Manawatu players add fire to indoor squad
Manawatu players Navin Patel and Rob Sheary are part of an experienced New Zealand indoor cricket World Cup squad heading to Dubai in September.
It will be the fourth world cup for Palmerston all-rounder and former Manawatu rep Sheary, who went to England in 2007, South Africa in 2011, both with the New Zealand team, then in 2014 he wasn’t picked for the senior side due to injury, but ended up captaining the invitational A side.
He missed out on the 2009 world cup while he was playing club cricket in England.
Central Districts pace bowler Patel was in the same team as Sheary three years ago.
‘‘I played a world cup in 2014 with the New Zealand A side and then I made my debut for the top New Zealand team in the transtasman last year in Australia, in Port Macquarie,’’ Patel said.
‘‘We lost that series 3-2, the first time a New Zealand side has taken a couple of games off the Aussies. That put us in good stead for the world cup this year with more belief that we can take them down.’’
The rest of the team is experienced too. Nick Ward went in 2009, 2011 and 2014, and Matt Henderson started before Sheary, having gone to the Sri Lanka tournament in 2004.
Patel and Sheary, who has just moved to Lower Hutt to run the Smith City store, also make up what is a strong bowling lineup.
In the squad is former New Zealand all-rounder Jesse Ryder and former New Zealand all-rounder Andre Adams is their bowling consultant.
‘‘There’s some very good players in that crew,’’ Sheary said. ‘‘There’s a lot of first-class players, we haven’t had that many before.
‘‘There’s an incredible amount of heat from our bowlers.’’
There has been a couple of changes to the original team, with the experienced pair of Scott Davies and Michael Dodunski replacing Michael Barry and Finn Allen.
Barry has been signed with the Auckland outdoor team so is committed to that and Allen is believed to have to see out his contract playing club cricket in England, then come home and train with the New Zealand under-19 squad.
Davies has been to world cups in 2007, 2009 and 2014, while it will be the second for Dodunski, who went in 2014.
There are eight nations going to the tournament, likely to be Australia, South Africa, England, UAE, Singapore and a team from the sub continent.
Palmerston North’s Corey Perrett is in the New Zealand under-22 team, as is Toddy Watson from Napier.
Now Patel has graduated he has just returned from holiday in England and is now doing actuarial work for Deloitte in Wellington, who should be flexible around his cricket commitments during summer.
Patel still plans to play club cricket for Marist, but he is yet to hear if he will get one of the final two spots on the CD contract list, which is announced at the end of the month.