Which Indian Top Cat can bell Kane Williamson who has 50+ in every ICC ODI outing against India?
“…They know this place, don’t they? They are everywhere”
This was Kane Williamson talking about cats that snuck into the press conference room after New Zealand’s semifinal against South Africa and walked right across to stop at his feet. But felines aside, the statement could well apply to Indian spinners in Dubai.
So who can bell the Kiwi talisman – Varun Chakaravarthy, Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav or Axar Patel? Or will it be Md Shami early on?
The cats in Pakan had sure dracted Williamson. Here’s how his presser went:
“Conditions changed little bit throughout… Somebody’s cat there… For us you know, it was nice to have the last match, and India are an outstanding team, and for us to have…. …so for us, it’s important we just…. They know this place well don’t they, they are everywhere!
“And yea, so…it’s important we take lessons from that last game (vs India). It’s a final, anything can happen. There was a great atmosphere I’m sure it should be good again,” he said.
Earlier in Dubai, where NZ lost to India, Williamson’s 81 had made him the NZ batter with the most fifty-plus scores against India in ODI cricket, according to stats sourced newstesapp.com. They quoted ESPN as Williamson breaking “the tie with Ross Taylor, who had retired with 11 such scores against India.”
As per the website, Nathan Astle is the only other New Zealand batter to have scored 10 or more 50-plus scores against India in this format.
Williamson currently boasts (or humble brags) 11 fifties besides a ton. He tallies 1,228 runs from 30 ODIs against India at an average of 45.48. His strike rate of 75.56 and points to his anchoring duties and is clearly low. He also averages lower 34.80 in Asia against India, compared to 58.09 at home (639 runs).
While he had a match-winning 67 in the 2019 World Cup semi-final, the star batter scored 69 in a losing cause in the 2023 WC semi-final, following it with 81 in the first CT league game. He is pretty consent against India in high-profile games, and 655 of his have come in victories over India, cranking up his average to a stunning 59.54.
In losing causes versus India, he has 508 runs at 33.86 and is equally potent in both innings – averaging 46.46 batting first, and leading run chases with 44.25, as per stats newstesapp.com.
After the semifinals, with the cat purring post-match, Williamson joined an exclusive club en route to his 15th ODI ton, as per Stuff.com. “It’s more significant than becoming the first player to score a hat-trick of centuries against South Africa. Williamson became the 16th player, and first Kiwi, to score 19,000 runs in international cricket, a l topped Indian great Sachin Tendulkar (34,357). The former Black Caps skipper was the fourth fastest (440 innings) to join the l of run-scoring machines, with only Indians Virat Kohli (399) and Tendulkar (432) and West Indian Brian Lara (433) ahead of him,” Stuff wrote.
