Oh deer, Stags take a beating

HAMISH BIDWELL
In the normal scheme of things, you expected to turn up for the first afternoon of the Hawke's Bay-Central Districts two-day match and see the Stags belting the ball to all parts of Nelson Park.
So when SportToday arrived to find Paul Pimm and Brad Patton at the crease, the first stop was to scorer Debbie Tunnicliffe's table, to find out what on earth had gone on. The Stags, New Zealand cricket's champion first-class side, had been knocked over for just 122, with Auckland import Andrew Niblett taking four for 29 for the Bay.
But, as we eluded to, this wasn't a typical situation. With Ross Taylor and Jacob Oram unavailable and Mathew Sinclair playing for the opposition, CD were light on batsmen, so much so that Ewen Thompson came in at three.
Throw in the fact that many of the players are still playing their club cricket on artificial wickets and it's no real surprise that they weren't troubling Tunnicliffe too much.
Nevertheless, Hawke's Bay coach Jim Cotterell was in bullish form when bad light stopped play 28-minutes early, with his side 91 for four in reply.
"This is a great (Hawke Cup) dress rehearsal for us and the guys bowled really well," said Cotterell.
"They got it in the right areas and kept it there all day and the batsmen have been prepared to leave it and play balls on merit. So, for us, it's been an excellent day.
"Our guys are all looking at this as an opportunity to show they can play. I think, sometimes, we suffer from being seen too much, because the (CD) heirarchy are based here, whereas other guys get picked (for CD teams) because they stand out in a poor area.
"If a guy does well against, say Wairarapa, they (the CD selectors) say 'well, it was against a poor team' or they see these guys play club cricket and say 'he keeps playing that shot or doesn't put the ball here often enough'. So when you put them up against these guys, it's apples with apples and a great opportunity for our guys."
One Hawke's Bay player trying to claw his way back into the CD reckoning is fast bowler Jeremy Kuru. Plagued by a side-strain since the end of last season, he nicked out Black Caps opener Jamie How in the first over of the match.
"I had an injury on my left side, but the right side was where the pain was," said Kuru.
"I just played rugby in the winter, because I was scared that if I did too much bowling it would go again. I came to the first training of the season (with Napier Technical Old Boys) and pulled it and felt that sharp pain in the same place and though 'oh no, not again'.
"But I'm feeling pretty good at the moment. I'm probably still only 80 percent and haven't tried to bowl too fast yet."
The match concludes this afternoon.