Cricket: Nevin poised to raise century

Chris Nevin will play his 100th game for Wellington against Canterbury tomorrow. Photo / Getty Images

Former New Zealand wicketkeeper Chris Nevin will play his 100th match for Wellington in their Plunket Shield season opener against Canterbury, starting in Wellington tomorrow.

Nevin said he was proud to be in the same company as Wellington's three other centurions - Evan Gray (120), Robert Vance (119) and Ervin McSweeney (102).

" They are all big names in Wellington cricket, so to be up there having played a similar number of games to three of the legends is a great feeling," Nevin said.

"I've got my family coming up from Christchurch to watch the game and I'm really looking forward to it."

Nevin, who made his Wellington debut in a domestic one-day match at the Basin Reserve on New Year's Day in 1996, has fond memories of his maiden first-class match a few weeks later against Northern Districts.

"We played very good cricket for three days and we set them about 440 to win on a wearing Basin wicket and they chased it down on the last day. So it was an incredible game of cricket and certainly a very exciting start to my career."

Another match that sticks out in his mind was a similar game that Wellington won against Canterbury in 2000/01.

"We got a good first innings total and then took a long time to bowl them out. In the second innings we batted for about 25 overs, declared and then won with about three or four overs to spare," he said.

"That was an amazing game of cricket and one that sort of summed up that whole (Championship winning) season. We were just so determined to win that it didn't matter whether it was the last ball of the game or the first we were in the contest the whole time."

Nevin has scored 4579 runs for Wellington at an average of 36.05 and has claimed 271 dismissals.

In another possible milestone, captain Matthew Bell is 264 runs shy of overtaking both Bruce Edgar and Robert Vance and becoming Wellington's leading domestic first-class run-scorer.

Bell has compiled 6230 runs.

Wellington
Matthew Bell (captain), Harry Boam, Dewayne Bowden, Josh Brodie, Grant Elliott, Andy McKay, Cameron Merchant, Chris Nevin, Neal Parlane, Iain O'Brien, Jeetan Patel, Robbie Schaw, Luke Woodcock

- NZPA