The Black Gloves
Blackcaps ODI mahi & a White Ferns squad, Welly Nix wahine reactions, Lydia Ko scoring averages, more Kiwi-NRL junior movement & the last Men's National League Team of the Week
Kia ora and welcome to The Niche Cache. There are many ways to support our mahi. Patreon has an extra podcast each week. Word of mouth works great too. Engagement is fabulous and if you’re on our website, dwell on those ads. Love ya self.
Podcast
Subscribe: Apple | Spotify | Youtube
Reading Menu
Flying Kiwis – November 25 (Football)
2022/23 HBJ Shield: Five Things From The Opening Weekend (Cricket)
Blackcaps vs India ODI Series Preview (Cricket)
2022/23 Ford Trophy: Henry Shipley, Tom Blundell and Central Districts Class (Cricket)
Kiwi-NRL Junior Siua Wong's Crazy Year Of Footy (Rugby League)
2022/23 Kiwi-NRL Train and Trial Breakdown (Rugby League)
Scotty’s Word
After the second ODI against India in Hamilton was washed out, Aotearoa takes a 1-0 lead into the third ODI (Wednesday in Christchurch). The Blackcaps defeated India in the first game at Eden Park thanks to Tom Latham's 145* and Kane Williamson's 94*, neither knock comes as a surprise given the class of these two and their recent mahi.
Williamson has five consecutive scores of 40+ and finished second for Aotearoa run-scoring at the T20 World Cup. Remember that Williamson led Blackcaps for runs at last year's T20WC and he has a T20I record of 36.91avg/118.76sr this year. Williamson has 10+ innings and an average over 35 in two of his 10 years of T20Is; 2016 and 2022.
This was Williamson's first 50+ score in ODIs since 2019 - only the seventh time he's batted though. Williamson had 11+ innings in 10 consecutive years of ODI cricket, averaging 40+ in all but the first year. Then he played two games in 2020 and this was his fifth innings in 2022. Williamson averaged 59.25 in 2019 and is averaging 54.25 this year.
Seeing Latham pop up with his black wicket-keeping gloves can be a bit weird given the lack of ODI cricket on local turf. Everyone should know by now that Latham is a domestic batting monster and like Matt Henry, he dominates any chance he gets when lacing up for Canterbury. Folks may not know that Latham is Aotearoa's best Cricket World Cup Super League batter and he is seventh for all CWCSL batters.
Only one bloke (Afghanistan's Rahmat Shah) has more runs in fewer innings than Latham. Babar Azam is the only batter who has 1,000+ runs and along with Latham, these two are the only batters who have 500+ runs with 60+ averages. Latham has the highest strike-rate of the 13 batters with 600+ runs - a smidge higher than Azam's 97.38sr.
Latham is one of the best batters in the CWCSL which features the 13 best ODI teams in the world racking up a large sample size of games. Aotearoa is now third on the CWCSL ladder and another win takes them tied with India on 13 wins. Three of Aotearoa's four losses came in the series against Australia.
Rolling with Lockie Ferguson and Adam Milne in the same bowling attack doesn't excite me, but there was a clear plan in place. At Eden Park, having two lads bowling a bit shorter and digging into the pitch can work well. At Seddon Park in Hamilton this became two spinners to go with the swing and seam. This will likely be repeated for Christchurch given that Michael Bracewell extracted funky spin from the Hagley Oval pitch in the T20I tri-series.
Milne is enjoying plenty of grace and whether he can parlay that grace into commanding selection is something I'm curious about. Milne took 1w @ 6.7rpo in the opening ODI against India and we will need more overs to gauge Milne's stock, especially on more normal cricket fields.
Trent Boult's absent at the moment, Kyle Jamieson's injured, and Blair Tickner now sits behind Milne in the depth chart. Ben Sears will be hunting an opportunity as well. This is Milne's best opportunity to make an impression if he is selected for the third ODI, because next the Blackcaps tour Pakistan where their ODI bowling attack will likely skew towards spinners.
