Domestic cricket watch

[sittingduck]

I'm taking more of an interest in the domestic cricket scene, possibly because right now NZ is rubbish and my occasional club side is even worse.

It also helps that my Auckland team is doign quite well, Andre Adams bowled superbly yesterday against Central taking 5-16 (i think) and bowling nine consecutive maidens to start with.

I wonder if he'll get another call-up to the NZ team, especially since Orams out again?

Canterbury have the most inexperienced side they've had in at least a decade and it will be intersting to see how they go while Northern and Auckland have the best sides on paper.

[Andy Mellon]

There's been some interesting play so far. Central and Canterburyare probably some way short of Northerns and Otago who are a fair distance behind Wellington who are probably going to be soundly beaten by Auckland.

Some players to look out (in addition to those selected for last year's WAT A Team) for might include leg-spin prospect Robbie Schaw and Hamish Bennett and Corey Anderson down at Canterbury. Mark Houghton has had a decent start to his debut first class campaign with Wellington whilst elsewhere the usual suspects (such as Adams, Ryder etc.) are performing. Interesting to see forgotten man Matthew Bell have a solid start to the season - though I'm sure Michael Papps will tell you how useful a good first class record is in international cricket!!

[sittingduck]

Well by the looks of it Central are WELL behind Auckland, I've been following day two of their game with Auckland and the Aces are abotu 340 runs ahead in the first innings.

It'll be interesting to see how the players cope switching between the different versions of the game once one day and 2020 games come into the calendar.

[sittingduck]

Looks like Skippy did pretty well at the death in the first one-dayer against SA. 33 off 22 or something like that. So much for the claims he bats too slow for ODIs. I must admit I was surprised to see him at number 6 in the line-up but he deserves his place far more than Gareth Hopkins.

[sittingduck]

Adams picked up 10-wickets yesterday in the match against Northern, He's been the bowler of the summer so far. What's the chance of gim getting a call-up agaisnt Bangladesh?

I'm all for it considering the level of competition we'll be facing and my dislike of Ian O'Brien's selection in the test team for SA.

If Bond's still out the bowling attack would be Martin, Gillespie, Adams, Vettori, Oram (more than enough to handle Bangladesh and giing us a team of...

Cumming, How, Fleming, Taylor, Styris, Oram, McCullum, Vettori, Adams, Gillespie, Martin.

Although the middle order could certainly be different with the likes of Skippy, Vincent and a returning Peter Fulton available.

[Aurelius]

How about Kyle Mills? I can't believe that he can't get a look-in for the Tests, while expensive bowlers like Mark Gillespie can.

Merry Christmas, all.

[sittingduck]

Test squad for the Bangladesh series is named to day,

Provincial teams have switched pyjama cricket for the next few weeks with the four-day comp to end in March.

Standings in that competition heading into the break are:

1, Auckland Aces, 18; 2, Wellington Firebirds, 16; 3 Canterbury Wizards, 10; 4, Otago Volts, 8; 5, Northern Knights, 4; 6, Central Stags, 4.