2024/25
ROUND EIGHT
WELLINGTON FIREBIRDS defeated CANTERBURY by 294 runs
Cello Basin Reserve, Wellington
29 March-1 April 2025
POINTS IN THIS ROUND:
Wellington Firebirds: 18
Canterbury: 6
Northern Districts: 20
Otago Volts: 3
Central Stags: 17
Auckland Aces: 4
SELECTED MILESTONES
Iain McPeake - final first-class appearance
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Ish Sodhi - 100th first-class match, highest first-class score for Canterbury (79)
Sam Mycock - career best first-class score (73)
Michael Rae - 200 first-class career wickets (all teams)
Nick Greenwood - highest first-class score
Tom Blundell (below) - 17th first-class century
Jesse Tashkoff - maiden first-class century
All images: PHOTOSPORT
SNAPSHOT:
The defending Plunket Shield champions were still alive heading into the final round of summer, but they needed Northern Districts to lose in Dunedin while they hoped for the best in Wellington.
Northern had been runners up this time last year, but this time wound the roles would be reversed - it would be the Firebirds with the bridesmaid tag after a crucial result further south where the real threat loomed.
The Basin match also decided the runner-up since Canterbury was also in the running until the last, but a fourth-innings disaster for an unsettled side ultimately kept them in third.
Both teams had had a certain amount of personnel disruption ahead of the potentially decisive match, with Firebirds Nick Kelly and Mo Abbas both having been called into the BLACKCAPS for the first time earlier in the week, and Rhys Mariu later subbed out of Canterbury's playing XI as he was called up for the first time as a BLACKCAPS injury replacement - Harry Chamberlain coming in for Canterbury, mid-match.
The match was also a poetic swansong for the Firebirds' "Big John" Iain McPeake who had announced his impending retirement ahead of the last game of the season, the faithful servant doing the honours with the final wicket of the victory and his Domestic career.
DAY ONE
Canterbury captain Cole McConchie won the toss and elected to bowl on a greentop that everyone knew would produce a result in the critical game.
After some early cloud, as Fraser Sheat and Zak Foulkes took the ball for the opening barrage, the sun came out to play as well - Firebirds openers Nick Greenwood and Sam Mycock doing a good job of holding on and almost seeing out the first hour together, even if the odd appeal or catch went begging.
It was first change Gus McKenzie, the Canterbury Swiss army knife, who made the breakthrough at 33/1 with Greenwood (after a patient 18) giving some catching practice to Matt Boyle in the slips.
Gareth Severin took over and gradually the hosts started to pick off some boundaries, reaching 91/1 by lunch.
But McKenzie struck twice in two overs shortly after the resumption to trap Severin on 29 and add Tim Robinson cheaply with a copycat dismissal.
The onus fell to promising rookie Mycock, in his fifth first-class appearance in his first season, to keep making headway with the bat.
He was looking good on his best score yet of 73 when Michael Rae whirred in for his first wicket of the game at 170/4.
The Firebirds added a further 30-odd runs before tea, after which Canterbury took the new ball - at 230/5, Jesse Tashkoff meanwhile having scored 50 on the dot before falling victim to Foulkes.
Five wickets fell in the remainder of the session after the new ball, the hosts all out 269 to usher in stumps, with just two first innings batting points for their trouble while Canterbury predictably bagged the four bowling points.
But everyone was still in the contest, and Foulkes, McKenzie and Rae all finished with three-fors.
DAY TWO
Now Wellington got their chance to utilise the juicy morning conditions at the Basin and Liam Dudding did not disappoint as he drew towards the end of his excellent first season with the Firebirds, having transferred from the Stags over the previous winter.
Dudding had Canterbury in trouble early, getting both openers to have Canterbury 27/3 in the 12th - with Logan van Beek meanwhile having trapped first drop Scott Janett early as well.
By lunch, Canterbury was 100/6 and in real strife, still 169 runs in first innings arrears.
Foulkes and Ish Sodhi, in his 100th first-class match (all teams), were both barely underway, and had a big recovery job to do in the middle session if they were to haul Canterbury back into a decent position.
