Richie - He's the greatest, and from Otago too
Roy Colbert - 8 April 2001

(Two cricket fanatics with their views on the game from their Dunedin sofa).

"Mate, I think we should throw a view awards around - it's that time."

"Absolutely it is, and I'd just like to say the National Bank wallahs got it pretty right last week with their three finalists for Player of the Year. A paucity of Otago players in there apart from Mark Richardson, but Emily Drumm and Craig McMillan had to be included."

"Despite their complete lack of Otago credentials, they did. Macca played some terrific knocks this summer, especially when the knives came out for him in January."

"He stepped it up, mate, as all the great ones can. We can only hope he will be savagely criticised by the media in seasons to come. He also became a ferocious pace bowler, feared globally, and ended the season as New Zealand captain. Were he not a Canterbury man, I would have handed him the trophy without a second thought."

"But as it is, he's a Canterbury man. Close, but no cigar."

"And Emily Drumm! What a wonderful player! I still play that CricInfo Women's World Cup final video every night before I go to bed. I tell you, mate, you can have your Rob Waddells, this women's cricket team was the purists' Sportsman of the Year. No question."

"But we're talking here of something far far higher than Sportsman of the Year, mate, we're talking New Zealand Cricketer of the Year."

"Richie?"

"Richie in a canter, mate. Daylight came second. Did you see that record for the season - 2600-odd at 66 including a triple hundred and a Test average well into the fifties? Phenomenal."

"Phenomenal indeed. And you must never forget at an age when most New Zealand Test players are thinking of retirement, Richie decided he would not only become a batsman, but an opening batsman - the hardest task in all of sport."

"I tell you, New Zealand cricketers mature late. Andrew Jones, Ewen Chatfield, Richard Hadlee - the list is endless."

"They do. And yet our selectors keep choosing players when they're still children. It's food for thought, mate, food for thought."

"Any other awards?"

"Television Umpire of the Year - Billy Bowden."

"Can't argue with that, mate. Billy always found an extra gear when the TV cameras were rolling. Comeback of the Year?"

"Everyone is saying Mattie Bell, but I've chosen Adam Parore. Finest 'keeper in the world, the man was so close to perfection you had to rub your eyes. A couple of years ago I was howling for him to be dropped. I tell you, mate, I'm proud to eat my words on that one."

"Forgotten Man of the Year - Simon Doull. Our best bowler in 1998/99, unplayable at the Basin, not rated in the top twelve two years later. You have to ask why."

"Cricket Ground of the Year?"

"Carisbrook. Everyone would agree on this one. Best track, best outfield, best crowd, best weather, best local officials. Christchurch and Auckland should be struck off and we should get all their games for the next ten years till they learn how to produce a game. The one-dayer down here with Pakistan was the game of the season."

"Team of the Year - Otago."

"Everyone would agree on this one too. Other teams were terrified of us and set us absurd targets in the fourth innings. But we set the standard. You would have to say New Zealand's stunning win in the third Test against Pakistan was solely inspired by Otago's stellar play in the early rounds of the Shell Cup."

"That it was, Flem said as much to me in fact."

"And now, winter. I'm off to Samoa, they have golf there. See you for the Sri Lanka tour!"

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