Hawke Cup heads back to Canterbury Country

Posted Sunday, 1 March, 2026 in Community News

Bay of Plenty had succeeded in ending Taranaki's year-old tenure a fortnight earlier, but couldn't hold onto the prized provincial cup in a one-sided drubbing, as Will Williams and company came calling at Bay Oval.

This season's Zone 3 Challenge dragged on until lunchtime on the third day, but in reality it was all over bar the shouting on the first afternoon, when Bay of Plenty was rolled for just 94.

Having won the toss and batted, captain BOP Oli White got almost a third of those runs in the effort to hold on and and least get the hosts to respectable triple digits.

But his side was up against County pro and former Canterbury and New Zealand U19 star Will Williams, not to mention experienced batters who were used to machining out big scores on the flatlands of Canterbury's rural hubs.

SCORES

Williams had played in his first Challenge Match in 2013 and has been a regular ever since, regardless of whether currently domiciled in England (where he plays as a home player, thanks to dual citizenship) or New Zealand.

The 33-year-old right armer left Canterbury for a good stint with Lancashire in 2022 and is now preparing for his first County season with Gloucestershire, to keep adding to his 216 first-class career wickets.

PHOTOSPORT

His younger left-handed brother Joe Williams had previously played one Challenge Match in 2020 at Rangiora, and this was the first time they had played together in a Challenge.

Family threads run prominently through the Canterbury Country Hawke Cup fabric.

There are the Foulkeses, the Chamberlains, the Frews (again, two brothers in this match's squad) to name a few, and there were Canterbury domestic reps as well in this team, Jesse Frew and Ronnie Kapur both having played for Canterbury this season.

Bay of Plenty had ND's Fergus Lellman at first drop (Bharat Popli by now on Plunket Shield duties) and White himself has repped both ND and Otago, but his team was torpedoed at 50/5 by lunch on the first day.

Williams had picked up two early, dismissing both Reuben Carter and Lellman for no score. Then he ran out Niven Dovey for good measure at 14/4.

Mike de Beer was the first local to manage to dig in a bit to support White; they managed to survive together for more than an hour - and the lower order followed suit, with some resilience from veteran Pete Drysdale.

But no one else got a score, and it was a sombre mood in the pavilion as the hosts and Hawke Cup holders were all out in 66.5 overs, before tea on the opening day.

Canterbury Country rubbed salt into the wounded pride by pouring on 440, both openers - Robbie Foulkes (younger sibling of BLACKCAP Zak) and Archie Redfern reaching centuries, and indeed the same top score of 106.

Their stand of 184 on its own was almost double the initial deficit.

Canterbury Country had this in the bag and, although BOP managed to eventually fight back collectively with the ball and pick up some mercifully cheap wickets (Gus Tustin finishing with 3/90), Jesse Frew's 82 and 53 from Will Williams in the second century stand of the innings really put the boot in.

Bay of Plenty batted again for some 42 minutes but all it provided was another nice moment for the Williams family who combined to have opener Tustin caught.

There was plenty of time left on the last afternoon for Canterbury Country to celebrate whistling the 1910 silverware away to Rangiora where the final Challenge of the season is expected to be played in two weeks' time, against Zone 4's South Canterbury.