New Zealand’s head coach, Gary Stead, has defended two potentially divisive selection calls before the first Test against England on Thursday after opting against sending an SOS to Trent Boult and calling up the uncapped Scott Kuggeleijn.
A recurrence of the stress fracture that led to Kyle Jamieson missing the past seven months of cricket – plus seamer Matt Henry absent from the series opener on paternity leave – might have prompted the Black Caps to ask Boult about his availability. But while the 33-year-old left-armer lives 20 minutes from Bay Oval and is back from playing T20 cricket in the United Arab Emirates, his decision to turn down a New Zealand national contract and go freelance last August put paid to this notion.
Asked about Boult, the architect of England’s 58 all out in their previous day-night Test in New Zealand in 2018, Stead said: “We discussed it internally but our decision was not to go with Trent. It has been decided since he gave up his contract that we will give priority to the locally contracted players.”
Stead declined to say this was the end of a Test career that has returned 313 wickets from 79 caps – “with the way the cricket world is moving so quickly, it would be remiss of me to make too many predictions” – but for now the hosts are looking elsewhere.
It means two uncapped seamers in Kuggeleijn and Jacob Duffy have been added to the hosts’ squad, even though the former – a 31-year-old bowling all-rounder for Northern Districts – remains a controversial figure in New Zealand cricket. He was charged with rape in 2015 and subsequently tried twice, with a hung jury in 2016 followed by a not guilty verdict in early 2017. However, the details heard by the two juries have meant his subsequent appearances for New Zealand’s limited-overs team were met with public criticism, including banners during his home debut in 2019.
New Zealand Cricket’s chief executive, David White, said after the not guilty verdict that the governing body was “not in the business of re-litigating past events”. Kuggeleijn has never addressed the issue publicly and after his call-up to the Test setup on Tuesday, one that prompted another backlash online, Stead looked to keep the focus on cricket.
New Zealand’s head coach said: “I get given the players I can choose from and we have gone with a resilient character, from a bowling point of view. When you lose two key bowlers, you look around and ask ‘who are the guys who can do job for us internationally?’ and he is one who can.”
Asked about the moral issue here, he said: “That is not my job to do that. I get given the players I can select from and he was on the list.”
Though Kuggeleijn has won 20 limited-overs caps since that not guilty verdict, his Test call-up underlines how threadbare New Zealand’s options are He has taken four wickets at 64 runs apiece during this season’s Plunket Shield.