A White Ferns squad to face Bangladesh has been named with Wellington's Jess McFadyen selected as the wicket-keeper. The next White Ferns target is the T20WC in South Africa early next year and there is only one international series this summer ahead of that T20WC, but a whole lot of Super Smash. This T20 focus frames all WF matters, such as Molly Penfold and Hannah Rowe playing the ODIs while Georgia Plimmer and Lea Tahuhu only play the T20Is vs Bangladesh.
This gives WF the glorious spin trio of Amelia Kerr, Eden Carson and Fran Jonas in both formats. Coach Ben Sawyer again referenced a "blueprint of how we want to play" and "we’ve got a pretty good style of play and so it will be about putting all of that together" without highlighting what this means. This leaves kiwi cricket freaks to observe and learn how the kiwis will play cricket under coach Sawyer.
Embracing the strength of spinners feels like it could be something to build on. Plimmer's steady selection despite not quite demanding this with domestic runs also feels like it could highlight a style. Plimmer can play aggressive strokes through and over the off-side, which stands out among wahine cricketers. Brooke Halliday is also punchy through the off-side as a lefty and Lauren Down is one of the classiest off-side hitters in Aotearoa.
This continues to be the most important pocket for WF batting. Plimmer has a T20I record of 9.2avg/88.46sr, Down has a record of 14.5avg/92.55sr and Halliday's is 12.55avg/92.62sr. One, maybe two of these ladies will play in the 1st 11 and they are competing for role-playing batting spots.
McFadyen has a similar T20WC opportunity and she will need to find T20I runs despite averaging 10 in 24 innings of T20 batting. McFadyen is one of the most productive HBJ Shield batters in Aotearoa though with 36.42avg and how she performs could dictate the wicket-keeping duties for next six months or so.
Eight batters have scored 50+ runs in HBJ Shield and they are all solid domestic veterans - no youngins. Kate Anderson and Caitlin Blakely are in this group, two younger players but Anderson debuted in 2014/15 and Blakely debuted in 2012/13. They have both played 50+ games in the two formats and this serves as another reminder to celebrate the grizzly mahi as it set the standards of domestic cricket.
After Friday's Scoring Average check with Lydia Ko, here's how they match up with Ko's driving mahi (distance | accuracy)...
2014: 70.08 - 5th (249.58m | 79.19%)
2015: 69.44 - 2nd (250.39m | 75.44%)
2016: 69.60 - 2nd (246.73m | 70.88%)
2017: 69.86 - 9th (243.25m | 78.41%)
2018: 70.05 - 7th (245.38m | 69.63%)
2019: 70.98 - 39th (245.47m | 70.08%)
2020: 70.26 - 6th (254.41m | 66.62%)
2021: 69.33 -3rd (259.21m | 65.52%)
2022: 68.98 - 1st (255.34m | 66.44%)
Ko has averaged 250+ driving metres for the last three years. This coincides with the lowest period of driving accuracy in her career. Ko is hitting the ball further, sacrificing accuracy in the process, leading to her best year on tour.
We can also reflect on these stats knowing the journey Ko has been on. After instant LPGA Tour success there was clearly a ploy to sacrifice distance for accuracy and this worked well in 2016/17 but led to Ko's rough patch. Improvements in technology and Ko maturing into her body are also factors here.
In Friday's email dispatch there was a note about Francis Manuleleua joining Penrith Panthers and Panthers announced their Jersey Flegg squad over the weekend. This included Manuleleua (Papatoetoe Panthers - Penrith Panthers), along with Ilai Tuia (Randwick), Kyson Kingi (Kerikeri), Lleyton Finau (Marist) and Taani Fangupo (St Paul's College/South Island).
Manueleua is joined by Finau in moving from NZ Warriors to Panthers. Finau played in the Warriors-Redcliffe U21s team that made the final this year, after Panthers recruited William Fakatoumafi (now with Roosters), Daeon Amituanai, Preston Riki and Kingi from Warriors the previous summer.
Taani Fangupo is a fresh joker and he appears to have been recruited from the South Island U20s team that competed in the NZRL Under 20s earlier this year. Fangupo went to St Paul's College in Auckland and was in a bunch of youngsters who moved to Otago to study, then popped up in the Otago/South Island rugby league system.
