SA chokes ~ - the impressive performance of Amy Satterthwaite

With only two wickets falling on Day 2 of the third Test between India and New Zealand in Indore, the visitors might have entertained hopes of better batting conditions on Day 3.  It did start well with Tom Lathan and Martin Guptill registering a 100 partnership for the opening wicket raising hopes fo emulating Kohli – Rahane partnership.   But Ashwin had different ideas, he found Latham's leading edge,  and by  end of day's play, had pulled it clean off, claiming yet another six-for at home.  With six wickets, and a hand (literally!) in two run-outs, he had contributed to all but two of New Zealand's wickets.

Today resuming, India set New Zealand a target of 475 to win the Indore Test, declaring almost immediately after Cheteshwar Pujara reached his eighth Test hundred just under an hour from tea on the fourth day. .. at the time of posting this, NZ is in shatters having lost 5 for 105 – with 3 falling to Ashwin’s guile. 

In statistics and uncertainty analysis, the Welch–Satterthwaite equation is used to calculate an approximation to the effective degrees of freedom of a linear combination of independent sample variances, also known as the pooled degrees of freedom, corresponding to the pooled variance.   A web search on Satterthwaite leads to a small village in England, about four miles south of Hawkshead.  It also led me to an marine carriage caselaw - New Zealand Shipping Co. Ltd. v. A. M. Satterthwaite & Co. Ltd – vessel Eurymedon, on which I have made a separate post. This is on Satterthwaite, the cricketer.

The national cricket team, nicknamed the White Ferns, represents New Zealand in international women's cricket.  New Zealand made its Test debut in 1935, against England, becoming the third team to play at that level. With Australia and England, New Zealand is one of only three teams to have participated in all ten editions of the Women's Cricket World Cup.

All-rounder Amy Satterthwaite, who hails from Canterbury, is a right-arm medium pacer who bats left-handed. Known as "Branch" due to her distinct height advantage, she debuted for her state side - the Canterbury Magicians - in 2003, aged 16.  In Aug 2007, she made a great impact at Taunton in T20 game against England. Needing 151, England were bowled out for 112 with Satterthwaite taking 6 for 17.

In recent times, there has been great hike for the players of White Fern, a cent % hike in their basic pay. The new three-year deal with New Zealand Cricket saw 15 White Ferns earn from $20,000 to $34,000 a year - up from $10,000 to $12,000.  With match fees of $400 for one day internationals and $300 for T20 games, leading White Ferns will soon be earning more than $40,000 per annum, not counting prize money, fees from playing in overseas leagues, or endorsements. In contrast, the top-ranked Black Caps male cricketer will earn $205,266 for 2016-17, with match fees at $8495 per test, $3682 per ODI and $2407 for a T20 international.

Money is no comparison ~ even as the Blackcaps are struggling and are almost certain to end the Test Series in India 0 – 3; meantime, in ICC Women Championship at Diamond Oval, Kimberley, in ODI no.996 on 8^th Oct 2016, something unpredictable happened, it is no simple reference to Kiwi women beating SA by 12 runs. 

Chasing a simple 128, South African women were 111/5 – just 17 needed off 14 overs with 5 wickets in hands.  The 6^th wicket fell in 37.5 at 115 and they survived 5 more overs and when they were all out in 42.2 – they were still on the same 115 and lost the game.  Amy Satterthwaite bagged a career-best 4 for 13 as New Zealand Women took the last five wickets without conceding a run to snatch a tight 12-run win from South Africa in that game.

In pursuit of 128,  SA were8 for 3; 34 for 4; 44 run partnership for 5^th and 37 for 6^th.  That sixth-wicket stand was brought to an end by Satterthwaite, who bowled van Niekerk for 37 to leave South Africa at 115 for 6, still favourites to score the 13 more runs needed for victory. Incredibly they did not even get one. Satterthwaite and Erin Bermingham split the remaining four wickets between them to complete a collapse of five wickets for no run in the space of 27 balls.

The win helped New Zealand consolidate their place in the top four of the ICC Women's Championship, a good sign for their chances for automatic qualification in next year's World Cup in England.  We have seen SA men  choking in Worldcup and other top tournaments ~ perhaps women are no different. 

One remembers so well that match in 2007 WC - Proteas were cruising at 206/5 while chasing down just 210 to win and were at a striking distance from a comfortable win. In that  45^th  over Lasith Malinga had Shaun Pollock clean bowled off his fifth ball and had Andrew Hall caught at covers of the final ball of that over. Coming back to bowl the 47th over Malinga struck off the first ball  to send Jacques Kallis on his way and completed his hat-trick in the process.  Malinga made it four in a row with the wicket of Makhaya Ntini who was castled by that famous yorker. South Africa huffed and puffed their way to get the remaining three runs and ended up on the winning side.

With regards – S. Sampathkumar

11^th Oct 2016.