Williamson's form in Australia has elevated him among the greats of New Zealand batting. Photo/ Getty Images
Williamson's form in Australia has elevated him among the greats of New Zealand batting. Photo/ Getty Images
In today's Midweek Fixture, Dylan Cleaver looks at the chances of Kane Williamson producing the greatest batting performance in a test series and the looming battle between the men's Black Sticks and High Performance Sport New Zealand.
This might be tempting fate, but I'm already contemplating where Kane Williamson's tour to Australia stacks up in the annals of brilliant New Zealand individual batting performances across a series.
For the purposes of this argument only series of three matches or more are considered, ruling out Brendon McCullum's match-winning double-century, match-saving triple-century combo against India in 2014. Also, this imaginary award will only consider those who pass three figures at least twice in the series, ruling out John R Reid in South Africa in 1961 and Martin Donnelly in England in 1949.
Heading into the inaugural day-night test, Williamson has scored 397 runs at an average of 132.33, with two centuries and a fifty. In raw aggregate and average numbers he is just above Ross Taylor but consistent scoring always trumps one monster score and a couple of failures. Williamson's return after two tests would look pretty good if it was spread out over a five-test series (don't get me started on Warner's numbers).
Let's just say Williamson plays to his career average in Adelaide and ends the series with about 500 runs at an average of 100 - where would that stand among New Zealand batsmen who have dominated series?
There are several factors you have to take into account, many of which are as much subjective as they are rooted in statistics, including the strength of the opposition, the pitch and outfield conditions, the match situation and dumb luck.
To quickly summarise Williamson's two tests to date in those categories.
1. It's not the strongest Australian bowling lineup ever, but it is pretty bloody good. Mitchell Johnson wasn't at his best but has retired as one of the greats; Mitchell Starc, injuries permitting, will end up being a great; Josh Hazlewood is highly touted; and Nathan Lyon is already regarded as one of Australia's finest finger spinners. Mitchell Marsh is an awkward fourth seamer.
2. It is an away series, so traditionally that makes it more difficult. The Gabba got slightly trickier as the match entered days four and five, but it was batsman friendly, as was Perth. The outfields provided premium value for shots.
3. Williamson was tracking down huge Australian totals in each of his first innings, scoring 140 and 166 respectively. In the second - 59 and 32 not out - he was attempting to save matches (the second dig in Perth was low-leverage in terms of match-saving requirements as it would have taken an epic collapse for New Zealand to lose).
4. It is hard to remember a chance he has offered. He had an edge fall short of first slip but that was as much a testament to his ability to play late with soft hands as it was to benign conditions. If anything, the only luck he had was bad, with his second innings lbw in Brisbane dubious.
There has been other notable performances that deserve mention.
Ross Taylor absolutely destroyed the Windies in a three-test series in New Zealand in 2013, scoring 495 runs at 247.5, including one double-century and two tons. The conditions were friendly and the bowling feeble, but this was a tour de force.
Martin Crowe's series against the Windies in 1987 was probably more meritorious, considering his runs were scored on grassy wickets against an attack that included Malcolm Marshall, Michael Holding, Joel Garner and Courtney Walsh.
Crowe scored 328 runs at 65.6 including two centuries and an 83. The next best New Zealander was John Wright, who scored 239 runs at 39.83.
His great foil at No 3, Andrew Jones, carved up an average Sri Lanka team in 1991, scoring 513 runs at 102.6 across three tests, including three centuries in a row and a 73. All the tests ended in draws, highlighting the lack of assistance for bowlers.
Glenn Turner took advantage of flat, flat Caribbean pitches and a West Indian attack in transition, scoring 672 runs across five tests in 1972, at an average of 96. He was at his run-hungry best, cashing in with two double-centuries and a 95 at Port of Spain. All five tests were draws, much to the chagrin of the locals.
Bert Sutcliffe's tour to India in 1955-56 took a lot out of the left-hander and that could be explained by his 611 runs over the five tests at 87.29, including an unbeaten century at Hyderabad and an unbeaten double at Delhi. To be honest, the bowling wasn't the strongest but tales of Sutcliffe's fortitude on this tour are legendary.
There may be others I have ignored - like Crowe's sensational one-legged tour to England in 1994 - but these are the ones that stand out for me. If Williamson scores a century in Adelaide during the third test, I'd be tempted to elevate him to the top of the tree.
Let me know who you think has put together the greatest batting series by a New Zealander. Write to me at dylan.cleaver@nzherald.co.nz.
***
South Africa's decision to forfeit its men's hockey place at the Rio Olympics might not only have provided a place for the Blacks Sticks, but also delayed an ugly stoush between High Performance Sport New Zealand and athlete advocates.
