17 May 2012

All cricket and no play

21/12/2011 9:54:00 a.m.

0 Comments

Luke Woodcock lives and breathes the game.

Luke Woodcock lives and breathes the game.

New Zealand cricket got a shot in the arm with the  Blackcaps’ historic win over Australia according to up and coming Firebirds hotshot Luke Woodcock. Niels Reinsborg chatted to him.
IT’S a good thing for Luke Woodcock that he’s pretty good at cricket.
The 29 year old Johnsonville player spoke of little else during our allotted 20 minute interview in the foyer of Wellington Cricket headquarters in the Westpac Stadium. Rain had meant the transfer of a training session from the Basin Reserve and Woodcock was among the players heading in to the cake tin for practice. Woodcock would have sooner joined them. He appeared genuinely reserved and uncomfortable being interviewed, especially when anything personal was approached. Like when I asked him if he had a partner. There was a long pause before he answered.
“I’m in a relationship,” he eventually says, “but we don’t want to go there aye mate. I’m really here to talk cricket.”
And Woodcock does seem to live and breathe the game. When he’s not playing it he’s watching it on television, or working at his small internet based company Buzzbats selling cricket gear sourced from India.
“I just enjoy the game so much. It’s all about being part of a team and getting to play with your mates.”
Woodcock is a Johnsonville boy, attending Newlands College. Sport was always his “thing” at school and as well as cricket he played school rugby.
“I really enjoyed the cricket the most, and I was better at it than the others.”
He went on to play club cricket at Newlands and Johnsonville, where in 2008 he reached the milestone of 4,000 club cricket runs. An all-rounder (he bats left-handed and bowls with a left-arm orthodox spin) Woodcock plays in all three forms of the game. His first season with the Wellington Firebirds in 2009-10 was outstanding. He scored 988 runs, breaking Wellington’s all-time single season scoring record by a hundred runs and winning the season’s Wellington Player of the Year trophy.
In the past season he made his international Twenty20 and One-Day debuts against Pakistan and then travelled with the Blackcaps as part of their One-Day World Cup squad. He did his second overseas tour in October in the One-Day and Twenty20 series against Zimbabwe.
I asked him what he’d be doing if he wasn’t playing cricket. His New Zealand Cricket online biography says he’d be a barista, but he admits this answer a bit “tongue in cheek”.
“I do like a good flat white, but it would have to be something in and around sport. Coaching young people maybe, or sports administration.”
He’s dabbling in this area already. He’s run Buzzbats for four years and now he’s planning a second small business either in coaching or administration. He also wants to complete a business course.
“Cricket’s pretty full time at the moment and I’ve hopefully got a few years left in me yet, but I’m thinking ahead.”
Meanwhile he does have some free advice for up and coming young cricketers.
“Don’t limit yourselves. Don’t get trapped into being a One-Day or a Four-Day, or a Twenty20 player. Get out and play in all three.”
And as the summer cricket season cranks up Woodcock is confident of the level of play at both a national and Wellington level. He says the recent rush of imports into the Wellington team is “exciting” both for the Firebirds and the New Zealand competition and with a recently new coach and a brand new chief executive he says Wellington Cricket can expect some glorious summers ahead.
So too can the Blackcaps. Woodcock reckons their recent test win against Australia is just a glimpse of things to come.
“The win was a massive boost to the Blackcaps and to everybody involved,” Woodcock says. “There’s a real good feel around cricket at the moment.”
Cricket at the Basin
HRV Cup Twenty20 returns to Wellington over the festive period, with the Hell Wellington Firebirds playing five home round-robin games at the Basin Reserve between December 27 and January 11.
The schedule is:
• Firebirds v Central Stags, 2pm, December 27.
• Firebirds v Auckland Aces, 2pm, December 28.
• Firebirds v Canterbury Wizards, 2pm, January 6.
• Firebirds v Otago Volts, 12noon, January 8.
• Firebirds v Northern Knights, 5pm, January 11.
• Final TBC, January 22.
Email This Print

0 Comments

Don't worry, we wont make this public

No comments.

