funkiest selection for NZW is Christabelle Onesemo-Tuilaepa who is named on the bench having not featured in any signing announcements or squad lists prior to the team naming. Along with twin sister Demielle, they are from Samoa and moved to Auckland to chase footy careers which led to them making representative teams in both league and union (peep the theme).
They went to Westlake Girls College along with Ashlee Matapo who popped out of nowhere last season to play NRLW as an 18-year-old. Matapo is named to start at middle forward this week and NZW are battling plenty of injuries for round one which has opened up space for these younger players in a similar fashion to the men’s team.
NZW do have Apii Nicholls at fullback and a halves combo of Patricia Maliepo and Gayle Broughton. That’s as good as it gets and as they also have a big, powerful forward pack, the Kiwi Ferns halves combo should lead the way for NZW. Young Aussie Natalia Hickling is named in the wider squad as the halves depth and she fits the theme of the NZW organisation recruiting young halves from Australia.
I expect Huriwai to cover dummy half behind Capri Paekau. Stacey Waaka is on the extended bench and could be a late inclusion but she will probably be eased into NRLW footy. That’s an example of the depth on offer because Mele Hufanga is also out injured and NZW don’t suffer too much as all the outside backs have done well in NRLW so far.
NZ Warriors team vs Bulldogs
Fullback: Apii Nicholls
Wing: Lavinia Tauhalaliku, Payton Takimoana
Centre: Tysha Ikenasio, Emmanita Paki
Half: Gayle Broughton, Patricia Maliepo
Middle: Annetta Nu’uausala, Mya Hill-Moana, Ashlee Matapo
Edge: Maarire Puketapu, Shakira Baker
Hooker: Capri Paekau
Bench: Jasmin Huriwai, Harata Butler, Laishon Albert-Jones, Christabelle Onesemo
Extendo: Metanoia Fetalaiga, Natalia Hickling, Stacey Waaka, Felila Kia
Here’s my best attempt at listing all NRLWahine named for Australian teams in round one...
Sharks: Annessa Biddle (Otara), Najvada George (Melbourne), Jaydika Tafua (Papanui)
Knights: Shanice Parker (Perth), Tenika Willison (Taharoa), Tiana Davison (Waitara), Fane Finau (Otara), Amelia Pasikala (Wairoa), Cheyelle Robins-Reti (Taranaki)
Titans: Georgia Hale (Richmond), Sarina Masaga (Howick), Te Ngaroahiahi Fanua Awhina Rimoni (Wainuiomata)
Roosters: Otesa Pule (Otara)
Dragons: Nita Maynard (Gisborne), Brooke Anderson (Sydney), Trinity Tauaneai (Wainuiomata), Seriah Palepale (Mangere East)
Raiders: Leianne Tufuga (Otara), Mackenzie Wiki (Manurewa), Grace Kukutai (Lynfield College)
Broncos: Kerri Johnson (Kaikohe), Brianna Clark (Sarina), Shannon Mato (Upper Hutt)
Cowboys: Abigail Roache (Richmond), Rosie Kelly (Hokitika), Hailee-Jay Ormond-Maunsell (Invercargill)
Eels: Martha Mataele (Sydenham), Boss Kapua (Taupo)
Tigers: Raecene McGregor (Sydney), Shaniece Monschau (Mt Albert)
Bulldogs: Moana Courtenay (North Shore), Daynah Nankivell (Moerewa), Monica Tagoai (Marist St Pats), Shaquaylah Mahakitau-Monschau (Waitakere College/St Peter’s Cambridge), Angelina Teakaraanga Katoa (Auckland), Alexis Tauaneai (Wainuiomata), Mary-Jane Taito (Mangere East), Giovanna Suani (Mangere East), Evelyn Roberts (Mangere East), Maatuleio Fotu-Moala (Otahuhu), Simina Lokotui (Mangere East)
For paid subscribers
NZ Warriors men’s signings/departures
Blackcaps ODI squad for West Indies tour
Emerging one-day New Zealand team
I did pretty well to debrief the Blackcaps Test series win without mentioning the other team. One thing I’ve been pondering is how coach Rob Walter has settled into his role nicely and how different his role is to that other team’s coach. The other cricket cartel team has more of a celebrity coach in charge so lots of the attention for them is directed towards the coach.
Many folks wouldn’t even know who Walter is, let alone how seamless the transition has been from the Gary Stead era. The cricket cartel nation is constantly having resets and reviews to shake things up, yet Blackcaps have had no such dramas in changing coaches. Stead was an excellent coach for Blackcaps and played his role in the most successful phase of Blackcaps cricket that I can remember, finishing with a Test series win in India and making the Champions Trophy final.
