The Stags have the top wicket-taker in the country this season with allrounder Josh Clarkson proving himself a force with the ball, consistently taking influential hauls and currently sitting top of the pops with 16 wickets at a sizzling bowling average of just 8.75 after four rounds.

The Stags blew the Aces off the park in Auckland after posting the equal highest total of the season, 377/5. 

Opener Brad Schmulian carried his bat for a career best 136 and is not the second highest run-scorer with 218 runs, behind only one player - you guessed it, Nicholls who has 291 after two hundreds in four games. 

Schmulian anchored while Will Young and Tom Bruce both produced half centuries. BLACKCAP Young’s 50 was a welcome return while Bruce’s 63 off just 39 balls delivered the knockout punches in the back half of the innings.

Clarkson (4/43), Blair Tickner (2/27) and the left-arm spin club of Ajaz Patel and Jayden Lennox (a brace each) then made easy work of defending the total as the juggernaut continues despite the team having lost a clutch of players to injury.

Prolific top order batter Curtis Heaphy injured his hamstring in New Plymouth and young bowling allrounder Toby Findlay also remains sidelined as an unchanged squad heads to Canterbury country. 

Pacemen Doug Bracewell, Brett Randell and Joey Field (who captains the Central Districts A team against Northern Districts A in Napier today) are all at various stages of returning to Domestic action.

The timely return of BLACKCAPS Tickner and Young for the last two rounds before Christmas have helped cover those absences as new coach Greg Hay gets his coaching career off to a flier.

The Stags finished in the top three last season, recovering from a shaky start in the first half of the comp to make the Finals weekend, and Schmulian says the way the team has started this summer is no accident.

“We were pretty disappointed last year in the first five games,” he says. 

“We only managed one victory, even though we played some good cricket so we’ve put all our efforts into these first five games to try and rectify that from last year.”

Along the way, the team has pocketed two bonus points and dropped only one match, against Northern Districts in round two.

“We’re already miles ahead of where we were last year and we're pretty proud of what we're doing at the moment,” says Schmulian who will make his 50th List A appearance tomorrow.

“Credit to the T20 guys who I think got a lot of pride and a lot of enjoyment out of the way they played their cricket last season [the Stags are the Super Smash defending champion, having despatched a star-stacked Canterbury side in the Grand Final] and I can feel that filtering into our gameplan and execution of skills at the moment. 

“Rangiora will be a tough game. We went down by three runs to them last year at Rangiora in a game we should have won, in that first half, so it’s a chance to rectify that result from last year and it'll be a real competitive game. 

“Canterbury are a top bar side, they’ve got all bases covered and with BLACKCAPS as well, but we’re playing real good white-ball cricket at the moment and we’ll be up for it.”

The match is livescored and livestreamed at cdcricket.co.nz from 10.30am with the toss at 10am.

After this match, all the men's teams switch their focus to the start of the first-class Plunket Shield championship, the Stags to host the Auckland Aces in Palmerston North in their first four-day match of the season from Tuesday next week. 

The Central Hinds meanwhile open their 2025/26 Domestic season this Saturday and Sunday in New Plymouth where they will host the Canterbury Magicians in rounds one and two of the national one-day Hallyburton Johnstone Shield, with free admission at Pukekura Park.