Gray matters Canterbury tales . . .
Psssst, have you heard the Black Caps’ latest idea for their one-dayers with the Windies? Not the one about the invitationonly Christmas Eve party in the interval between their two games at Hagley Park, held at an isolated farmhouse on the Canterbury Plains where umpires, cameras and blabber-mouth guests will be banned from festivities.
If they really get into it, Chris Gayle might be missing longer than he was after a brief visit to the crease in Whangarei.
That disappearance prompted New Zealand to come up with another idea for the doubleheader in Christchurch and they’ve already notified the ICC and bookies around the globe about their intentions: get Ben Stokes to fill in for the Windies. After all, he’s only restricted from playing on the Ashes tour.
Marginally more seriously, though, over at the Kiwi camp, they were nutting out a side without captain Kane Williamson and Tim Southee who were excused from the Hagley hit-outs and all-rounder Colin de Grandhomme who is on bereavement leave.
As the Kiwi brains trust mulled over tactics and combinations with new skipper and local hero Tom Latham the idea tugged at them like a heavy trout from the Waimakariri. Let’s test ourselves even more, let’s see how we handle an extra bit of pressure because the Windies haven’t applied much of that so far.
All the Cantabs, Latham, Henry Nicholls. Matt Henry and Todd Astle would start, and with Adam Milne who missed out in Whangarei they had 10 of the original group to play tomorrow. There was a full bowling lineup and squad replacements Mitchell Santner and Neil Broom could watch from the balcony.
There were discussions about the integrity of the game before others pointed out that innovation was the light sabre for the future. If it was good enough to play test cricket under lights against the Poms with a pink ball at an Eden Park venue more suited for zip-lining and rock concerts, playing a man short in limited overs cricket was trivial.
History suggested New Zealand regularly dabbled with restricted contributions in their teams so playing a man short wasn’t a unique approach. There was one last hurdle though.
The group hit the speed dial button for the ICC and got a response in even quicker time. It’s the fastest the ICC has ever reacted. The idea was rejected because a full council meeting needed to hear the arguments and all the delegates were on Father Christmas duty this weekend.
“We tried”, the Kiwis said as they drew up Plan B on the whiteboard around ideas to play better than they did at Cobham Oval.
The bowling and fielding was solid with a good return for Doug Bracewell, nice start from Todd Astle and strong pace from Lockie Ferguson in a number of spells. The run chase was efficient too and more of that batting at Hagley was required.
Now for the 12th man: Broom or Santner.