Woodcock century keeps him in mind
Pampling leads
ANOTHER century from veteran Wellington opener Luke Woodcock provided the major highlight on the opening day of the third round of Plunket Shield matches on Saturday.
At Auckland’s Eden Park Outer Oval, Woodcock made an unbeaten 117 against the hosts as his side reached 278-5 by stumps on a rain-interrupted day in the four-day encounter.
That followed his ton in the previous match and a 98 in the first match of the Shield season. While the 34-year-old is still seemingly behind Jeet Raval and Dean Brownlie in the pecking order for a new Black Caps opener should Martin Guptill get the chop for the upcoming two-test series against Pakistan, the left-hander’s 244-ball effort can’t have gone unnoticed.
Wicketkeeper-batsman Tom Blundell, named this week in the New Zealand A team to play Pakistan in Nelson next week, made 85 from 108 balls, featuring 12 fours and a six. He and Woodcock added 137 for the fifth wicket as they bolstered Wellington’s first innings after the hosts won the toss and inserted their opponents.
There were late starts in all three matches due to inclement weather, and unsurprisingly the bowlers had the best of the early running.
In Hamilton, Northern Districts slumped to 9-3 after Canterbury skipper Andrew Ellis won the toss and put the hosts in.
Returning Black Caps limitedovers all-rounder Corey Anderson and Daryl Mitchell played a series of bold strokes in a brief fightback, with Anderson striking five fours and two sixes in reaching 35 off 37 balls before perishing to rookie seamer Henry Shipley.
Northern’s approach didn’t change as wickets continued to tumble – 104 runs in their 138 all out in 29.5 overs came from boundaries, as Anton Devcich made 37 off 27 balls and Tim Southee 27 off 22. Kyle Jamieson led the Canterbury pacemen with 4-32 while Ed Nuttall snared 3-44.
Canterbury also found survival tough against an attack containing Southee and international leg-spinner Ish Sodhi as they were rolled for 112. Southee took 5-39 – his 13th first-class five-wicket bag – while Sodhi captured 4-39.
When stumps were drawn late, Northern’s lead had edged to 39, with nine second-innings wickets in hand.
There was a notable sixth PHOTOSPORT wicket partnership for the Otago Volts as they hosted the Central Stags at Dunedin’s University Oval.
After winning the toss and electing to bat, the hosts had limped to 101-5 – despite 40 from another experienced veteran opener in good touch, Brad Wilson.
But all-rounders Josh Finnie and Anaru Kitchen put on 182 for the sixth wicket before the 19-year-old Finnie perished just two short of a maiden first-class century after batting for 186 minutes and hitting 15 fours and two sixes from the 144 deliveries he faced.
The partnership was a record for the sixth-wicket for Otago against CD but fell 34 short of the association’s sixth-wicket record against all sides of 216 set by Hamish Rutherford and Derek de Boorder against Wellington in the 2011-12 season.
Kitchen did go past three figures – reaching the mark in style with a six – and finished the day unbowed on 124. Golf: Overnight leader Rod Pampling has a one-shot advantage after two rounds of the US PGA Tour event in Las Vegas. The 47-year-old Australian rebounded from two early bogeys for a round of three under, moving him to 14-under 128 at TPC Summerlin. He won the last of his two PGA Tour titles in 2006 at Bay Hill. ‘‘The hole looked really big yesterday,’’ Pampling said, referring his openinground 11-under 60.