February 11, 2023
Going into the seventh round of fixtures of the Sheffield Shield, Australia’s 4 day state cricket championship, New South Wales were rock bottom without a win in 6 games. Tasmania meanwhile were in third place, having recorded two wins, over Victoria ( by 4 wickets ) & South Australia ( by 7 wickets ) and were looking to overhaul Queensland, who were less than one point ahead of them in the table. The first meeting between the two sides in November was a rain affected draw, notable mostly for Matthew Wade’s 146 for Tasmania.
NSW have been weakened by the number of their players that have been selected for representative cricket this season, and Pat Cummins (captain), Josh Hazlewood, Nathan Lyon, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc and David Warner were all missing today being in Test tour party to India.
On the other hand, no Tasmania players were selected for the tour and they have had a settled side, with nine players having played all 6 of their matches so far, and 6 of those nine were selected for today’s match.
Tasmania were only allowed into the Sheffield Shield in 1977 and have won three titles, the last of which was in 2012/13. Their nickname is The Tigers and their key players today included Peter Siddle, who played for Victoria in the Sheffield Shield game in 2020 covered by these diaries, and is now 38. Siddle played 67 tests, taking 221 wickets and has been a regular in the English county competitions, and will be returning to Somerset for 2023.
Tim Paine, also now 38, is a former captain of Australia, taking over after Steve Smith was sacked after the ball tampering scandal in South Africa. He played 35 tests in total, 23 of them as captain, with an average of 33 and a top score of 92. Ben McDermott is an ODI and T20 international and has previously played for Derbyshire and Hampshire. Quick bowler Nathan Ellis has a handful of ODI and T20 caps, and last played in a T20 for Australia against England last October where he took 3-20 in 4 overs as Jos Buttler’s side won by 8 runs. He had also played for Hampshire in the 2022 Vitality Blast.
Missing today was Matthew Wade, who made 4 centuries in 36 tests for Australia, including two in 2019 drawn Ashes series in England when selected as a batsman rather than as a wicket-keeper. Now 35, he was playing in the T20 tournament final in South Africa this weekend, whilst quick bowler Jackson Bird, 34 wickets in 9 tests, and spells for Hampshire, Nottinghamshire & Kent was surprising named as 12th man despite being ever-present and their leading wicket taker this season.
The New South Wales XI contained 4 players who featured in the 2020 game against Victoria covered by these diaries, namely captain Kurtis Patterson, opening bat Daniel Hughes, all-rounder Moises Henriques and bowler Liam Hatcher.
https://fatbearssportingdiaries.blogspot.com/2020/02/new-south-wales-vs-victoria-day-one.html
One notable inclusion for The Blues was leg spinner Adam Zampa, a regular in Australia’s ODI and T20s sides with over 70 caps, who made one Shield appearance earlier in the season in an effort to win selection for the Indian tour, but was overlooked, and was making his first ever red-ball appearance at the SCG for NSW. He has played for Essex, and Welsh Fire in the Hundred competition
NSW captain Kurtis Patterson won 2 test caps for Australia and scored 114 not out against Sri Lanka. Fast medium bowler Sean Abbott is an ODI and T20 international and will play for Surrey in 2023, having also played for them in 2021.
Moises Henriques won 4 tests caps as well as playing in a number of ODI’s and T20s for Australia, and has Glamorgan and Surrey on his CV, whilst medium pacer Chris Tremain is an ODI international.
There had been a lot of rain in Sydney in the past few days, including almost monsoon weather conditions on Thursday but Friday was dry and the weather today was a scorching 29 degrees with barely a cloud in the sky.
The SCG is pretty central in Sydney and reached by a short journey on the Light Railway to Moore Park. Only one gate was open for today’s match and the entrance was free. The Members Enclosure is restricted the SCG members ( and has a dress code of trousers and shirt collar ) and everyone else had to make do with the Ladies Pavilion. These were the only two stands where access was permitted today in the 48,000 capacity stadium.
Only one food and drink outlet was in operation, with coffees at 4.50 AUD each, a can of beer at $9, most hot foods were priced between $17-18, panini’s were $11-13 and a box of chips were $5.50. The SCG is a cashless venue so the credit card fees and exchange rate costs on my two coffees will probably be greater than the costs of the two drinks !
NSW won the toss and elected to bat and when we arrived they had progressed to 115 for 1 of 43 overs. Opener Blake Nikitaris had been dismissed for 16 but opener Hughes was 68 not out and Patterson was undefeated on 28 with two left handers at the crease. Peter Siddle had bowled 11 overs including 4 maidens.
There were probably about 40 spectators in the Members stand, and around 120 in the two tiers of the Ladies Pavillion when we arrived, although with numbers trickling in during the afternoon the attendance probably peaked at around 200. The outfield looked in tremendous condition.
