Insomniacs in the UK will be chomping at the bit in the early hours of Wednesday morning as New Zealand and Australia begin their ODI series out in Auckland.
The last time these two met on this ground it was a bit of a one day epic as Australia were skittled for just over 150 in the World Cup and New Zealand only got home nine down.
That match was a big thing for both sides. The World Cup was a huge thing for New Zealand and that match was pretty much a group decider even as early as it was played. It was a packed house and peaking for it was a big priority. You sense there is nowhere near as much importance on this particular renewal of their rivalry.
That said it is always big for New Zealand to get one over their rivals so they won’t be able to take it easy in this match. There might be two more matches to come but getting off to a fast start makes winning the series so much easier too.
A lot will have changed in the Kiwi side since that World Cup match. Tim Southee and Ross Taylor are both injured as is Mitchell McClenaghan who surprisingly didn’t feature in that match. Daniel Vettori played in that game but he has now retired. Henry Nicholls is likely to be in for Ross Taylor while Matt Henry will be Southee’s replacement.
Although this match doesn’t carry the significance of the last two times these sides have met it clearly doesn’t carry any less importance for the Australians if them sending some of their best players over to New Zealand during the India T20s counts for anything.
Like their opponents they will have a much changed side from that World Cup meeting. Gone are Michael Clarke, Brad Haddin and Mitchell Johnson. They have retired while injuries to Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins and Aaron Finch means they miss out. Shane Watson hasn’t been selected.
Shaun Marsh replaces Finch while George Bailey is back in the middle order. Matthew Wade will keep wicket and John Hastings and James Faulkner will support Josh Hazlewood in the seam department.
Eden Park is the natural venue to begin hostilities here. This is the second match here in little under a week after Pakistan finished their tour here over the weekend. They did so on a wicket which offered good turn and that could be significant going into this match.
One thing we know about this ground is it has short boundaries so runs are naturally going to come. If the ball doesn’t swing they are likely to come in huge supply too so I’m expecting another high scoring game.
I can’t be betting on the match outcome here. The ground is just impossible to defend as Pakistan found out the other night. Australia nearly defended 150 odd here in the World Cup but their seam attack is nothing like as good for this match so I would expect the side batting second to win unless the wicket continues to turn and New Zealand find a decent spinner from somewhere.
With that in mind I’m going to head to my old favourite of the sixes for a bet in this match where given what happened on Sunday I’m surprised we can get a good price on a 15 sixes line.
There were 17 here on Sunday in what wasn’t as high a scoring match as it could have been. A sign of how reachable the boundaries are here could be seen in the fact that Mohammad Hafeez and Kane Williamson registered eight maximums themselves. When you think Brendon McCullum was out first ball there is scope for plenty more here.
In their famous World Cup match here 151 played 152/9 and there were still 11 sixes that day. I’d be surprised if there isn’t a couple of hundred more runs in this match and so that should in theory yield the extra sixes we need.
Warner, Marsh, Maxwell, Mitchell Marsh, Wade, Faulkner and Hastings can all go big for Australia while Guptill, McCullum, Anderson, Elliott and Ronchi can do the same for New Zealand so everything points to there being at least 15 sixes here.
Back 15 or more sixes for a 5/10 stake at 2.00 with Sportingbet
