Najmul Hossain Shanto and Tom Latham will do battle to begin the home summer. Photo / Photosport
Najmul Hossain Shanto and Tom Latham will do battle to begin the home summer. Photo / Photosport
OPINION
It’s hardly a marketer’s dream. An understrength team beginning an inconsequential three-match series against Bangladesh - who last month finished the World Cup with two wins - on a rainy day in Dunedin.
The Black Caps’ start to summer won’t brighten many moods, but Kiwi cricket fansare now well accustomed to this period being less festive than they hope.
This will be the fourth straight year when the cricket on offer persuades few to cut short a trip to the beach, a combination of unavailable players, unappealing opposition and uninspiring stakes causing more apathy than excitement.
And there is more cricket to come in January, when Pakistan visit for a five-match T20 series. But once again the premier fixtures will arrive when everyone has long been back at school or work, the summer break a teasing memory.
The world was rather different the last time the Black Caps enjoyed a truly captivating encounter over the holiday season. It was the summer of 2019-20 and a three-test series in Australia, including that rarest of gifts: a Boxing Day test at the MCG.
No need to recall the results of those transtasman clashes - don’t spoil an otherwise pleasantly hazy memory - but that appetising Christmas lunch was also followed by a full three-format dinner when India came to visit.
Since then, pickings have been slim. The next year, Pakistan dropped by for the standard two tests after three T20s, before Australia added some spark in late February.
In 2021-22, the Black Caps played one match in December, Ajaz Patel the only cricketer to enjoy the month while, presumably, watching non-stop replays of his 10-wicket haul in a 372-run defeat at Wankhede. They then played two matches in January - the first being a historic test loss to Bangladesh - and the main event arrived with South Africa in February.
Last summer produced a similarly dormant December - a Boxing Day test in Pakistan preceding 10 more matches in the subcontinent, giving cricket-deprived Kiwis an endless wait until the day long circled on the calendar: February 16 and a first sight of Bazball.
Neil Wagner completes a remarkable test win. Photo / Photosport
Any angst over the missing home summer was forgotten by the time Tom Blundell dived to his right to remove James Anderson and seal an unforgettable one-run win at the Basin Reserve.
But the memory of that match will now have to carry fans through another underwhelming couple of months, before Australia arrive in February for three T20s and two tests.
Bangladesh recently provided two good test contests on turning tracks in their own conditions. Ranked eighth in ODIs and ninth in T20s, if they’re competitive in days to come, it will be more about who’s absent for the Black Caps.
Six frontline players are sitting out the ODI series and who can blame them? The World Cup - the pinnacle of a four-year cycle - ended a month ago.
But, equally, no blame can be cast if the series is greeted by general disinterest from the public, and although the fourth-ranked Pakistan at least offer greater intrigue, the Black Caps have seen plenty of them in the last few seasons.
There may well be some eye-catching cricket in the weeks to follow. Rachin Ravindra’s homecoming is reason enough to buy a ticket. Yet for many fans, passing the time before it’s an acceptable hour to crack open the chilly bin, the best cricket will be played in the backyard.
Kris Shannon has been a sports journalist since 2011 and covers a variety of codes for the Herald. Reporting on Grant Elliott’s six at Eden Park in 2015 was a career highlight.