Tonga Nau moved from Mt Albert Grammar School in Auckland to Dunedin for his studies, then played for Otago in the NZRL blokes competition. Nau then moved to Melbourne where he played for Storm's Jersey Flegg team and I'm curious where he winds up to start next season.
That's two young lads who moved from Auckland to Otago with their studies as their primary focus, now in NRL systems. This highlights the many pathways on offer to footy juniors in Aotearoa and Fangupo's move to Panthers is another salute to the NZRL U20s competition that has low key brewed a bunch of Kiwi-NRL prospects.
Thomas McKenzie also made the move from Otago to Australia, playing nine games for Norths Devils U21s this year. Norths is part of the Broncos feeder net in Brisbane but I'm not sure where McKenzie will pop up next.
Musical Jam…
Wildcard’s Notebook
Real downbuzz ending to the Wellington Phoenix’s second A-League Women’s game. Just as with last week, there was an impressive start and then a poor second half involving a flurry of goals conceded. At least they lasted a little longer before that collapse this week. Against Melbourne City they were tied at 0-0 at the half only to find themselves 4-0 down after 70 minutes (going on to lose 4-1). Against expansion side Western United they were tied at 1-1 at the break and were still level after 70 minutes... only to lose 4-1 in the end. Three goals in the last ten. It wasn’t good.
It’s such a pity because for a long time there they played pretty well. Michaela Robertson made a big difference to the team with her classy stylings. She may be new to the pro scene but she’s a hugely experienced player at the domestic level and while there are some superb attacking prospects in this squad it’s Mickey Robertson who has the most well-rounded game. She’s the only player in this team that can shoot, pass, dribble, has good pace, and a reliable technique. All the forwards tick at least a couple of those boxes. Some get up to as many as four. Robertson is the only player who ticks the lot and that was on display as she made her club debut.
Also on display was the set piece prowess of Michaela Foster, with one of her corners leading to Marisa van der Meer’s equalising goal. Sweet as. Even when this team struggles to create from open play, as they did here and will in other matches, they’re always going to at least have that dead ball threat. Would be useful if they still had a target player like Grace Jale as this Nix side doesn’t have a lot of size to it and that limits their set piece potential somewhat... but there are ways around that. Crowd the keeper and stay alert for the crumbs. That sorta thing.
But the midfield didn’t operate as well this time and the team in general gave up way too many shots. The Nix actually shaded possession slightly thanks to Western being quite direct in their play, but there were still too many messy moments coming out of defence - particularly in the second half when the midfield tired and couldn’t support as often. Also worth noting that it was 1-1 when Robertson and van der Meer went off.
Again what’s hardest to ignore are the mistakes leading to goals. Kate Taylor’s shallow clearance led to the first goal. She was off-balance but she still had the chance to get rid of that thing and did not. The second goal wasn’t an overt error, though it came from a corner kick that they couldn’t win first contact from. Sydney Cummings leapt above about three players in her vicinity to power that header in.
Then six minutes later they conceded from another corner, this time Bri Edwards tried to punch but, like Taylor’s clearance for the first goal, didn’t get any depth on it. The ball went straight up and down and hit Charlotte Lancaster as a few players competed for the dropping follow-up. Almost went in for an own goal until Hannah Keane poached it from a yard out.
The final goal came via a stunner of a cross from Emma Robers and an even more impressive header by Keane... but Foster and Knott both had a chance to stop Robers from advancing back near halfway and Robers fought through both challenges. One is fine, that happens. Consecutive missed tackles is always going to put your team under pressure though.
None of that was much fun to watch... although the same thing remains as with last week: individual mistakes are correctable. The Nix weren’t completely outclassed (although Western Utd having three imports scoring the goals made things very tough – Jess McDonald, Hannah Keane & Sydney Cummings... all Americans although Cummings plays for Guyana internationally). They’re not as far off the pace as it sounds and with the likes of Lily Alfeld, Emma Rolston, and Grace Wisnewski to return there is help on the horizon. I’m expecting this to be a team that shows a lot of progress over the course of the season same as last time. Seems it may just take a few weeks for that to reflect in results, is all.
