James Neesham had his feet up in the team hotel when South Africa and Afghanistan needed not one but two Super Overs to split their T20 World Cup thriller. The New Zealand all-rounder, who still carries the scar tissue of the 2019 ODI final, could not help a wry grin.
“It’s good now that you had the opportunity to play a second Super Over when the first one’s a tie,” he said after New Zealand’s own fixture against South Africa in Ahmedabad. “That would have been nice…”
Back at Lord’s five years ago the Black Caps tied the match and then tied the one available Super Over before losing on boundary count. Moments later Neesham posted on X: “Kids, don’t take up sport. Take up baking or something. Die at 60 really fat and happy.” The post went viral; the frustration has never fully left him.
He has, however, kept turning up: another 50-over World Cup, now two T20 editions, still chasing the piece of silverware that refuses to shake hands. Watching somebody else sweat through a shoot-out – for newer followers, a Super Over is six balls each, most runs wins – felt strangely comforting.
“The reason these tournaments are so good is crunch moments like that,” he reflected. “We’ve seen multiple games in this tournament including England-Nepal, games that go right down to the wire and they have real ramifications for the rest of the tournament.”
He added, “It [Afghanistan-South Africa] was obviously a great watch the other night. We were travelling here, waiting to leave for the airport, and everyone was around the TV in the hotel, delaying the bus, so it was pretty cool to watch. Hopefully there are some more good games like that in the rest of the tournament.”
New Zealand’s own campaign has lacked that drama so far: comfortable wins over Afghanistan and the UAE, a seven-wicket defeat to the Proteas. They should still reach the Super Eights, yet a slip against Canada on Tuesday in steamy Chennai would leave too much maths for comfort.
Neesham contributed an unbeaten 23 against South Africa – tidy, not headline-grabbing. The focus now is qualification, not style points. But if the Black Caps do find themselves in another knockout log-jam, he knows the rules have at least moved on.
One Super Over is no longer the end of the story.
