Boult & Southee: New Zealand’s inseparable swing kings

Trent Boult, the left-arm fast bowler who finished as the tournament’s joint-highest wicket-taker when the Black Caps reached the final four years ago, is right in the thick of things – laughing, joking, winding up his teammates.

Tim Southee, who shares the new ball with Boult and was groomsman at his wedding last year, is more reserved and happy to take a backseat. Until, that is, he’s asked to stand nose-to-nose with Boult in front of the camera for a game of "You Laugh, You Lose".

The rules are simple: try not to laugh while your teammate tells you a silly joke. Southee is hopeless, unable to even deliver his own joke before bursting into a fit of giggles. Boult’s incredulous. “How are you so bad at this?”

Southee and Boult have spent a lot of time in each other’s company over the last decade. Club teammates at Northern Districts and new-ball partners at the 2008 ICC Under 19 Cricket World Cup in Malaysia (where Southee took 17 wickets at 6.64 and Boult 11 at 10.90), Southee graduated to the senior national side that same year, before Boult followed in 2011.

The pair now have 926 international wickets between them, sitting third and fourth in the list of New Zealand’s most prolific Test bowlers (Boult is on 246, two ahead of Southee) and forming arguably the most potent new-ball partnership in ODI cricket. Certainly, when you combine output and longevity, they stand alone.

Asked to pick out the best spell he’s seen from his partner in crime, Boult immediately recalls Southee’s career-best haul against England at the 2015 World Cup, when the Kiwis romped to an eight-wicket win at Wellington with 37.4 overs to spare. “7/34 was it?” “7/33,” corrects Southee.

“There are a number of spells of Trent’s,” continues Southee, “but since we’re approaching a World Cup I’ll say that spell against Australia in 2015 [when Boult took 5/27 in front of a packed house at Eden Park in a nail-biting one-wicket victory]. To come back and rip their middle order in half and turn the game on its head was pretty special to watch. But I could be here all day. There’s a number of times he’s bowled extremely well and it’s been great to be at the other end and have the best seat in the house to watch it.”

Boult and Southee were able to take full advantage of the swing on offer at the last World Cup but they aren’t expecting the same kind of assistance this time around.

“The ball hasn’t really been swinging much in the white-ball formats as a whole,” says Boult. “It definitely hasn’t moved around like it did back in 2015. But the strength of the bowling group we have here, we don’t just rely on swing, we can find other ways to take wickets. Whoever can adapt to the conditions, they’re going to have the most success. That’s going to be the big challenge.”

The very next day Boult and Southee find conditions to their liking in a warm-up fixture at The Oval, scripting a six-wicket victory over much-fancied India. Boult is the star of the show with 4/33, taking out three of the Indian top four, while Southee delivers seven parsimonious overs, conceding just 26 runs and snaring the key wicket of MS Dhoni.

As it has been for so long now, the Boult-Southee combination is running like clockwork.

Memories of the 2015 World Cup, hosted by New Zealand and Australia, are still fresh in the mind. And despite the Black Caps losing the final to Australia, Boult insists those reflections are overwhelmingly positive, with the impact of the tournament still being felt back home.

“Those are still some of the fondest memories of my career to date, having it in our own backyard in front of all our families and friends. It was a great time. To get to the final and fall over at that last hurdle was frustrating and disappointing but it’s been great for the game and the country. Hopefully we can go one better at Lord’s.”

“Rugby is massive in New Zealand,” adds Southee, “and I think every sporty kid grows up wanting to be an All Black. But hopefully after that 2015 World Cup a few more kids are growing up wanting to be Black Caps. I think it has changed the way people view cricket in New Zealand.”

As is usually the way, New Zealand are regarded by many as underdogs to lift the title, but with an impressive pedigree in the competition – they have only failed to reach the semi-finals once in the last five World Cups, and they only missed out in 2003 after forfeiting their game against Kenya due to security concerns – no opposition will be taking them lightly. Not when they have Southee and Boult to contend with.

“Historically we’ve done well in World Cups of late,” says Southee, “and I guess it’s the Kiwi way to fly under the radar and just go about our business. As people we quite like that. It sits well with us.”

By Jo Harman