Cricket: Season of the flashing willow

Black Cap Tim Southee takes the bowling honours so far. His eight for 27 off 25 overs for ND against Wellington was outstanding. Photo / Getty Images

More than halfway through the domestic first-class competition and certain pre-conceived notions have been hit for six.

Like the one which says that pitches are minefields in the opening weeks of the season.

A glance at the number of centuries scored so far in the Plunket Shield tells a different story.

Certainly there have been sub-100 totals put up - Otago's 88 at University Oval in Dunedin against Northern Districts in round one and Central Districts' 94 also against ND at Whangarei a few days later being cases in point.

But generally it's been harvest time for batsmen good enough to take their opportunities.

We'll come to them later, but first the bowlers.

Best figures of the shield so far? Test swing bowler Tim Southee, whose eight for 27 off 25 overs for ND against Wellington was outstanding.

Indeed, ND have the best selection of fast-medium operators in the competition, so perhaps no surprise they are six points clear on the table.

One week, they had Graeme Aldridge and Trent Boult slicing through CD; in the next round it was Southee and the consistently impressive Brent Arnel chomping through Wellington.

Arnel has 20 wickets at 15.0 apiece; Aldridge 20 at 19.05; CD's Michael Mason (21 at 23.71) and leading wicket-taker Ewen Thompson (22 at 26.04) have similarly done sterling work with the new ball for their side.

There have been come-from-behind wins, spectacular chases, and even a match featuring two forfeits, which drew the ire of rivals.

Auckland and ND rubbed out one innings each and ND won the contrived ending by dismissing Auckland 55 runs shy of the target.

It was unfortunate, but would you rather spend a day dozing off while one side got batting practice or make something of a bad situation?

And would CD and Wellington, who have been most vocal, have done the same if put in that situation? And what if Auckland - sitting at the foot of the table - had won, not the leaders?

Would there have been the same fuss? What do you think.

And so to the batsmen.

It's been party time for the willow-wielders, the most prolific of whom has been Otago's one-day international Neil Broom with three centuries, in successive matches. One of them, against CD in round three, was part of a 306-run stand with Shaun Haig for the third wicket, an Otago record; another, 152 not out, steered Otago to a more-comfortable-than-anticipated win over a depleted Auckland bowling attack.

Canterbury's classy South African Johan Myburgh has a couple, so too CD's opener Peter Ingram, whom we'll come to in a moment.

However two centuries which should be noted by the national selectors with an eye on the future were by openers Josh Brodie for Wellington against Auckland in his second first-class game, and Auckland's lefthander Jeet Raval, who spent 4 hours over 134 against Otago.

Brodie has been warmly spoken of; Raval announced himself with 256 in his second first-class game against CD late last season.

But the event of the shield so far, by a distance, was the first-wicket record 428 by Ingram and Jamie How for CD against Wellington this week.

They cleared the 37-year-old hurdle of Glenn Turner and Terry Jarvis (387 against the West Indies in Guyana) in setting up a stunning nine-wicket win. They were 22 short of the New Zealand record for any wicket, by Martin Crowe and Andrew Jones against Sri Lanka on the same ground 18 years ago.

Wellington held a 235-run first innings lead. How do you lose from there? Ingram and How were just too good and while How has had plenty of test opportunities - and might yet come again - Ingram is still waiting.

Cricket has its philosophical souls, who accept the rough and smooth with equal facility. It also has those who feel keenly the whiff of unfair treatment. Ingram apparently fits more easily into the latter category.

He's 31, has scored 2682 runs in the last 3 domestic championships - in 27 matches, and at an average of 58.3.

The selectors must be aware of that.

The shield resumes on February 25, with ND on top with 26 points.

Canterbury, courtesy of their eight-point haul against ND this week, are up to second on 20.

Otago have 18, CD and Wellington 16, and Auckland, the defending champions, are gone from the race, on 0.