In a year that just gets better, Melie Kerr finished the closely contested 2024/25 Dream11 Super Smash with a record ninth title (the most by any team in the men’s or women’s Dream11 Super Smash) and as the top overall run-scorer from either the men’s or women’s half of New Zealand's exciting T20 national championship.
Fresh off having being crowned ICC Women’s T20 cricketer of the year, the 24-year-old cricket superstar finished with 441 runs from 12 games at a 63.00 average after she captained Wellington Blaze to an eight-run victory that broke Otago Sparks hearts in the Grand Final at the Cello Basin Reserve.
Melie's magic | All photos: PHOTOSPORT
Despite a calamitous start — Blaze opener Rebecca Burns run out off a wide from the non-striker’s end off the very first ball of the match, and, both Kerr sisters back in the shed early as the Sparks sought to give outgoing coach Craig Cumming the dream farewell, Kerr and her team drew on copious big-match experience to fight their way back into the trophy match, and ultimately, seal the title with two balls to go.
Last season Kerr’s Blaze had defended a total of just 89 in a weather-shortened 17-over match against the Central Hinds at Eden Park.
his summer they again impressed to defend 104/8 against the top qualifying, white-hot Sparks who were in the Grand Final for the first time in four years.
Blaze gamechanger Hannah Darlington
The Sparks are consoled on the statistics front by spinner Eden Carson emerging as the top wicket-taker of the entire T20 Domestic season, with 18 victims — ahead of teammate and import Kirstie Gordon, Northern Brave’s import Chamari Athapaththu and Central Stag and top men's wicket-taker Blair Tickner who all finished with 16 victims, while the Kerr sisters were not far behind on 15 (Melie) and 14 (Jess Kerr).
Two cricket families produced 1,429 of the runs scored in the season, thanks to the Kerr sisters and Boyle brothers, with all four indviduals appearing in the Grand Finals.
In his breakthrough season, 22-year-old Matt Boyle (Canterbury Kings) finished as the men’s top run-scorer with 377 runs at a crisp 156.43 strike rate, including a new career best of 81 not out.
His elder brother Jack (a former Kings player who migrated to the Central Stags) was the men’s third highest run-scorer with 285, including his own career best of 82 not out.
The Stags win their first title since 2019
Winning Stags captain Tom Bruce was in commanding form this season with 339 runs, and finished second in the men’s tallies, with a 157.67 strike rate.
Star seamer Jess Kerr’s maiden T20 half century against the Central Hinds in Nelson opened the floodgates to her best season yet with the bat, after the WHITE FERN had put a lot of behind-the-scenes hours into improving that facet of her game.
Jess Kerr celebrates victory with her sister Melie
The elder Kerr sibling was rewarded by 326 runs and three half tons in all, at a healthy 119.41 strike rate, with form set to flow on into the national team.
Both the Kerr and Boyle families have pedigree in the game. The Boyle brothers are the sons of former Canterbury and Wellington batter Justin, and nephews of David Boyle, a dour Canterbury opener through the 1980s.
The Kerrs’ parents Robbie Kerr and Jo Murray both represented Wellington, as did their late grandfather Bruce ‘Bags’ Murray, a BLACKCAPS Test representative.
The Central Stags had qualified top of the table in the men’s half of the competition, and defeated a strong Canterbury Kings side by six wickets after chasing down the Kings’ middling 135/8 at the Cello Basin Reserve.
Tom Bruce led from the front
Unlike the tug-of-war women’s Grand Final that oscillated between the two Finalists, the men’s trophy match saw the Stags control their destiny for most of the game, from the moment the Bruce won the toss and elected to bowl.
After a string of fourth place finishes, it was the Stags’ first Grand Final in seven years, having last lifted the title in Hamilton on 2018/19 - which had been Bruce’s first season as captain.
The Kings must wear the runner-up tag for a further 12 months after a remarkable five straight years as the runner-up.
The Canterbury men were Super Smash’s very first champion when the competition began 19 years ago, but have not taken the title since.
While they brought an all-star bowling BLACKCAPS attack to the capital that had served them so well in the brutal Elimination Final against Northern Brave on the previous day, they came up short against a team that far less experienced faces performing key roles.
Emerging Stags Curtis Heaphy and Will Clark
At just 21, Toby Findlay (son of former Stag Craig Findlay) emerged as an exciting asset for the Stags in his first Dream11 Super Smash summer.
Findlay had debuted in the first-class Plunket Shield two years earlier as a concussion substitute for Brett Randell, and this season was the Napier youngster’s first as a contracted player and his first playing white-ball for the team.
He kept his cool to take 3/29 in the Grand Final, including the huge wicket of Daryl Mitchell was caught by Jayden Lennox on 46.
Lennox gets a hug from Jack Boyle
Lennox finished with the equal most catches this season, alongside Otago Volt Dale Phillips — they both held on to 11 of them. Suzie Bates, Melie Kerr and Kings captain Cole McConchie were not far behind with 10, all standouts in the field.
Lennox, 30, has emerged from the shadow of premier Stags spinner Ajaz Patel over recent years, and was one of two front-line spinners for the champions alongside another Hawke’s Bay 30-year-old, Angus Schaw — Patel having missed the entire campaign as he recuperates from a knee injury.
Schaw had debuted in early 2023 but this was his first full campaign and he contributed not only with the ball, but as the team’s finisher with the bat — winning crucial games in that role alongside Will Clark and Curtis Heaphy.
Dane Cleaver's innovative technique nullified the Kings' tall timber
With no Doug Bracewell (the class allrounder pursuing overseas opportunities), Patel, Seth Rance (retired) or, for a number of their games, Josh Clarkson (impending fatherhood), this was effectively a fresh-look Stags squad that did the job.
The teams now have just a few days to catch their breath before the men’s white-ball season continues, with the back half of the one-day Ford Trophy beginning on Waitangi Day, 6 February in Auckland, Dunedin and Wellington.
The Stags have some catch-up to do in that competition in the bottom two, with the Auckland Aces and Canterbury in the top two slots after the first half of the one-day championship.
The women’s one-day Hallyburton Johnstone Shield resumes on Saturday, 8 February in Auckland, Wellington and New Plymouth, with four regular season games to go to determine the finalists.
The Otago Sparks are in pole for that one as well, a remarkable 15 points clear of the pack, but they will be seeing it through without their beloved mentor Cumming at the helm who departs for a new role in the United Kingdom with Nottingham’s Blaze.
2024/25
Dream11 Super Smash GRAND FINALS
Cello Basin Reserve, Wellington
Sunday, 2 February 2025
Otago Sparks Q1 lost to Wellington Blaze by 8 runs
Central Stags Q1 beat Canterbury Kings by 6 wickets
Congratulations to our champions, and well played to all our Dream11 Super Smash season teams after such a closely contested competition this season!