CricketGeek Player Profiles: Colin Munro

Colin Munro is a left handed batsman and right-arm medium pace bowler from Auckland. He was born in Durban, South Africa, but moved to New Zealand as a teenager. His brother played youth cricket with Hashim Amla, but it wasn't until he came to New Zealand that Colin started to make a name for himself as a cricketer.

He played 5 matches for the New Zealand under 19 team, and then was picked in the Auckland team as a specialist bowler, batting at number 11. He has a strange delivery stride with his bowling, that causes the ball to skid onto the batsmen somewhat. As a result he has been an effective holding bowler, doing jobs like bowling into the wind, keeping things tight at the other end to a spin bowler, and seeing in the new ball.

Due to his aggressive batting style, and defensive bowling, he was typecast as a limited overs player, and he was worried that he had been pigeon-holed, and wouldn't play any first class cricket. He didn't play a single first class match between November 2010 and February 2012, and was stuck with a record of having played 6 first class matches, with a highest score of 37 and an average of 14.29.

However during this time he did start to score in the t20 and list A matches for Auckland, playing 18 t20 innings at an average of 30, and 18 list A innings at an average of 38.4. As a result the Auckland coach decided to give him another try in the first class team and he did not disappoint.

He hit a hundred in his first match back, and has averaged 77.54 in his 10 matches since his comeback as a batsman, with 4 hundreds and 4 fifties in 14 innings. The highlight of that time was a sensational 269* off 252 balls against Wellington, with an attack featuring 3 international bowlers.

Due to an injury to James Franklin, he's been picked to play in the 2nd test between South Africa and New Zealand at St George's Park in Port Elizabeth. It will be interesting to see if he can translate his domestic form to the international game.