When Bay of Plenty captain Peter Drysdale walks out for the toss with Northland at the Bay Oval this morning in the Fergus Hickey Rosebowl two-day game, he will become just the 11th Bay player to play 50 matches for his province.
Derek Beard leads the all-time appearance list that dates back to 1932 with 105 games, followed by the only other Bay of Plenty centurion in Mike Wright with 102 appearances. Recent players to post 50 games or better for Bay of Plenty, include Jono Boult (58), Ben Williams (55) and Matthew Drake (50).
Drysdale made his debut for Bay of Plenty at the ND one-day tournament held in Taupo in 2009. Since his debut, he has scored 1763 runs with a highest score of 102, which places him seventh on the all time list of runs. He has also taken eight wickets.
Bay of Plenty are strengthened by the release of Joe Carter, Bharat Popli and Tony Goodin from the Northern Knights, to play in the first Fergus Hickey challenge of the season.
All three are genuine match winners. They all feature on the Bay of Plenty honours board. Popli owns the Bay of Plenty record of most centuries with six tons and an aggregate of 2105 runs.