This is truly an extraordinary situation that still has the potential to boil over.
The belief is that without this late reprieve men's hockey would have had its funding slashed - it still may - and the programme would have gone into a death spiral with HPSNZ happily waving it to the bottom.
That might sound melodramatic, but that's how many in the sport view it.
Hockey players are already privately seething that they are expected to play and train like professionals with minimal support, while the only ones whose remunerative welfare seems to be taken into account are the Australian employees at Hockey NZ.
It's a tricky situation that highlights a potential flaw in HPSNZ's funding model. For this I have a certain amount of sympathy for the money men.
For years the sports media have carped about good money being thrown after bad when it comes to sports funding and even now I find it difficult to reconcile the amount that has been soaked up by swimming over the years for so little return.
We wanted bang for our buck and with most of the taxpayer dollars being funnelled into Olympic sports with medal-winning pedigree and potential like rowing, cycling and sailing, we've gained a reputation as a nation that can turn a little into a lot.
Team sports are mightily expensive to fund. Hockey requires squads of at least 15 and support staff to boot. And at the end of the Olympics the most medals hockey can bring back is two - and even that is a far-fetched scenario if you consider that New Zealand has won a single Olympic hockey medal, in 1976.
But this is where you get into trouble if you are too locked into a dogmatic approach to funding. Some 70,000 people play hockey in New Zealand. It might be a minority sport, but in participation terms it is a popular one. The strength of the sport is not concentrated in a couple of big cities. There are vibrant hockey scenes in provincial outposts like Northland, Manawatu, Buller, Taranaki and Hawkes Bay.
There are a number of pinnacle tournaments and New Zealand has shown itself to be capable of hosting events, which bring in overseas money and visitors.
And we were prepared to chuck away any future chance to be competitive in one half of hockey's catchment - the men - because they lost a lottery-like penalty shootout to Canada in a game they otherwise dominated? Something does not compute and believe me, it's not just hockey folk who think there's something discomfiting about such fickle doomsday scenarios.
Not all of this should be sheeted to HPSNZ, not by a long shot. Hockey is in a good space globally, with a number of televised tournaments and burgeoning professional leagues in the Netherlands and India. The FIH, which governs international hockey, needs to do a far better job of distributing wealth around the globe.
If they did that, it could underpin any commercial programme Hockey NZ might try to drive.
Under that scenario, HPSNZ would become a topping-up mechanism, rather than a principal funder with the ability to play God over a programme's success or failure.
That's going to happen overnight, however. Until such a day the sport and the Government sports funding agency are set on a collision course.
New Zealand's sole hockey medal at an Olympics was gold and it involved one of the most courageous acts in our sporting history. Watch here as inadequately protected keeper Trevor Manning gets smashed on the knee. It takes him a while to get back up and when he does he pulls off another save. At the conclusion of the game it was discovered he had shattered his kneecap.
(As an aside, the player hitting out Australia's corners was Ric Charlesworth, who would later become a shortlived appointee of New Zealand Cricket, when he came in as a change agent to lead the high-performance programme. It didn't work out.)
Played my first organised cricket game on Monday night in, I'm guessing, about 10 years. Part of the magic of T20 is it has allowed never-weres like myself to re-engage with the sport we love without the threat of divorce papers. As it was our Mairangi Vice were no match for the Bay City Bowlers and it feels like somebody has stabbed me in the shoulder blade, but aside from that it was marvellous.
I'm selling ... Formula One
This might just be me, probably is, but as a casual fan I cannot remember a less interesting season. Is it still going? Compared to MotoGP, it's a snoozefest.
I'M READING ...
Read this, if only for the imagery you can conjure up of a beatnik Richie McCaw. I have one in my mind of him wearing a kaftan and smoking a hookah while listening to the Grateful Dead.
If this exercise has proved anything, it's that conservative steady-as-you-go betting is a mug's game. With time running out to the end of the year, I have to abandon the $1.30-$1.80-type bets and get a little more radical to try to recoup my money.
Last week: Happiness insurance. Manchester City to beat Liverpool at $1.60. Pretty happy with this loss of $10. What was that score again, Raheem?
This week: They have the worst name in New Zealand Football but WaiBOP United are the surprise package in this year's ASB Premiership. They thrashed four-time champions Waitakere United 5-1 last week on a truly awful North Harbour Stadium pitch and tomorrow night (Thursday) should dismantle Hawkes Bay United on a much smoother wicket. The TAB have their numbers back to front on this one so $10 on a WaiBOP win @$3.30 is a steal. (NB. These odds shortened considerably).
