Seven BLACKCAPS, including captain Brendon McCullum, have been named in the New Zealand XI to take on a West Indies XI in a warm-up match for the ANZ International Series.
New Zealand XI for West Indies warm-up match
Brendon McCullum (c) - Otago Volts
Todd Astle - Canterbury Wizards
James Baker - Northern Knights
Dean Brownlie - Canterbury Wizards
Mark Craig - Otago Volts
Peter Fulton - Canterbury Wizards
Tom Latham - Canterbury Wizards
Andrew Mathieson - Central Stags
Hamish Rutherford - Otago Volts
Jesse Ryder - Otago Volts
Anurag Verma - Northern Knights
General Manager National Selection Bruce Edgar says the players have come predominantly from the Otago Volts and the Canterbury Wizards who don’t have Plunket Shield or HRV Twenty20 matches at the time.
He says the three-day match, which will be played from November 27-29 at Lincoln University’s Bert Sutcliffe Oval, will have a dual purpose for the New Zealand batsmen.
“This warm-up match will give our batsmen some critical match time as well as giving them a sighter of some of the West Indian bowlers.”
Jesse Ryder has been named in the New Zealand XI just eight months after he was violently attacked in Christchurch. Edgar says it’s important that Jesse is back playing at this level.
“It will be great to see Jesse back in a New Zealand team environment but it’s simply another opportunity for him to show that he can perform consistently.”
Aaron Redmond (Otago Volts) and Jeet Raval (Auckland Aces) will open the batting for the West Indies as the visitors won’t have a full XI in the country at the time due to their One Day International squad still being in India.
The BLACKCAPS Test squad for the ANZ International Series against the West Indies will be named on Monday 25 November.
Tickets for the ANZ Tests went on sale this week at www.ticketek.co.nz. We encourage fans to register for BLACKCAPS priority ticketing to get the best deals. Go to www.blackcaps.co.nz/priorityticketing for more details.
Entry to the New Zealand XI versus the West Indies XI match at Lincoln University is free. The match starts at 10.30am each day.
