Warming up for the Race for 18 Centuries

As we are well aware, both Ross Taylor and Kane Williamson are poised to surpass our legend Martin Crowe.  First off I will post Martin's Eden Park records.

I missed Martin's memorial on 3rd March (2 years ago)  RIP

Martin Crowes Eden Park Records	Runs	Years	Not Out
	2	1982
	16	1984
	84	1985
	0	1986
	23	1986	1
	10	1987
	104	1987
	78	1988
	9	1988	1
	24	1990
	113	1990
	45	1992
	56	1992
	31	1993
	25	1993
	16	1995
	14	1995
Runs	650
Average	38.24

 And now Ross Taylor's last 10 innings and Eden Park records.

Player	Last 10 Innings	Not Out	Eden Park Record	Year
Ross Taylor	11		19 and 3	2013
	37		3 and 41	2014
	102	1
	40
	60
	77
	15	1
	93
	16
	107	1
Runs Total	558	3
Innings - NO	7
Average	79.71

 And now Kane Williamson (Captain Terrific)

Player	Last 10 Innings	Not Out	Eden Park Record	Year
Kane Williamson	53		91 and 1	2013
	104	1	113 and 3	2014
	2
	130
	1
	176
	42
	1
	43
	54	1
Runs Total	606	2
Innings minus NO	8
Average	75.75

Pretty much self explanatory, a neck to neck race to 18 100's.  Based on Kane's 2 high scores at Eden Park (one ton) I'm plumping for him to get there before Ross.

Kane odds (from me)  1.80
Ross 1.90

A Surprise memory from Martin Crowe. Enjoy.

The Baby Faced Assassin - Mike Hesson, NZC Coach.

While all the plaudits are going to the players and the captain, and rightfully so, one man has stood back and engineered those plaudits.  A Geek Boy to look at and listen to, Mike Hesson is far from that.  When appointed NZ Cricket coach in 2012 after the unsuccessful yet much publicised reign of NZ great John Wright, everyone was left standing aghast.  Mike Who??  The media soon stood up though when this softly spoken man announced that there were changes afoot, and one not so popular at the time.  But he had a mission.  And he was going to do it his way.  The fallout was loud, long and potentially calamitous for New Zealand cricket going forward, but he stuck to his guns, still quietly spoken, and got on with his vision.

So what has Mike Hesson achieved in two and a half years?  Sure results are on the board and now the public is back in the fold.  A team to follow and admire.  But how have those results come about?  In 2012, the cupboard was bare and there had to be changes made.  Some players just weren't performing, and key players weren't performing to potential.  Yet two and a half years downtrack, the core base of that 2012 team is still playing.  Hesson didn't go out and axe, cut and thrust, he parried.  He started getting the players to believe in their abilities and fostered improvement.  The results are a testament to that improvement.  Hesson has fashioned a record unenviable in New Zealand Cricket, and one that probably will never be matched or bettered.  Yes he is blessed to have the talent at the right time, but the talent are also blessed to have a mentor that not only believes in them, but drives them to greater things.

Below I have compiled a synopsis of core players performances from the Pre Hesson days and still performing.  Kane Williamson, Ross Taylor, Brendon McCullum, BJ Watling, Tim Southee, and Trent Boult are all core players that have been in the team for some time, so their performance indicators make interesting reading.

Kane Williamson
Career Average  45.7
Pre Hesson  32.6
Post Hesson  56.5

Ross Taylor (this is surprising giving the circumstances surrounding the captaincy loss)
Career Average  44.9
Pre Hesson  42.4
Post Hesson  51.3

Brendon McCullum (I have only counted his pre Hesson roles as higher order batsmen, not WK batsman.)
Career Average  38.7
Pre Hesson  40.9
Post Hesson  47.4

BJ Watling (only played a few games before Hesson)
Career Average  40.7
Pre Hesson  32.7
Post Hesson  46.0

Tim Southee
Career Average 31.6
Pre Hesson  42.9
Post Hesson  26.8
Pre Hesson averaged 1.5 wickets per innings. Post Hesson up to 2.2 wickets per innings.

Trent Boult
Career Average  27.1
Pre Hesson  35.4
Post Hesson  25.3
Pre Hesson averaged 1.5 wickets per innings. Post Hesson up to 2.2 wickets per innings.

The marked improvement of these core players is testament not only to the team and captain, but a coach that has come along with a plan and stuck with that plan. And the players, the administrators, and now the public are also buying into it.  The coach change in 2012 brought about a change in fortunes for NZ cricket, and long may that reign.

Tale of the Tape - Who is our best batsman in the past 12 months?

Brendon??

Or

Kane??

Brendon has scored heavily in three test innings but is this enough to topple young Kane off the averages and runs scored in a calendar year perch?

In the spreadsheet below I have tallied all test innings, all ODI innings and all T20 innings seperately to give a synopsis of how they went in all three forms.  You'd think no surprises right?  And to get a balance of how well both batsmen have progressed through the year, a match up at the end of their combined runs from all three forms and a combined average.

Intrigued to see how they fared and who is best?

The stats.

Williamson		B McCullum
Tests	NO	Tests	NO
45		37
58		12
56		224
113		1
3		8
47		302
7		7
113		17
2		4
42	1	3
161		31
3		25
23		18
32		39
11		43
192		45
		202
908		1018		Runs scored
60.53		63.63		Average
ODI's	NO	ODI's	NO
8		51
47		33
16		14
71		6
77		30
65		0
60		0
88		49	1
10		23
70	1	16
		12
512		234		Runs scored
56.89		21.27		Average
T20's	NO	T20's		NO
24	1	60		1
51		17
29		16		1
42		4
19		65
37		0
0		40
32		21
234		223		Runs scored
29.25		37.17		Average
Kane		Bmac
1654		1475		Total from 11 December 2013 to 13 December 2014
51.69		44.70		Average across all forms.

Kohli King of the ODI Batting Averages?

In this article about Virat Kohli, the writer (Shrikan Shankar) claims "There is no doubt that he is the best ODI batsman in the world at this moment."

Ok  that would be hard to argue with, except for the bit about ":at this moment.  If one was to search Cricinfo, trawl through countless ODI stats, one would arrive at a very different answer.  It's been widely reported that New Zealand is on the move, both in tests and ODI's and that they are fashioning a very capable unit in both forms.  And the figures below show that Kohli in 3 months of cricket compared to the other worldly performers is actually a distant 3rd to young Corey Anderson and behind Morgan from England on averages, and has Taylor,Williamson and Finch snapping at his heels.

Williamson	Taylor	Anderson		Kholi	Morgan	Finch
71	55	68		123	54	121
77	57	44		78	106	0
65	17	8		6	50	22
60	112	13		2	53	108
88	102	131		82	31	7
8	3	17		31
47	9	29		0
16	49			136
	9
432	413	310		458	294	258
54.00	51.63	62.00		57.25	58.8	51.6

So please folks out there in commentator world if you want to make claims, please do your homework. A New Zealander is actually the hottest property on the planet.