The Pink Report

Some Season Stats

When the Northern Districts cricket family gathered for its 2010/11 awards night a week ago, there was time to pause and reflect that, while neither the flagship Yahoo!Xtra Northern Knights nor the youngish, work-in-progress Northern Spirit side bagged any silverware this season, the summer still turned up some individual performances that sit right up there with the best in the country this summer.

One thing that will jump out as soon as you look at the Knights' first-class batting averages below is that the top order collectively did the bizzo - especially in the second half of the summer when the team really needed to haul back the Central Stags' early breakaway lead.

It's one of the aphorisms of cricket that seldom do you lose a four-day match when your top order powers up - likewise, seldom does the other side manoeuvre itself to a good points-haul if you shut down its top three or four batters. BLACKCAPS selector Lance Cairns watched a lot of the side's summer at home, but Brad Wilson's consistency at the top - seven 50s or better from 18 innings - will be also noted by his fellow selector Glenn Turner I'm sure, who’s a great stats-watcher. Admittedly there's often not a lot in it for the opening bowlers on our home decks, but that shouldn't detract from the calm and steady way he went about building the platforms - a great anchor for the more gregarious styles of Daniel Flynn and BJ Watling. And as for BJ and Daniel, they're right back on the threshold of test cricket themselves, surely.

It will come as no surprise that Brad and BJ's ND record opening partnership in Whangarei turned out to be the highest opening stand by any team this summer. Daniel Flynn's and BJ's 184-run partnership in Hamilton not long after was also the second-highest second wicket stand of the season (topped only by Otago's Broom brothers when they combined against us in Queenstown), while Flynny and Hamish Marshall's galloping 183-run partnership that followed was the best nationally for the fourth wicket.

That Flynny, BJ and Brad delivered five centuries between them (six, really, remembering that Daniel got fabulously greedy in Hamilton with that record double ton) was even more important in a season when the batting depth didn't seem to be quite what it had been in the past. Pete McGlashan is always exciting to watch - he seems to lift the tempo whenever he arrives at the crease and on his day that's worth good runs. Among the country's opening bowlers, Graeme Aldridge is one of the better all-round talents, backing himself to find the boundary - he had one and almost two first-class fifties this season. And Trent Boult, coming along well, can clearly hold a bat straight - he played a good nightwatchman's hand in the last home game at Hamilton, nearly cracking his maiden 50. But in between such cameos, overall there was a youngish, green shine to the late order that was exploited by the opposition teams. That was at times the price for having a more balanced attack.

Time and experience may fix those brittler points. I thought Brook Hatwell did a decent job in his debut season, often in the midst of all that late order uncertainty. A little bit older than the other newbies at 28, Brook knows his game inside out, sets himself high standards and never looked too fazed by finally getting a crack at the first-class scene - although I'm certain it meant a truckload to him. He was introduced for one away game near the end of the one-day comp and got a forty on debut when the rest of the team was in tatters. He got run out at the non-striker's in his first Plunket Shield match a couple of weeks later, which was stink luck, but dug in for a patient 71 when he got his chance in the second dig there in Whangarei. Brought back in for the horror match against Auckland at Seddon Park, Brook was absolutely kicking himself for becoming yet another one of Bruce "The Vengeance" Martin's victims there, the last to fall when only 18 more runs were required for victory - as difficult as they were to come by in that weird, low-scoring match. But he also batted nearly twice as long as anyone else in that desperate innings, and with Bradley Scott's support made us dare hope for a win. Then in the last match at Rangiora, after getting cut short by another run out in the first innings, he upped his first-class high score to 73. Good value for money. (Speaking of which, I'm not forgetting that little wager, Brookie!)

After the departure of established off-spinner Bruce Martin during the off-season and the non-availability of Daniel Vettori and Kane Williamson (on BLACKCAPS duty - Vettori didn't play a game for us all year), opportunities obviously opened up in the spin bowling department this season. The tracks didn't turn a lot at home - they were generally what I call pudgy decks north of Taupo, the groundsmen battling extended humidity this summer - so it was a big challenge ahead for the likes of Jono Boult and Jason Donnelly and valuable learning experiences for them as the season progressed. With right-armer Joe Walker doing a Daniel Vettori and being plucked straight out of school in Hamilton to join the first-class squad, the competition between the young slow bowlers for a spot will only hot up next season. Joe's already in the national under-19 squad from which the New Zealand team will be selected to go to next year's under-19 World Cup in Darwin, and he turned heads as well as the ball with his dramatic haul in Hamilton's snappy Hawke Cup victory over Marlborough.

There's not too much left to say that hasn't already been said about the core pace trio of Graeme Aldridge, Trent Boult and Brent Arnel: one is well deserving of a tap from the national selectors but hasn't had it (their loss, our gain); one probably will get that tap before too long if he continues to be well managed, stays fit and keeps going like he has been this season; and the other's been there done that. G and Trent both picked up two five-wicket bags this season, with G's 6/45 in Queenstown at the start of the summer standing out as the fourth-best performance by any bowler in a single innings this season. Unfortunately we were on the receiving end of two of the others (Bruce Martin's 7/97 in Auckland and Todd Astle's 6/28 in Whangarei), so the batters owe G a couple there.

And behind the stumps, often standing right up to the pace bowlers in his inimitably creative and brazen way, wicketkeeper Pete McGlashan had another solid summer: 26 dismissals from seven matches in the end, after having missed the pre-Christmas rounds with a broken middle finger. That was right up there with the best hauls nationally and Pete was one of only two keepers to grab six in an innings (Welly's Joe Austin-Smellie the other).

2010/11 PLUNKET SHIELD AVERAGES

BATTING

BOWLING

Trent Boult came through his season with flying colours and injury-free.