Blackcaps vs Australia First Test Preview
The Blackcaps will defend their top spot in the World Test Championship with the Test series against Australia starting on Thursday at the Basin Reserve. Aotearoa is joined by India in stacking up three consecutive wins and while there is plenty of nuance in assessing WTC rankings, New Zealand is first and the series against Australia will obviously be crucial in sorting out the WTC ladder.
Australia is third, behind India. Australia is pretty damn good at cricket and while the T20 series doesn't have much crossover to the Test series, the Aussies did showcase their typically dominant mahi that kiwis know so well. All the Blackcaps WTC stats are the same from this debrief of the Test series win over South Africa.
Below are Blackcaps stats at the Basin Reserve for the lads who have played there before. The Wellington flavour offers hopeful balance to the Devon Conway and Tom Blundell slumps as they will be playing at their home ground. These two also have decent records in Wellington along with Tom Latham who like Conway and Blundell, doesn't have a 50+ score in four games of this WTC cycle.
Blackcaps at Basin Reserve
Batting
Kane Williamson: 1,488 runs @ 74avg
Tom Latham: 835 runs @ 49avg
Tom Blundell: 298 runs @ 74avg
Devon Conway: 139 runs @ 46avg
Daryl Mitchell: 126 runs@ 31avg
Will Young: 53 runs @ 17avg
Bowling
Tim Southee: 59w @ 31avg/3.1rpo
Neil Wagner: 45w @ 29avg/3.7rpo
Matt Henry: 15w @ 32avg/3.1rpo
Mitchell Santner: 3w @ 41avg/2.4rpo
While the T20 series was being played, Latham and Will O'Rourke won the Ford Trophy with Canterbury. Latham scored 64 run in the final and as he had a knock of 58* in the Super Smash final, Latham's last two domestic innings are 50+ scores in white ball cricket. This can be stretched further with four 50+ scores in his last five domestic games and as he scored 20+ runs in three of his four innings against South Africa, Latham has at the very least planted run-scoring seeds.
O'Rourke bowled 10 overs @ 4rpo in the Ford Trophy final without a wicket. Not ideal but it didn't impact O'Rourke's slick mahi in Ford Trophy as he finished with 13w @ 20avg/4.3rpo. While not quite in the Zak Foulkes zone (averaging below 23 in all three domestic formats), O'Rourke sits below 25.5avg and this includes exceptional performances for NZ-A against their Aussie equivalents last year.
Scott Kuggeleijn is in the squad after he shared the best bowler salutes with O'Rourke from the two NZ-A tours (one in NZ, one in Australia) last year. Along with his mahi for NZ-A, Kuggeleijn is the leading wicket-taker in Plunket Shield which will return for the second stanza on Thursday.
FC vs Australia A in NZ
Scott Kuggeleijn: 9w @ 28avg/3.7rpo - 1st
Will O'Rourke: 4w @ 34avg/4.3rpo - 3rd
FC vs Australia A in Australia
Scott Kuggeleijn: 13w @ 17avg/3.7rpo - 1st
LA vs Australia A in Australia
Will O'Rourke: 7w @ 10avg/3.8rpo - 1st
Scott Kuggeleijn: 3w @ 26avg/5.2rpo - 3rd
2023/24 Plunket Shield
Scott Kuggeleijn: 22w @ 16avg/2.9rpo - 1st
Will O'Rourke: 9w @ 18avg/2.3rpo - 17th
Will Young is ready to step in if Conway is unable to play after his injury in the T20 series. The rest of the 1st 11 intrigue revolves around the balance of the bowling attack as New Zealand can roll with four seamers while relying on Glenn Phillips and Rachin Ravindra for spin overs, or inject Mitchell Santner into the team. There is also a super funky option of leaving Phillips out to select Santner with the four seamers, which would weaken the batting a wee bit.
Last summer's win over England had Michael Bracewell alongside Southee, Henry and Wagner. Daryl Mitchell bowled a few overs in the first innings but the epic victory came with Aotearoa using just four bowlers in the second innings, all of whom bowled 15+ overs.
Matters could be complicated by the Basin Reserve where batting seems easier than bowling. Wellington is where Williamson, Latham, Luteru Taylor, Martin Crowe, Henry Nicholls, Lou Vincent, Mathew Sinclair have double hundys as well as Brendon McCullum's triple banger. Along with big individual knocks and Daniel Vettori averaging 29 in 32 innings, all the batting stats are pretty good for kiwis at the Basin.
Bowling stats aren't as good, aside from Sir Richard Hadlee (20avg), Jacob Oram (16avg) and Kyle Jamieson (14avg). As noted above, the current Blackcaps are all hovering around 30 and spinners haven't been very effective as Vettori and Santner average 41 in rather different sample sizes. Ajaz Patel doesn't have a wicket in his two Tests at the Basin, while Michael Bracewell and Mark Craig average 37 in their two Tests in Wellington.
All of which could suggest that variety, options and skill will be important for New Zealand. This may boost the selection case for Santner and O'Rourke to feature together in the bowling attack. Beating Australia will require seam and swing, so the pitch may skew in that direction. No matter how green it looks prior to a Test though, the Basin Reserve deck tends to favour batters and a key challenge for Aotearoa will be taking 20 wickets against a grizzly Australian batting unit.
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