Cricket: This could be Auckland's season

Gareth Hopkins. Photo / Paul Estcourt

Auckland's talents at the shorter forms of the game are offering the thought that this could be a season to savour.

With three domestic titles on offer, Auckland have already won the HRV Cup for T20 and sit top coming to the halfway point of the national one-day competition.

Only the first-class title, the Plunket Shield, looks beyond them, after a poor start, which has them sitting joint bottom on two points along with perennial tailenders Wellington.

Auckland head south to play Otago at Oamaru's Centennial Park in the fifth round tomorrow, two points clear of three teams at the top of the ladder. Their latest win, by 40 runs over Central Districts this week, again demonstrated the point that they are getting important contributions from a range of sources.

Captain Gareth Hopkins and opener Lou Vincent have hit centuries, while allrounder Colin Munro's middle order contributions in both short forms of the game have been significant this summer.

Against CD, Auckland were looking ropey at 135 for six, only to get important thirties from bowlers Daryl Tuffey and Ronnie Hira. That lifted them to 279 and gave the bowlers plenty to work with.

"We dug ourselves a bit of a hole really so it was nice to see the guys down the order respond to that challenge and put runs on the board when we really needed them," said coach Paul Strang yesterday.

Hopkins and Vincent have scored 199 and 198 runs at 49.75 and 66 respectively, and are fourth and fifth on aggregate; opener Jeet Raval is averaging 37.5 and Munro 48.33.

Left armer Michael Bates is again to the forefront in the bowling, with nine wickets at 24 apiece, while Andre Adams and Tuffey have taken seven apiece.

Tuffey sits this game out, with offspinner Bhupinder Singh returning to the 12.

Northern Districts welcome back internationals Kane Williamson and Brent Arnel for their game against Canterbury at Whangarei's Cobham Oval. They've lost Scott Styris to the ODI squad, while in-form lefthander Daniel Flynn is injured and out of at least this weekend's match. That's a worry for ND, as those two have been their most successful batsmen in the competition thus far.

Former international batsman BJ Watling is back after recovering from a back strain. Veteran Michael Parlane drops out of the squad.

In the other game, Wellington host CD. Wellington will have World Cup-bound spinner Luke Woodcock for the game, as he's one of three cup squad members sitting out the first two ODIs, along with Williamson and Auckland's Kyle Mills.

They share bottom spot on the table. The loser will be well off the pace but not necessarily out of semifinal contention.

Four teams advance to the semifinals early next month.

Points after four rounds: Auckland 12, Canterbury, ND and Otago all 10, Wellington and CD 4.

National one day competition

Fifth round, all start 11am tomorrow

Otago v Auckland, Oamaru

Otago (possible): Craig Cumming (c), Aaron Redmond, Michael Bracewell, Neil Broom, Darren Broom, Derek de Boorder, Darren Stevens, Ian Butler, Nick Beard, Craig Smith, James McMillan, Warren McSkimming.

Auckland: Gareth Hopkins (c), Jeet Raval, Lou Vincent, Greg Todd, Anaru Kitchen, Colin de Grandhomme, Colin Munro, Kyle Mills, Andre Adams, Ronnie Hira, Michael Bates, Bhupinder Singh.

ND v Canterbury, Whangarei.

ND: James Marshall (c), Brad Wilson, BJ Watling, Anton Devcich, Kane Williamson, Peter McGlashan, Joseph Yovich, Peter McGlashan, Bradley Scott, Trent Boult, Brent Arnel, Graeme Aldridge.

Canterbury: Peter Fulton (c), Michael Papps, Rob Nicol, Shanan Stewart, Dean Brownlie, Reece Young, Andrew Ellis, Carl Frauenstein, Todd Astle, Ryan McCone, Mitchell Claydon, Marty Kain.

Wellington v Central Districts, Wellington.

Wellington (possible): Grant Elliott (c), Stewart Rhodes, Mark Calkin, Josh Brodie, Neal Parlane, Luke Woodcock, Harry Boam, Joe Austin-Smellie, Jeetan Patel, Andy McKay, Mark Gillespie.

CD: Kruger van Wyk (c), Peter Ingram, George Worker, Mathew Sinclair, Brad Patton, Tim Weston, Kieran Noema-Barnett, Doug Bracewell, Tarun Nethula, Adam Milne, Michael Mason, Mitchell McClenaghan.