White Ferns vs England: T20 Series Debrief
New Zealand went down 1-4 to England in the T20 series and aside from a flurry of runs from Izzy Gaze in the fifth T20, the White Ferns have slumped to a new low in Aotearoa. There isn't much of an advantage playing in local conditions for White Ferns as they have lost T20 series to Pakistan and England this summer with a 2-6 record.
England are one of the best teams in the world and the series loss to Pakistan forecasted what was to come as the summer winds down. Having lost the first two games against Pakistan of their three game series, White Ferns are 0-4 across the first two games of both series. An injury to Sophie Devine didn't help matters in this series against England but the usual niggle of low energy, sloppy fielding and minimal resilience were evident through the five games.
Gaze did go bonkers though with 51* @ 182sr in the last outing. White Ferns were 69/5 when Gaze came to the crease which tells the familiar tale of a batting unit that lacks confidence and the fact that Gaze hit her best knock for international/domestic batting, while also averaging 14.8 after that knock highlights how low the baseline is for White Ferns matters.
Playing as the wicket-keeper throughout this series, Gaze continued to make the hard stuff look easy and the easy stuff look really hard. This was so blatant that even the TVNZ commentary took note of Gaze's mishaps and it takes lots of obvious errors for some commentators to slip out of cheerleader mode. Gaze is clearly a talented cricketer who has flashed her potential in her five years of domestic/international cricket, but the errors and standards set behind the stumps don't align with winning.
Not only have White Ferns used three wicket-keepers in their last three T20 series, Bernadine Bezuidenhout is now operating as a batter with 59 runs @ 14avg/105sr against England. Bezuidenhout is a 1st 11 T20 batter with a career record of 13avg/101sr which is now worse than Gaze's T20I mahi.
The biggest batting hole though is Maddy Green who had 42 runs @ 10avg/70sr. Green had elevated into a big-four role thanks to consistent performances over the past two years but she had one knock over 10 runs against England. This is a concerning return to Green's career stats in T20I cricket where she averages 16 with a strike-rate of 99, which isn't much better than Gaze or Bezuidenhout.
As expected, Leigh Kasperek didn't play in the two games she was selected for after Eden Carson didn't play in the three games she was selected for. While it is strange to select players for specific games and then not give them an opportunity in a losing team, the bigger issue here is that the ploy to lean into seam over spin didn't really work.
Lea Tahuhu, Rosemary Mair, Hannah Rowe and Jess Kerr all averaged less than a wicket per game. Rowe was the worst as she took 1w @ 10.28rpo which made her the most expensive White Ferns bowler and this flips for J-Kerr who offered an economical 6.3rpo but only took 1w in 16 overs. Mair's pace and accuracy stood out in a ho-hum bowling attack, yet she finished with 4w in 19.5ov and Tahuhu was almost a non-factor, only bowling 12ov in four games with 3w.
The home conditions thing should help these seamers. Instead, they rolled out this vs Pakistan earlier in the summer...
Hannah Rowe: 1w @ 65avg/9.2rpo
Jess Kerr: 0w @ 8.1rpo
Lea Tahuhu: 0w @ 10rpo
In New Zealand conditions, White Ferns seamers have been the worst bowlers across two series. This is a hefty issue for White Ferns right now and is amplified by overlooking spinners, even the Bates bowling hype saw her bowling 3ov in this series. Bates' 6rpo makes her the most economical White Ferns bowler in this series, but like White Ferns not selecting the best players in New Zealand, they didn't even give Bates the chance to flex her bowling.
This may apply to Fran Jonas as well. Jonas played all five games and along with Mair, they were the only White Ferns to hit 19ov bowled against England. Jonas took 3w @ 7.1rpo and she doesn't seem to spin the bowl, relying on slow in-swing to righties. She also played all three games against Pakistan with 2w @ 5.4rpo and for a player who is now consistently selected in the 1st 11, Jonas is trending in the wrong direction
2022: 13w @ 13.46avg/4rpo
2023: 3w @ 69.33avg/6.7rpo
2024: 3w @ 45.33avg/7.1rpo
Depending on your vista you may have Carson and/or Kasperek as better T20 spinners than Jonas. Aotearoa's depth in women's cricket has been a topic of conversation in recent weeks and at the same time that NZ-A defeated England A in a one-day series, there is a pesky under-performing vibe in players who have been identified as 1st 11 White Ferns.
Players like Jonas, Rowe, J-Kerr and Bezuidenhout have all enjoyed steady White Ferns security as their performances diminish. Mair was promoted after a strong domestic summer but the White Ferns environment doesn't seem to bring the best out of players, which may now be hindering Tahuhu.
T20 cricket is the most important format for White Ferns at the moment as they prepare for a T20 World Cup later this year. White Ferns won a 2022 Commonwealth Games bronze medal by beating England in England, after wins against India and South Africa to qualify for the medal round. White Ferns haven't made the semi-finals of a T20 World Cup since 2016 though and they head into a T20 World Cup phase with two series defeats in Aotearoa.
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