2025/26
HALLYBURTON JOHNSTONE SHIELD
Rounds Three and Four 29 and 30 November 2025
• Fitzherbert Park, Palmerston North
Round 3: Central Hinds lost to Wellington Blaze by 45 runs
Round 4: Central Hinds beat Wellington Blaze by 129 runs (DLS)
Emma McLeod works on a century stand Flora Devonshire
Photo: MBUTCHER
Two highlights of the Hallyburton Johnstone Shield's second weekend arrived in Palmerston North.
First there was a cracking maiden bag for Blaze's spin star Xara Jetly on Saturday. Then young gun Central Hind Emma McLeod produced a landmark maiden ton in Sunday's rematch.
Saturday's one-dayer doubled as the special, annual Viv Stephens Memorial Trophy match - a silver platter that goes on the line in the first one-day contest between the Hinds and Blaze each season.
It honours the late, Foxton-born Stephens who represented Wellington until the formation of the Hinds in 1979, then became Central's first Domestic women's captain, after having helped to establish the team. Stephens (née Sexton) also represented the WHITE FERNS.
The Hinds headed in as the holder of this trophy, after having beaten the Blaze in Wellington last season. This time the tables were turned, and the fortunes reversed.
About the only thing that went right for the hosts was Hannah Rowe winning the toss, as she elected to have a bowl on a very windy, rather enervating day that tested her side in the field and at the popping crease.
View this post on Instagram
Yet there was still a blessing of sunshine, something that would disappear by the end of the weekend...
The Hinds did manage to startle the Blaze first ball, Rosemary Mair trapping Blaze captain Georgia Plimmer for a royal duck. With Plimmer destined to sit out the match the next day, it was a quiet weekend for the WHITE FERNS batter.
An 89-run second-wicket stand between Hannah Francis and Rebecca Burns really got the runs flowing, however, and Burns was settling in for a stint that would span almost 36 overs.
Dangerous and powerful, Burns also packs the experience to control and pace an innings - as well as step on the gas at the right times. But just as it looked like a century was beckoning, she holed out on 87, at 182/4.
It was the wicket captain Rowe desperately needed, and she had got it herself.
As the Hinds finally got things to stick in the field, the Blaze lost a tumult of six wickets at the death, but Xara Jetly's 41 proved handy as they still reached a decent total of 240/9.
The Hinds initially looked like they were going to fall a long way short of that target, after the entertaining Jetly put on a clinic with her 6/39, which included the wickets of all the guns in the top order.
View this post on Instagram
That haul was the second best in all of Blaze's one-day history, behind only pace bowler Amanda Cooper's impeccable 6/9 at Karori Park in 2008/09.
It was not only the Wellington spinner's first six-for, but her first bag of five: her previous best was 4/37, as the Viv Stephens Memorial Trophy booked a passage back to Wellington with Blaze's 45-run victory.
•
Sunday was a brand new day, in more ways than one as the Hinds took revenge in real style - with one of their best all-round displays in this format and a bonus point to boot.
Plimmer, as mentioned, would sit this one out, Jess Kerr taking over the Blaze's armband - and being asked to field this time, after Rowe again won the toss.
The next couple of hours belonged chiefly to Emma McLeod as the livewire 19-year-old, already a capped WHITE FERN, wrote another couple of lines in her impressive cricketing CV with a maiden Hallyburton Johnstone Shield century.
She carried her bat for an unbeaten 139* off 145 balls: that's the sixth highest score in Hinds history.
An attractive leg-side player who's unafraid of a ramp shot and sharp between the wickets - running a quick three to get to her ton, McLeod's century came off just 115 balls.
Plimmer's royal duck was meanwhile emulated by another Georgia, Central's Georgia Atkinson, in this second match, as Kerr got some delicious hooping early swing.
But after that the Hinds produced back-to-back century partnerships.
View this post on Instagram
McLeod opened, and was supported initially by first drop Cate Pedersen who reached a List A maiden fifty in her 18th match, the Napierite coming back to the Hinds this year after a few summers away studying in Auckland and playing intermittently for the Hearts.
A scintillating lofted drive for four was a Pedersen highlight, but she also fell looking to loft an on-drive off Rachel Bryant in the 22nd over.
Left-hander Flora Devonshire strode in to make sure the hosts didn't lose momentum, supporting McLeod further with an intelligent knock of 46. The pair put on 119 for the third wicket, and this after McLeod and Pedersen had put on 104 for the second.
At the 40-over mark, the Hinds were sitting pretty at 206/2, but Jess Simmons struck twice in the 43rd, before Jetly almost predictably got in the wickets column and picked up a brace at the death.
McLeod's wicket wasn't among them though, as she almost danced back to the pavilion to the applause for her impressive maiden century, all 197 minutes' worth, with 12 boundaries and 274/6 on the board.
View this post on Instagram
The Hinds brought in Lizzy Cohr on the Sunday, the Wairarapa legspinner having debuted exactly a fortnight earlier with a four-for on debut, her sole match ahead of this one.
Now, she did it again with her smart variations.
As the weather packed up and the Blaze found themselves light years behind the DLS par score, Cohr had two big names in her wickets column - Burns, Kerr (who top-scored with 32). She took three wickets in the space of four balls and had the Blaze on the ropes when the heavens opened and eventually forced an early end to the game.
The Hinds had turned in a blinder for the 129-run DLS victory while Cohr had two four-fas from two games, and this time new best figures of 4/13 off her four overs.
Central will be back at Fitzherbert Park on the weekend of 13 and 14 December to host battling defending champs the Otago Sparks, while the Blaze heads to Rangiora to play the Canterbury Magicians.