Help is also on the horizon for us kiwis trying to watch FIFA World Cup games as tonight is the final 11pm kickoff. If you’re a nighthawk like myself, those 11pm kickoffs are too tempting to miss but then you try watch them and then also get up early for the next morning’s games and after a few days of that pattern you’re a walking zombie. At least that’s been my experience.
But the third round of group fixtures are always played at the same time as each other so that teams don’t get cynical with mutually convenient draws or get unfair advantages by already knowing the other result in their group. Hence they can’t spread them out across four time-slots any more. None of the knockouts are 11pm kickoffs either.
Good reason for that being that 11pm in Aotearoa is 1pm in Qatar. They already moved the World Cup to November because of how it’s physically impossible to play football in the heat of the Qatari summer so you can guarantee that even in air-conditioned stadiums (remember when FIFA said this would be the first carbon neutral World Cup lol) the ol’ 1pm games have been pretty ruthless. And that’s been reflected in what we’ve seen from those games...
Argentina 1-2 Saudi Arabia
Morocco 0-0 Croatia
Switzerland 1-0 Cameroon
Wales 0-2 Iran
Tunisia 0-1 Australia
Japan 0-1 Costa Rica
Cameroon TBD Serbia
It feels fair to say that at least four of those were significant upsets – including one of the all-time turn-ups with that Saudi Arabia win over Argentina (great game btw). Could go either way on Swiss vs Cameroon and while Morocco holding Croatia to a draw was probably not the expected result Morocco have since beaten Belgium so maybe not such a shocker in hindsight. Also if the unbearable heat is the main factor then a North African team oughta do alright compared to a European side.
Another relevant point: the All Whites would have been playing Japan in that game had they qualified. Wrote on Friday about how Costa Rica’s age and experience was their biggest asset in getting past the All Whites but then their biggest problem in getting thrashed by Spain... well it was back to being a strength again with an excellent business-first performance against the Japanese. Not sure the All Whites would have had that in their bag. It’ll probably go back to being a weakness for Costa Rica when they face Germany in the last game with the Germans needing to win to advance. That one could get up to sevens as well.
2022 Men’s National League – Golden Boot Final Standings
9 goals – Garbhan Coughlan (Cashmere Tech) & Gianni Bouzoukis (Wellington Olympic)
7 goals – Jesse Randall (Wellington Olympic)
6 goals – Oliver Colloty (Melville Utd)
5 goals – Jack-Henry Sinclair (Wellington Olympic), Eddie Wilkinson (Christchurch Utd), Emiliano Tade (Auckland City), Sam Mason-Smith (Miramar Rangers), Dane Schnell (Birkenhead Utd)
4 goals – Ryen Lawrence (Melville Utd), Luke Jorgensen (Birkenhead Utd), Nicolas Zambrano (Auckland Utd)
2022 Men’s National League – Assist King Rankings
9 assists - Jesse Randall (Wellington Olympic)
7 assists - Jack-Henry Sinclair (Wellington Olympic)
5 assists Eddie Wilkinson (Christchurch Utd)
4 assists – Joseph Lee (Auckland Utd), Kailan Gould (Wellington Olympic)
3 assists – Lyle Matthysen (Cashmere Technical), Emiliano Tade (Auckland City), Garbhan Coughlan (Cashmere Tech), Cam Howieson (Auckland Utd), Josh Galletly (Melville Utd)
2022 Men’s National League – Clean Sheets
4 clean sheets – Conor Tracey (Auckland City)
3 clean sheets – Scott Basalaj (Wellington Olympic)
2 clean sheets – Mack Waite (Auckland Utd)
Two things there... my laptop is trash and has crashed a couple times which could have burned some unsaved Natty League stats so it’s possible that the assists tallies aren’t entirely perfect. If you wanna contribute to the New Laptop Fund then Patreon will do the trick. We don’t do paywalls or subscriptions but the good faith of those readers willing to donate a small amount for what we do is what keeps this boat afloat. The goal stats are double-checked and accurate. Also the assists are kinda just up to my discretion as to what should be considered an assist so if NZF are keeping a secret tally then it’ll probably look different.
