Finn Allen belts Black Caps to win over Australia in T20 World Cup Super 12s
Ian Anderson is the chief cricket writer for Stuff
ANALYSIS: In a trans-Tasman World Cup final in Australia seven years ago, Mitchell Starc made the defining statement against New Zealand’s explosive opener with the third ball.
In the opening game of the Twenty20 World Cup in Australia on Saturday, New Zealand’s explosive opener made the defining statement against Mitchell Starc with the second ball.
Young Black Caps opener Finn Allen set the visitors up for an upset victory over the hosts at the Sydney Cricket Ground in the first game of the Super 12s – and put New Zealand instantly in pole position to race into the semifinals.
Allen hammered the second ball Starc delivered over the mid-on fielder to the boundary, then thumped the next one harder, higher and faster into the stands.
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Another four off the fifth ball rocked the hosts back on their heels, and they never recovered as the Black Caps won by 89 runs to rapidly force the Cup holders into a sudden-death situation after just 37.1 overs of eye-popping action.
It wasn’t as big of an occasion as the 2015 one-day World Cup final at the MCG, when Black Caps skipper Brendon McCullum was bowled third ball charging at Starc in the opening over in what was ultimately a comfortable triumph by the hosts.
But it did ensure Kane Williamson’s men have a great chance of making the playoff stage of yet another world championship.
The Australian fans hadn’t seen such a savage display of boundary hitting like Allen’s since Lance Cairns at the MCG in 1983, and the crowded house at the SCG must have wanted to claim another Finn as their own.
Rick Rycroft/AP New Zealand's Finn Allen took the attack to Australia in their T20 World Cup cricket match in Sydney.
But Cairns’ six sixes were achieved when the game was already lost, and the home supporters could safely enjoy their heroes being tonked around the park by a cheeky Kiwi.
On Saturday evening, Allen’s jaw-dropping 42 changed the pre-tournament tone within just 16 balls.
He was given a life when dropped by Adam Zampa when on 19 off the second ball of the third over bowled by Pat Cummins – a difficult chance but one you’d expect the champion side to grab.
In contrast, New Zealand’s brilliance in the field was in complete contrast to their ragged displays during the tri-series in Christchurch earlier this month while their nine-wicket defeat in a warm-up game to South Africa earlier this week clearly held all the significance of ... well, a warm-up game.
Australia appeared to have got the jump on the visitors when the coin fell in their favour and captain Aaron Finch chose to bowl, knowing any interruption from predicted rain would be easier to calculate its impact when chasing with the bat.
But the only shower in evidence were the defending champs in comparison to the side they beat in last year’s final.
If Allen was the rock star frontman hogging the spotlight, Conway was the Richards to his Jagger.
Allen danced and belted out the hits but Conway, currently New Zealand’s best batter, picked out a rolling rhythm and interspersed it with a string of tasty licks in making his unbeaten 92 from a mere 58 deliveries.
Black Caps followers knew what Allen’s approach would be – dance down the wicket to the pacemen like they’re spinners – but this was the first time in his 19-game T20 international career that he’d faced such a vaunted attack.
It mattered not a jot – after Starc conceded 14, the world’s top-ranked T20 bowler Josh Hazlewood went for 15 and Cummins for 17.
New Zealand would have had pre-match plans to go after their rival’s fifth bowler, Marcus Stoinis, but going after all of them proved rather useful.
Australia may have been guilty of misreading the pace of the pitch at the outset and not adjusting as quickly as Allen was dispatching the ball. They could they have been craftier and used spin almost instantly and try and beat Allen with subtle changes of pace and less abstruse turn.
Finch didn’t even use a sixth bowler on an evening when none of his charges went for less than nine an over – not even with Conway and Jimmy Neesham, two left-handers in late, did Glenn Maxwell get to employ his off-spinners.
Mark Kolbe/Getty Images Devon Conway top-scored in New Zealand’s 89-run win.
There was a concern Williamson had also blundered with his captaincy when he removed a second slip in Trent Boult’s first over just two balls after Warner had been beaten outside off stump, only to see an edge from the same batter fly through the now-vacant zone.
It didn’t prove costly, as while Boult was supposed to be the Black Caps bowler posing the most danger to the Australian top-order, long-time new ball partner Tim Southee (3-6) instead got rid of Warner and Mitchell Marsh while Mitchell Santner’s guile was rewarded with 3-31 off his four overs.
Ish Sodhi got the nod as the other spinner ahead of Michael Bracewell and dismissed dangerman Maxwell while Mark Chapman started for the injured Daryl Mitchell and wasn’t required to bat.
New Zealand still have Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, England and Ireland to play in their group and given the amount of upsets witnessed in a week, there’s no guarantee of at least three more wins to make the last four.
But they would have slept far more soundly overnight than Australia’s players, who may have had nightmares recalling South Africa winning four of their five group games at last year’s tournament but missing out on the semifinals on net run-rate.
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