Nathan Ellis bustled in but the first impressions were that there was little pace in the wicket and it looked a good track to bat on. However, after one bouncer which Hughes evaded with ease, Ellis then produced a delivery that bounced a bit more to strike the batsmen on the helmet, resulting in a delay of several minutes for treatment. When play eventually resumed, Hughes straight away cracked a half-volley through the covers for two.
Slow left-armer Tom Andrews, in his first appearance for Tasmania this season, was bowling at the other end, and the two well set batsmen were content to milk him for singles through the leg side.
The sides soon took a very leisurely drinks break after which Ellis was replaced by Beau Webster bowling military medium, who was greeted by a fabulous cover drive from Patterson for four. If veteran Siddle though he would be able to have a quiet time grazing on the deep square leg boundary to Andrews he was wrong as he was the busiest fielder on the park, returning throws to the keeper as the singles ticked over.
The first false shot we witnessed occurred as Hughes attempted a flashing cover drive off Ellis which instead took an inside edge to fly down to fine-leg for a single, narrowly missing his leg stump.
The first bowling change saw portly off-spinner Jarrod Freeman replace Andrews, and the two NSW batsman cautiously played the new bowler. The pace of the game was all very sedate, with the biggest danger to the batsmen being a possible run-out from a quick single, but the throw went to the wrong-end.
The score had move to 146 for 1 from 55 overs when Webster changed to bowling off-spin, with Patterson driving through mid-on to move to 49 and then pushed the next ball to the point boundary for a single to bring up his half century.
Freeman then beat Hughes past the outside edge and Paine also whipped off the bails, but both umpires were unmoved. Freeman at this point had now bowled 21 overs at barely two an over.
Webster was soon taken off and replaced by Ellis, now bowling around the wicket, and he immediately bowled a no-ball to bring up the 100 partnership. An attempted bouncer was hooked by Hughes to fine leg for a single.
Tea was taken at 15.10 with the score 162 for 1 from 63 overs. Hughes had reached 87 from 205 balls with Patterson on 54 from 123 balls. Tasmania had bowled their overs at just under 16 per hour and were up with the required rate to complete the day’s play on time. We had seen 47 runs in 20 overs.
Andrews opened the final session from the opposite end to which he had previously been operating from and from his second ball had a big appeal for LBW as Hughes attempted to turn the ball to leg, but the ball looked high and not out was the verdict. The next ball induced a thick outside edge which squirted away for two.
Freeman continued to be stingy from his end but Hughes produced an exquisite drive through extra cover past a diving fielder off Andrews and then tapped the next ball for a single to move to 94. From Freeman’s next over a leg glance yielded two more runs before another straight drive to the boundary brought up his 7th first class century. A classical cover drive produced another boundary to take 10 from the over and put a dent into Freeman’s hitherto impressive figures.
Out of the blue Andrews then found the edge of Patterson’s bat and Paine took a smart catch and took off the bails for good measure. The umpire’s finger was raised and Patterson had to trudge off for 56 with the score now 187 for 2.
New batsman Henriques immediately looked to use his feet against the spinners and got off the mark with a single to mid-wicket after taking a long stride down the pitch. Andrews produced another good ball to beat Henriques’ back footed defensive prod, but the NSW all-rounder then decided to stop poking around by coming down the pitch and smacking Freeman over the long-on boundary for six and bring up the 200 for his side.
Henriques’ urgency saw a quick single taken to mid-on and with the shy at the stumps missing and beating the covering fielders, 5 was added to his score. The day’s funny moment then occurred as Siddle took his position on the deep square leg boundary for the left-hander but unfortunately for him the right-handed Henriques was on strike. He realised his mistake two balls later and scuttled back up to the cover point position where he should have been, but fortunately for him his lapse hadn’t cost any runs.
Freeman finally got a rest after figures of 29-3-67-1 as Siddle, now sporting a short dyed blonde hairstyle, came back on for his first over since we had been in the ground. Henriques showed due respect for two balls before nudging a single to move to the non-striker’s end, and the come-back over yielded just that single.
At that point we decided to leave the stadium, with NSW having reached 217-2 from 77 overs, with Hughes undefeated on 121 from 251 balls and Henriques on 16. We had witnessed 102 runs from 43 overs, and one wicket.
Postscript : By the close of play NSW had reached 272 for 3 from the allotted 96 overs. Hughes was still there at the finish with a career best 153, although Henriques had been bowled by Freeman for 24. New batsmen Jason Sangha was 15 not-out
Highlights of all Sheffield Shield matches can be found on Cricket Australia’s YouTube channel ( cricket.com.au )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zf9BwqO5Wr4
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