Celebrating a unique summer of supremacy
Dylan Cleaver reflects on Black Caps’ remarkable seven series wins
The end of the start happened on November 27, 2020, when Mitchell Santner launched Kieron Pollard into the stands at Eden Park to win a rain-truncated Twenty20.
The end of the end happened 125 nights later, late on Maundy Thursday, when Nasum Ahmed sliced Glenn Phillips to Tim Southee as New Zealand won a rain-truncated Twenty20 at Eden Park.
In between, some stuff happened.
We must resist the temptation to reach for the thesaurus to search for new ways to say the same thing, but what New Zealand have done this summer has been unprecedented, unparalleled, singular and unmatched.
If you think that’s an exaggeration, overstatement, hyperbole, embellishment or overkill, think again.
Seven series played, seven series won. Twenty-one matches played, 17 wins, three losses and one no result.
Four tests played, four wins and qualification for the inaugural World Test Championship final secured.
New Zealanders scored 10 centuries this summer, two of them doubles, while only Jermaine Blackwood and Fawad Alam reached three figures against.
Important numbers, all of them, but the one that paints a complete picture of the Black Caps’ dominance is this: across all formats, they have amassed 5357 runs for 119 wickets, the rest have mustered 4435 for 202.
Even with the bulk of the matches being T20s, they’re averaging 45 for every partnership, while taking a wicket every 22 runs scored against them. If this was softball, you’d apply the mercy rule.
The team’s dominance has been so complete that a couple of historically bizarre narratives emerged. One was that New Zealand were doing ho-hum New Zealand things against ho-hum teams in ho-hum conditions. The other was that the Black Caps didn’t “deserve” to qualify for the WTC final.
To address the first, it is enough to say the very idea that New Zealand is expected to smash allcomers on home turf shows just how far they’ve come in a relatively short time.
This is a team that have won less than a quarter of its 446 tests, yet sweeping a test summer against Pakistan, a team that before the tour led the head-to-head 25-12 overall and 10-7 in this country, is considered par for the course.
While the West Indies result was more predictable, New Zealand lead that head-to-head 17-13 only by virtue of winning eight of the past nine tests between them.
It should be remembered New Zealand had the worst of the batting conditions in three of the four tests, while the fourth at Bay Oval was probably a toss-up.
As for the WTC qualification, the entire process was a quirk. Don’t take my word for it, a number of credible online sources indicate the world has been rocked for much of the past 14 months by a So just embrace it. thesauric answer: this was a summer
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global pandemic. ost of the above can be of profound dominance,
Did New Zealand benefit from worked out on a calculator. supremacy, ascendancy and authority. rejigged scheduling more than While cricket tragics have a deep most? Not really. After getting and abiding respect for numbers, Kyle Jamieson’s emergence as a their clocks cleaned 0-3 in Australia, they speak little to the romance of world-class performer was one of they had to do a lot of things the game. the major talking points, as was the right — which they did, including Cricket has an element of decision by the brains trust of the beating India 2-0 — and rely on maths, yes, and history, but at its Royal Challengers Bangalore to Australia doing a lot of things best, there’s also a lot of English. turn him into a very wealthy young wrong — which they did, including Cricket is a collection of short man. As if by some universal losing to a second-string Indian stories and characters. decree, the cricketing gods chose team 1-2 at home and losing points Each century is a drama — and that time to send Australia here for for tardy over rates. Henry Nicholls’ century at the a T20 series to remind everybody
If anything, New Zealand could Basin Reserve had drama while the that Jamieson is brilliant but not have felt aggrieved if they didn’t Windies provided farce — and each infallible. make it because a 1-0 series win wicket a plot twist. He’s going to be against England weirdly didn’t It doesn’t matter if you view this though.
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count even though it took place season through a maths, history or any others outside of the during the qualification window. English lens, it leads to the same summer’s main stars made just fine, their marks, from Lockie Ferguson him . . . Looking back, we made it blitzing the West Indies in harder for him than we needed to,” a T20 at Eden Park with a five-for Southee once confessed. “He’s such delivered at extreme pace, to Martin a good bastard; he’d do anything Guptill rekindling his form with for you.” a sensational 97 in the second T20 But Wagner doesn’t get the new against Australia. ball, no matter what a good bastard
Finn Allen was clean bowled to he is. Jamieson doesn’t either, no the first ball he faced in international matter how spectacular his performances cricket, then reverse swept a are. Yet there in Christchurch, four to get off the mark in the after just three overs, second. Todd Astle got one chance Boult could see they had another — and only went and took 4-13 in a Kookaburra ball that was refusing 10-over match. There were to swing, so reportedly told Kane glimpses of Will Young’s talent, Williamson to get Jamieson on for Jimmy Neesham’s final over a couple before stumps. Jamieson against Australia in Dunedin was obliged and took a wicket. New ballsy, and Trent Boult’s performance Zealand won the following day. across that series reminded It’s a tiny yarn to which perhaps everyone of his class. more meaning has been attached
But there’s another Boult story than is necessary. It was one of 202 that tickled this fancy more than wickets taken across this season, many of the “big” moments of the after all. But there’s something summer. It’s not the sort of thing about it that speaks to a team that that usually wins headlines and it knows small sacrifices can lead to didn’t even come from the horse’s big things.
(small) mouth, but was just tossed
M out as uch tougher tasks lie in wait. an aside during a mundane postday International cricket has press conference during New skewed wildly towards home advantage. Zealand’s win against Pakistan in New Zealand were the second test at Hagley Oval. fortunate to be able to host tours
It went like this: Late on day and play sport in front of crowds. three, Pakistan were batting for a (Interestingly and probably not second time, a massive 362 runs coincidentally, two of the three behind New Zealand, who had just games they lost this summer were racked up an abacus-busting 659-6 in empty stadiums when Auckland declared. moved back to Level 3 during the
There were 11 overs left in the Australian series.) day. That’s Southee and Boult England at home will be tough, time. Although cricket has moved particularly if the Indian Premier on what from its selfish, look-afteryour-own-game League affects the availability of days, fast bowling some of the best Black Caps. Then is the one remaining A-type, territorial there’s the WTC final on neutral corner of the dressing room. ground against the best team in the Southee and Boult are the kings of world. that corner. In the past, it has Falling short would hurt New taken time for them to warm to Zealand. It might even cause some new members. to reclassify this summer as something
“[Neil Wagner] didn’t quite gel less than it was. That would straight away. It took time — he be a mistake, an error and a broke us down. We got to know miscalculation.