Then Walter took over and he has worked with 20+ players in each format, guiding the top-tier to a T20 World Cup final and another Test series win overseas. Walter has also been instrumental in giving opportunities to emerging talent which has cultivated incredible depth with a bunch of seamers debuting in Zimbabwe, Mitch Hay and Dean Foxcroft scoring runs on Test debuts and players like Kristian Clarke and Jayden Lennox playing key roles during the ODI series win in India.
Coach Walter has continued Stead’s mahi in creating an environment where players do their jobs, regardless of where they sit on the depth chart. Blackcaps went deep into their seam bowling stocks vs West Indies last summer and two players from that series in Jacob Duffy and Michael Rae weren’t even part of the latest series win.
This is a guy who has worked through the Aotearoa pipeline in the domestic circuit and then with NZ-A before taking up a job with South Africa. That reflects well on coach development in New Zealand and there’s plenty more coming through the pipeline such as BJ Watling who has done a lovely job with Northern Districts.
All of which makes these quotes below from Walter even more interesting. He said this stuff while he was coach of South Africa in 2023...
“They’ve gone beyond the time where people couldn’t understand why they achieved the results they have. They’re a very good side now and you don’t see many holes in their make-up. They have a lot of depth in different positions and for the most part, highly experienced cricketers who’ve played a lot and achieved a lot.
That’s probably the strength of this New Zealand side, it’s not easy to get a game, let alone a World Cup squad.
If you look at a guy like Daryl Mitchell, it’s an indication that in the New Zealand system, you have to play a lot of domestic cricket to eventually get a shot at internationals. I was exposed to Daryl from day one when I started coaching in New Zealand and it’s only in the last two years that he’s really become an unbelievable international cricketer.
In New Zealand, when a player steps in [to the national side] there’s pressure from beneath and it inspires the incumbents to raise their game”
Musical jam...
Nick’s Notebook
The Belgian team that absolutely smoked the All Whites 5-1 in the group stage were on the verge of getting knocked out by Senegal this morning, trailing 2-0 after 85 minutes and looking pretty toothless... which in turn reflected terribly on New Zealand for being thrashed by those same jokers. But then Romelu Lukaku (86’) and Youri Tielemans (89’) scored to take it to extra time and Belgium ended up getting a very late penalty awarded after a VAR review, which Tielemans dispatched top bins for the win (120+5’). 3-2 to Belgium. Nice to see a bit of fight from those guys against someone other than the All Whites, we were looking a bit exposed there for a sec.
A key lesson of the World Cup is that it’s never as simple as the rankings or the pedigree of teams... all these nations from all over the globe bring different styles and New Zealand’s (much evolved) style didn’t match up great against Belgium who could move the ball with a much quicker tempo and more precision against the slower kiwis. Senegal’s threat is their athleticism, especially in transition. They’ve got rapid forwards who run direct and made Belgium’s older dudes look exhausted, unable to settle. Kevin de Bruyne was subbed within an hour. We were incapable of doing that to them. Senegal were not... but then they bottled it.
If not for the collateral shame for New Zealand, it would have been brilliant to see Senegal advance at the humiliating expense of Belgium. Humiliating not because Senegal were rank underdogs or anything - they have an awesome squad that’s honestly underachieved in this tournament - but for how little Belgium had accomplished. They were wasteful in draws against Iran and Egypt. Blew out the NZers but then didn’t take any of that momentum into the knockouts. Then were on the brink of going down whilst barely firing a threatening shot until the last five minutes against Senegal. Oh well, that’s the World Cup for ya. Crazy things happen.
Group Stage Eliminations by Confederation:
Asia (7/9): South Korea, Qatar, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, Uzbekistan
Europe (3/16): Czechia, Scotland, Turkey
North & Central America (3/6): Haiti, Curacao, Panama
Oceania (1/1): New Zealand
South America (1/6): Uruguay
Africa (1/10): Tunisia
European and South American teams have dominated the World Cup throughout history – no nation from any other region has ever won it. Four years ago, Morocco became the first African nation to make the semi-finals and it’s been incredible to see the success the African teams are having, with only Tunisia failing to advance to the knockouts. Alas, the knockouts are here now and they appear to have triggered something else from those AFCON sides...
