Plunket Shield returns for Black Caps
Northern Districts could boast as many as seven frontline Black Caps including captain Kane Williamson in next month’s Plunket Shield opener as the top players all return to domestic cricket.
New Black Caps coach Gary Stead, in Wellington on the final stop of his tour of the six major associations, confirmed all would be made available for the opening round starting on October 10.
It means new Northern coach John Bracewell could potentially field a dream team including Williamson, Tim Southee, Trent Boult, Colin de Grandhomme, BJ Watling, Neil Wagner and Ish Sodhi against a fresh-faced Otago at Bay Oval in Mt Maunganui.
Boult is a slight questionmark, with his and wife Gert’s first child due in October, while Watling and Wagner are scheduled to join New Zealand A for the latter part of their series against Pakistan A in the United Arab Emirates.
Stead will assemble 17 of the 20 Black Caps contracted players at Lincoln, near Christchurch, on Wednesday for a threeday camp to ramp up preparations for the Pakistan series in the UAE starting on November 1. Only England-based trio Matt Henry, Jeet Raval and Lockie Ferguson will be absent as they complete their county seasons.
Then the players who aren’t touring with NZ A for their Twenty20 opener against Pakistan A on October 12 will return to their domestic teams. Auckland should have Raval and Martin Guptill available to face Wellington at the Basin Reserve on October 10, while in Nelson, Ross Taylor and Adam Milne (Central Stags) could face Henry, Tom Latham and Henry Nicholls (Canterbury).
‘‘I think 100 per cent of the [Black Caps] who go over to the UAE will play one [shield] game, and I hope a big majority will play two,’’ Stead said.
The second round of Plunket Shield starts on October 17 and the Black Caps are scheduled to fly out a week later.
By then it will be almost seven months since New Zealand’s last match, the test series-clinching draw with England in Christchurch.
Williamson played Indian Premier League then had an NZC-restricted English county stint with Yorkshire before returning home for a September break.
Being NZC’s most valuable playing asset, captain of all three formats and central to next year’s World Cup bid, Williamson’s workload and rest periods will be closely monitored over the next six months. Stead will firm it up next week with his skipper and others.
‘‘Kane and I have discussed the concept broadly across our whole squad as to how we manage players, and look for opportunities for slightly extended rest periods and what they might have around mental and physical wellbeing leading into that World Cup.
‘‘Where you might get home for twothree nights, if we could make that sixseven nights that hopefully will help with that freshness.’’
Others to be managed and given time off during the season are Taylor, Southee, Boult (who is missing the Pakistan T20 series for paternity leave), de Grandhomme, Latham and Nicholls.
‘‘There’s 61 days of international cricket between now and the end of March, which is as big as any domestic season,’’ Stead said, as they host Sri Lanka, India and Bangladesh after returning from the UAE.