The other thing is that NZF inexplicably gave Lyle Matthysen’s goal on the weekend to Garbhan Coughlan which is why some places you look will have Coughlan on 10 goals and ahead of Bouzoukis. There was absolutely no doubt about it that Lyle Matthysen scored that goal. Check the replay. Coughlan and Bouzoukis are tied on nine.
Men’s National League – Team of the Week #9
GK – Max Tommy (Melville United) – You’ll soon see it was a tough weekend to find standouts in any of the more defensive positions, last round of the season felt kinda like last day of school before the holidays watching movies and kicking back. But Max Tommy delivered a bunch of saves as Melville made sure that despite being 2-0 down away to Auckland City with ten men and most of the second half remaining it didn’t get any worse. A lesser team with a lesser keeper might have shipped five or six.
RB – Joel Peterson (Christchurch United) – Into the line-up at wing-back for the derby against Cashmere Tech and Peterson scored twice in a wonderful attacking performance with his energy up the right edge really helping set the tone for a thrilling finale victory.
CB – Ross Haviland (Auckland United) – Scored a nice goal and held down the fort in the absence of the injured Kurtis Mogg, Captain Haviland taking his opportunity for the spotlight without his former Wellington Phoenix buddy at the back alongside him. Hav’s gambling runs forward from defence can be risky but they’re always exciting... and on this occasion got him on the scoresheet.
CB – Justin Gulley (Wellington Olympic) – Back in the team after a week off and at his usual high standards. There was one fantastic sliding block in the first half. There was also heaps of clever distribution as his right side of the field tore Miramar Rangers to shreds in the first half. Also the goal they eventually conceded didn’t happen until after Gulls had been subbed off and wrapped in cotton wool for the grand final next week.
LB – Sam Sutton (Wellington Phoenix Reserves) – On the one hand it was pretty rude that Birkenhead flew into Wellington to see an opponent stacked with A-League players. On the other hand it was thrilling to watch Sam Sutton deliver a top tier left-back showing complete with quality defending against a team that loves to attack down the wings and tireless support in attack including a very well taken goal.
CM – Matt Todd-Smith (Christchurch United) – Again, defensive midfielders were scarce this week. MTS was looking a lock for the team of the week at half-time of his match as his constant interceptions and tackles and tidy distribution led to United simply recycling attack after attack in the Cashmere Tech half. MTS then went off injured early second half which almost cost him this spot... but in the end his mahi in less than sixty minutes still outmatched what any one else got up to with ninety at their disposal.
CM – Sam Lack (Napier City Rovers) – Hell of a game from the teenaged playmaker, scoring a banger of a goal as well as setting another up late on. He was NCR’s main threat throughout with his slippery movement and cheeky creativity. Bit of a breakthrough year for the Lackster. Pretty excited to see what he gets up to down the line.
CM – Kailan Gould (Wellington Olympic) – Yeah it’s one of those weeks making room for all the attackers. Gould didn’t score in Olympic’s last game (eh, there’s always the grand final) but he got two assists and played a significant role in the other two goals. That’ll do it.
FW – Eddie Wilkinson (Christchurch United) – Mate, two goals and two assists against your biggest local rivals and without another game until next season he’s got a couple months to savour this feeling. Outrageously good yarns.
FW – Gianni Bouzoukis (Wellington Olympic) – Two more goals, taking him to nine for the season. That means that he’s tied with Garbhan Coughlan for the 2022 Golden Boot (which doesn’t include grand final goals though GB can surely take some bragging rights with a strike in that one too). He went hard in search of that tenth one too but didn’t quite get there. No worries. Another quality effort from one of the league’s very best goal scorers.
FW – Yan Sasse (Wellington Phoenix Reserves) – To be honest, if a Brazilian professional visa player for the A-League team drops down for a game with the reserves and doesn’t make the team of the week then you’ve got problems. Luckily Sasse looked a mile above everyone else with a goal and an assist as well as cracking the post a couple times. Fingers crossed this kickstarts his Phoenix career.