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Sports correspondent & historian with |
History should view the 2024 and 2025 Bay of Plenty senior representative cricket team as the most successful since their first match in 1932.
The Bay of Plenty Cricket team recorded 10 straight wins in 11 matches in the Northern Districts competition.
A review of the Bay of Plenty representative record has revealed only two teams that can nearly match the current side’s achievements.
The 1985 and 1986 Bay of Plenty representative side posted seven wins and a rained-out affair from eight encounters.
We must fast forward 30 years to understand the 2015 and 2016 Bayside teams.
They won eight matches, including taking the Hawke Cup from Hawke’s Bay, and lost only one.
It is worth recalling the 1985 and 1986 squads, where the Bay of Plenty selectors could call upon some of the best players in the country.
Lance Cairns, the late Andy Roberts, Geoff Howarth, Bruce Blair and David White all wore the New Zealand strip during their cricket career.
Include English County player John Derrick and Bay centurions Derek Beard and Mike Wright in a local cricket team that finished the season unbeaten.
Current Bay of Plenty coach Jono Boult is in his second season, having built his team with 10 recruits in his first year and three debutants in the last six months.
An example of his success in plucking players out of premier club cricket is provided by his three recruits this season.
Lake Taupō bowler Mathew Madeley was the season’s ace bowler, with 16 bowling scalps from seven encounters.
Dual Pāpāmoa representatives Nikhil Vishwanath and Kade Smit also made their mark in their Bay of Plenty debutant season.
Vishwanath hit 111 runs in five games, while Smit, who was called in with five matches remaining in the season, posted 153 runs.
At the other end of the spectrum, long-term Bay of Plenty representatives Peter Drysdale (139 games) and Bharat Popli (104) provided the glue of experience that kept the team on track.
Drysdale, who has few peers as an all-round cricket player, belted 282 runs and grabbed 13 wickets.
Master blaster Popli again showed the way with the bat, with 302 runs and his 14th Bay of Plenty century.
It could be said that coach Boult rolled the dice when he appointed 23-year-old Ollie White as season captain.
White, who had just two previous Bay matches, led from the front with his willow weapon.
The season best, of 431 runs, was capped by his highest score of 173 against Counties Manukau at the Bay Oval.
The quality of the Bay skipper was shown by his big century coming on the back of two ducks in a row.
In the future, the current squad of 26 players will take pride in winning two major Northern District titles: the Fergus Hickey Rosebowl and the Brian Dunning Trophy.
They should have had their names on the Baywide T20 prize after finishing with three wins out of three, but the trophy went to Waikato Valley due to a superior run rate.