Cover Story

Best of Wellington 2011

Briefs

  • A question of nutrition

    Controversial Washington-based nutritionist Sally Fallon-Morell is to speak in Wellington on March 29.
    Fallon-Morell is the co-founder of the American food lobby group the Weston A. Price Foundation and the author of Nourishing Traditions. She advocates for the consumption of nutritionally dense foods such as lacto-fermented vegetables, stocks and broths, and whole raw dairy products.
    Fallon-Morell will speak at St Patrick’s College Hall on March 29.

  • Relay for cancer

    Organisers say Sunday’s Relay for Life is full to capacity with hundreds of Wellingtonians registered for the event.
    A total of 88 teams, made up of 10 to 500 members, plan to take part with a further 25 teams on the waiting list.
    The 24 hour relay, the Cancer Society’s biggest fundraising event of the year, takes place at Frank Kitts Park from 4pm on March 31.

  • Osteoarthritis awareness

    Arthritis New Zealand has launched a nationwide campaign raise awareness about osteoarthritis. 
    Arthritis is New Zealand’s leading cause of disability, affecting 305,000 adults, and osteoarthritis is its most common form.
    The campaign features television commercials and an interactive website.


  • Wild walk

    Take part in the Big Walk at Zealandia on March 31.
    Walkers can choose a two, five or 10 kilometre walk catering to all fitness levels.
    Money raised will go to the Foundation for Youth Development.

  • School pool

    The opening of the new Khandallah School pool this week means hundreds of children will be able to continue their swimming lessons.
    The pool was the first to receive a grant from Wellington City Council’s Schools Pools Partnership Fund, a fund set up in 2010 to help schools improve their pool facilities.
    Grants from the fund have also been made for pools at Wellington East Girls’ College, Barhampore School and Tawa School.

  • Easter bikers

    Motorcyclists are invited to get on their bikes and collect Easter eggs for families support from the Wellington City Mission.
    The charity run on April 1 is organised by motorcycle lobby group BONZ.
    Eggs can be donated at Red Baron Motorcylces in Alicetown. The registration fee for bikers is $10, plus the cost of Easter eggs.

  • Crafty

    Made on Marion opens on the site of the former Golding Handicrafts site in Marion St, from April 1.  They will continue to supply craft materials.

  • Ze upgrade

    Taranaki Street fuel users will notice that the Z Energy’s former Shell Service Station is closed.  Z are doing a “total revamp”.
    The job will take four weeks.

  • Newlands Moves

    Developer Ayal Aharoni has agreed to build only 90 instead of 220 houses on his six and a half hectares above Ngauranga Gorge in Newlands.  Only low density occupation will be allowed on the remaining 8.4 hectares.


  • Baring Head

    There's a new  draft plan out for what should happen at Baring Head.  It outlines how the Greater Wellington Regional council would like to manage the newest addition to its regional parks network. Grazing animals will go, motorised vehicles will be prohibited, predators will be controlled, and the lighthouse will be preserved. Submissions are invited.


  • It’s a wonder

    A new childcare centre in Newtown says it is dedicated to helping kids grow up healthy in mind, body and spirit. Little Wonders Childcare on Rintoul Street is an independent early childhood education and learning centre, the sixth centre to be opened by its Auckland-based owner. It caters to 100 children aged between three months and five years old and has been open for a little more than seven weeks.

  • Festival treats

    CHILDREN have not been forgotten by organisers of the New Zealand International Arts Festival.
    For a perfect first theatrical experience White tells the story of friends Cotton and Winkle who live in a world where there is no colour and everything is startlingly white. That is until a brightly coloured egg tumbles out of the sky and changes their world for ever.
    White plays at Capital E from March 7-11.
    The tale of Peter and the World also promises to be a magical night for all ages. Sergei Prokofiev’s classic children’s tale is told through film and live music from the NZ Symphony Orchestra at the Michael Fowler Centre on March 9.
    March 11 is Young Writers and Readers Day and readings from children’s writers and illustrators Lynley Dodd and Gavin Bishop.

Reader's Poll

Should TVNZ7 be saved as non-commercial?