The Pink Report

Electric Knights In Oamaru

Twenty20 is supposedly a batsman’s game where bowlers just can’t win, but in discharging the Volts by nine wickets, the Yahoo!Xtra Northern Knights showed the value of tight line and length even in this amped-up form of the game.

Everything should have been in the Volts’ favour when they batted first at Oamaru. Home ground, short boundaries and they even turned on a mean local southerly to freeze up the bowlers’ muscles and fielders’ fingers. But the Knights creamed them with old-fashioned, no-nonsense accuracy, backed up by their customary sharp fielding.

The Otago batsmen, meanwhile, threw caution to that unsporting southerly, playing Kamikaze cricket compounded by some kooky dismissals - none more so than when Craig Cumming’s front spikes seemed to get jammed in the pitch as he attempted to play forward. The problem for him was not that he got off-balance, but that Graeme Aldridge was, as usual, right on target to clip the top of the stumps.

To my mind it was the pivotal, if freakishly unlucky, dismissal: it meant it took the Volts three-quarters of the innings to get going. But my favourite kooky dismissal was Aldridge’s second strike, the wicket of Neil Broom. I’m sure if Neil practised late-cutting the ball straight into the heart of his stumps a hundred times, he wouldn’t manage to hit them once. And what about Joseph Yovich’s timely double-strike, sorting out the overseas pros in two balls, and that sizzling run-out throw from David Warner?

The Volts’ smallish total (132) gave Brad Hodge the luxury of taking his time against the better bowling and getting a good look at the attack, defusing any advantage they might have held as a pack of unfamiliar bowlers. I thought he gave a great lesson in how to take control of a run chase, although a few punters around the country might not have enjoyed his one-handed six quite so much: his solid batting partner Brad Wilson was paying $9 at the TAB to top-score and up until then it was looking like a happy pay-day.

So the Knights bound up to the top of the HRV Cup points table, at least until a couple of other teams catch up after playing their third round match, too. More importantly, the scale of their back-to-back demolition wins has sorted out the net run rate issue that arose from their collapse against the Stags. Going into the Oamaru game it was still an unhealthy -0.343; now it’s in positive territory at 0.831. If they can deliver another dominant performance against Wellington on Sunday, they’ll be nicely placed early in competition proceedings.

Which, by the way, won’t be the only domestic cricket action unfolding this weekend. The Northern Spirit get their season underway this Friday at home at Seddon Park with their opening Action Cricket Twenty20 match against the Wellington Blaze. That’s followed by their opening Action Cricket Cup one-day match against the same team on Saturday, then a second Twenty20 encounter against the Blaze on Sunday; all at Seddon Park. Admission is free so if you’re in The Tron, pop down to support the girls and check out why two of them - the stellar Nic Browne and Natalie Dodd - were named in the White Ferns Rose Bowl squad earlier this week; they’ll be taking on Australia later this month at the same venue as the curtainraiser to the BLACKCAPS’ Twenty20 international against Pakistan.

One more note before I go make myself a cup of tea. Good luck from me and all the team at Northern Districts to supremely loyal Knights supporter Jason Uden. Jason is fronting up in the tough Taupo half-ironman this Saturday, a nice wee morning workout consisting of a two-kilometre swim, 90km bike ride and 21.1km run. A farmer and a dad, Jason started training this year for his first ever ironman triathlon to help raise funds and awareness for autism, a condition which affects his young son Cam. Northern Knight Bradley Scott has in turn been supporting Jase, and ran the Huntly half alongside him. I recommend a read of his very entertaining blog entries at http://ironmanforcam.blogspot.com.