South Africa lost 1-0 to Canada due to a 90+2nd min goal
Ivory Coast lost 2-1 to Norway due to an 86th min goal
DR Congo lost 2-1 to England due to an 86th min goal
Senegal lost 3-2 to Belgium due to a 120+6th min goal after also conceding an 89th min equaliser to force extra time
The exception is Morocco (with their past pedigree) who beat the Netherlands on pens after equalising in stoppage time. We’ll see how it goes with Egypt vs Australia, Algeria vs Switzerland, Ghana vs Colombia, and Cape Verde vs Argentina still to come. Those other four African sides were good enough to have won those games but came up short in critical moments, unable to handle the pressure against teams outside their confederation. A lot like how the All Whites weren’t able to hold onto leads in their own games. We’ve got more of an excuse since we don’t even get competitive games within our confederation, but then that’s why we went home early and they all made knockouts. By the way, we drew with DR Congo a couple years ago. Drew with Tunisia also.
Not really sure the gap has closed for the other confederations, though. The Central American teams were all eliminated in the first round with only the three North American hosts progressing from that region. Asia did crap with the exception of Aussie and Japan. Oceania wasn’t able to squeeze through - commiserations to our All Whites. Gotta log this context for the next four years as the All Whites try to put themselves in position to go further next time.
All Whites Opponents By Confederation During Bazeley Era (Since March 2023)
Africa (1-2-2): DR Congo, Egypt (2), Tunisia, Ivory Coast
Asia (2-2-3): China, Qatar (DNF), Australia (3), Malaysia, Iran
Europe (0-2-7): Sweden, Greece, Ireland, Ukraine, Poland, Norway, Finland, England, Belgium
North & Central America (0-1-2): Mexico, USA, Haiti
South America (1-0-2): Colombia, Ecuador, Chile
Oceania (9-0-0): Solomon Islands, Vanuatu (3), Tahiti (2), Samoa, Fiji, New Caledonia
Darren Bazeley’s contract runs through until September so he’ll get at least one more window in charge (probably many more on top of that too but we’ll see). Sounds like there will be at least one home game in that slot, probably against an Asian opponent. The match calendar is changing to have a 16-day window in September-October with room for up to four games and therefore less disruption to club seasons. There’s then a normal length window in November. That means up to six more games before the end of the year. Chris Wood could be sitting on 99-caps at Christmas time if we schedule the maximum amount and he plays them all.
Check out the Paywalled section if you’re one of those clever, talented, kindly souls who support TNC financially - there’s a full breakdown of the Men’s U16 football squad that’s just been announced including a few curious selection trends from NZ Football at this level
There’ll be at least one New Zealander partaking in NBA Summer League activities this year: Flynn Cameron’s been invited to play for the Portland Trail Blazers. The reigning NBL Most Improved Player will give it a nudge against Phoenix, Orlando, Minnesota, Denver, and whoever they end up against in their last match which is results-dependent. Portland just traded for Ja Morant so perhaps he’ll put in a good word for another kiwi NBA teammate after his time spent with Steven Adams. NZ Breakers old boy Karim Lopez will play for Morant’s old team Memphis Grizzlies after his draft pick was traded there on the day. Cameron won’t have to compete with any draftees in Portland because they’d traded away all their picks and didn’t select anyone, not even in the second round.
Last year we had Sam Mennenga (LA Lakers), Tyrell Harrison (Denver Nuggets), and Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones (Toronto Raptors) for our busiest ever Summer League group... but Mennenga and ATW were only used very sparingly while Harrison started off great but then they gave up on him after a couple games. We’ll see how much room Cameron gets to impress but usually these are purely about experience and personal growth rather than a genuine shot of earning an NBA contract. Almost nobody earns one of them based on Summer League but the invitation alone has become something of a badge of honour that only gets dished out to those among NZ’s very best current pros/college grads.
New Zealanders who have been invited to NBA Summer League:
Kirk Penney, Craig Bradshaw, Steven Adams, Tom Abercrombie, Robe Loe, Corey Webster, Tai Webster, Jack Salt, Finn Delany, Sam Waardenburg, Mojave King, Sam Mennenga, Tyrell Harrison, Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones, Flynn Cameron
Highest Individual Score By Batting Position on Blackcaps Test Tour of Ireland/England
1 – Tom Latham 151 vs England, Test 3
2 – Devon Conway 157 vs England, Test 3
3 – Henry Nicholls 121 vs England, Test 2
4 – Rachin Ravindra 121 vs Ireland
5 – Daryl Mitchell 100* vs England, Test 3
6 – Tom Blundell 186 vs Ireland
7 – Glenn Phillips 100 vs England, Test 2
8 – Glenn Phillips 44* vs England, Test 1
9 – Kyle Jamieson 41 vs England, Test 2
10 – Ben Sears 19no vs England, Test 3
11 – Will O’Rourke 0* vs England, Test 2
So across the last four Test matches played, for three wins and a loss, the Blackcaps have scored seven hundreds by seven different batters in seven different positions. None of them tonned up twice on that tour but none of them needed to, the weight of runs was shared around. Dean Foxcroft did get out for 98 (batting at seven) against Ireland on debut so it could have been eight. Mitchell, Blundell, and Ravindra (x2) are the only ones with additional 50+ scores.