So their 70-run partnership for the seventh wicket was right on cue, and Sodhi kept going to mark his 100th game with a special knock.
By tea he's reached a half century, battling on for the ninth wicket on a reasonably nice afternoon for batting, wan patches on the fading deck now, with Fraser Sheat at 216/8.
The pair frustrated the heck out of the Firebirds as they carried on for a 91-run stand, taking the score to 270/8 after the new ball, before van Beek nipped one in to trap Sodhi on 79.
Sodhi had been just shy of his first-class career best unbeaten 82* for Northern Districts.
Just a few minutes later, Dudding (4/75) trapped Sheat on 41 after 100 minutes of niggle, and Canterbury's first innings lead was kept to just five runs.
There was so little in it, both teams fighting tooth and nail for supremacy and their last shot at the Shield as the second innings began with 11 overs left in the day.
The hosts got through to stumps intact, back in the overall lead with 32 on the board heading into 'moving day'.
DAY THREE
Reaching 126/1 by lunch, the Firebirds set themselves up nicely for a big day at the office.
Canterbury quickly fought back early in the second session, however, as Michael Rae picked up a brace of cheap middle order wickets.
Opener Nick Greenwood, still at his post, was out soon after as well, on 80 - not the first to misread Zak Foulkes.
From that handy position of 126/1 the hosts were now a less comforting 166/4, but the partnership of the match was about to take shape.
Young Jesse Tashkoff combined with his skipper Tom Blundell to slather on a massive, 214-run fifth wicket stand - the highlight of the day as Blundell ultimately set Canterbury a 392-run chase to win.
Blundell had contributed 119 off 115 balls, Tashkoff (below) 109 off 123 for his maiden first-class century at 24 years old.
Their partnership was a Wellington record for their matches against Canterbury, eclipsing the mark of 139 that had been set by the stellar combination of Michael Papps and Luke Woodcock in Rangiora in 2013/14.
Canterbury's day got worse across the pivotal afternoon. They were in early trouble at 28/3 by stumps, still needing a further 364 runs on the final day of the Domestic season.
Van Beek was in command with the red ball again, enjoying his fruitful bowling partnership with new mate Dudding this season. Van Beek would end the season as the top Plunket Shield wicket-taker with 36 victims at 20.53.
Of course, everyone still had one eye on Dunedin where Northern Districts meanwhile now just needed to find seven Otago wickets on the last day to secure the Shield - weather permitting.
DAY FOUR
Canterbury would require their further 364 runs at fairly tough 3.64 runs per over on the final day of the season: still alive, but for how much longer?
On the back foot after the quick loss of three wickets the night before, pride and the placings were hanging in the balance as substitute batter Harry Chamberlain (below; in for Rhys Mariu, who had become the latest to be whisked off for his BLACKCAPS debut) and McConchie, both yet to reach double digits themselves, resumed at 28/3.
It wasn't the way Canterbury wanted to finish their hot and cold first-class summer: rolled for 97 in just 27.2 overs.
Matt Boyle's 24 was the paltry top score as the Dudding/van Beek pairing continued searing through the top five, finishing with 3/29 and 3/25 respectively.
Then Michael Snedden took over to keep the batters on their toes, picking up a whirlwind 3/11 off just four overs as the Canterbury lower order this time folded.
Nine down, now, for 82.
Iain McPeake had come on when they were six down and he was watching the end of his Domestic playing days come at him in a rush. He still hadn't got a wicket, Snedden greedy, but then Fraser Sheat went to audaciously larrop him over square, and paid the price as Sam Mycock took the last catch of the Firebirds' campaign.
McPeake's arms went up in triumph, the perfect ending to the match for the big paceman. The Firebirds had ended up winning what had been, until the last innings, a closely contested match by the proverbial country mile, Canterbury gone by lunchtime.
Wellington had done all they could. It wouldn't be enough to hold onto the Plunket Shield, but they could look back on another impressive campaign, back to back.