Most Test Runs by NZers vs England
John Wright – 1518 runs @ 37.02 avg (4 100s)
Martin Crowe – 1421 runs @ 40.60 avg (5 100s)
Kane Williamson – 1408 runs @ 40.22 avg (5 100s)
Luteru Ross Taylor – 1272 runs @ 41.03 avg (3 100s)
Stephen Fleming – 1229 runs @ 35.11 avg (2 100s)
Daryl Mitchell – 1191 runs @ 56.71 avg (4 100s)
Most Test Runs by NZers vs England In England
Martin Crowe – 845 runs @ 40.23 avg (3 100s)
Daryl Mitchell – 779 runs @ 70.81 (4 100s)
Bevan Congdon – 726 runs @ 33.00 avg (2 100s)
John Wright – 714 runs @ 35.70 avg (1 100)
Devon Conway – 681 runs @ 42.56 avg (2 100s)
Devon Conway Test scores in England:
200, 23, 80, 3, 3, 13, 46, 52, 26, 11, 1, 41, 9, 11, 157, 5
Daryl Mitchell Test scores in England:
6, 13, 108, 190, 62*, 109, 56, 12, 0, 44, 68, 11, 100*
Daryl Mitchell in Tests vs England
24 inns | 1191 runs | 56.71 avg | 4 100s | 8 50s
Daryl Mitchell in Tests vs Everyone Else
38 inns | 1220 runs | 34.86 avg | 2 100s | 8 50s
The NZ U17 Men’s Basketball lads continue their efforts at the FIBA U17 World Cup. They got on the board in their third and final group game, beating Slovenia 79-74 in a meeting of two 0-2 teams. The Junior Tall Blacks shot out to a 10-0 lead in the opening minutes and then it was pretty much even the rest of the way with Slovenia making little runs whenever NZ seemed to be finding some breathing room. Liam Keogh was the star in this win, scoring 20 points on/11 shooting with 8 rebounds, 3 assists, and 4 steals.
Aussie-based Keogh was everywhere with his long arms and lanky athleticism (very good defender too), scooping in lay-up after lay-up. Point guard Tawhiri Cate of the Canterbury Rams knocked down four triples for 18 points and 9 assists. Big man Zach Rampton (Nelson Giants) scored 10 points. And the main man Jayden Cecil had an average game by his standards but still delivered 14 points and 3 assists. He looks like an outstanding prospect with his variety of scoring moves.
That was an important win because it meant that the kiwis avoid having to face Australia in the round of sixteen, instead leaving that fate to Slovenia. The JTBs, on the other hand, faced off against Serbia early this morning. Serbia beat us by 48 points at the 2022 U17 World Cup but began this tournament getting whupped 88-66 by the Aussies, before big wins over under-matched Venezuela and Ivory Coast.
This one was tough as Serbia turned up with a team full of rangy, long-armed giants who kept grabbing offensive rebounds, poking away turnovers, disrupting shots at the rim, and generally just messing with the kiwi game plan. They were up 31-16 after the first quarter with only nine points from Jayden Cecil keeping the pulse going for NZ. He and Marco Sula were almost entirely responsible for the scoring in the first half and it wasn’t until Keogh and Rampton settled in and started challenging some shots that the JTBs looked in any way competitive... and Serbian burst out of the gates in the second half ruined any of that progress. It ended in a 121-91 defeat.
There are classification games too so it’s not over until everyone’s played through and got their ranking out of sixteen (it’s a youth tournament so more games against more nations is the whole point). Tomorrow night at 9pm NZT we face Japan to see if we can get into those 9-12 placed classifiers or drop into the 13-16 classifiers. The loss to Serbia saw the JTBs out-rebounded 62 to 39, giving up 74 points in the paint. Couldn’t hang against the long limbs of their opponents… except for Jayden Cecil whose 37 points were hugely impressive and keep up his extensive mahi at this event.
Jayden Cecil so far at the 2026 U17 World Cup:
With all 16 teams having played four games to this point, Jayden Cecil is the second top scorer in the entire tournament with 28.8 ppg. Only Dwight Gaines of Puerto Rico with 29.3 ppg is ahead of him and Gaines is playing about an extra minute per game.
Musical Jam...
