Player Profile(#27)...Tim Southee (New Zealand)

Timothy Grant Southee (born 11 December 1988 in Whangarei, New Zealand) is a New Zealand cricketer. He is a right-arm fast-medium bowler who plays international cricket for New Zealand and State Championship cricket for Northern Districts and plays for Northland in the Hawke Cup. He made his first-class debut on 19 February 2007 at the age of eighteen.

After an impressive start to his career with Northern Districts, Southee was picked to play for a New Zealand side in a Twenty20 match against a Bangladesh side on December 23, 2007. The game was a charity match for cyclone relief in Bangladesh.

On 30 January 2008, Southee was named in the New Zealand squad for two Twenty20 International games and three One Day International games against England. New Zealand Cricket Selection Manager, Sir Richard Hadlee said:

"Why delay producing a player of some talent? Perhaps I could compare him with Brendon McCullum when he started (in 2002) - he had a lot of potential. It might take a lot of time for Tim to find his feet but why wait two or three years when someone is in a special category? The feed back we're getting is that this guy has got it. "He runs in relatively straight, he gets through his action nicely and he moves the ball, particularly away from the batsman."

He made his official international debut on 5 February 2008 in the first Twenty20 match. In the second match, Southee was New Zealand's best bowler with figures of 2/22 from four overs.

Southee then traveled to Malaysia to play in the 2008 Under-19 Cricket World Cup, where he finished as Player-of-the-Tournament after taking 17 wickets at 6.64 with an economy rate of 2.52 runs per over.

After an injury ruled Kyle Mills out of the third Test match of England's tour, Southee was picked to make his Test match debut on 22 March 2008 at Napier. He had an immediate impact in the first day's play, dismissing Michael Vaughan and Andrew Strauss in his second and third overs, and then later claiming the wicket of Kevin Pietersen. On the second day's play he took the two wickets needed to complete a debut five-wicket haul, finishing with 5-55. During New Zealand's second innings against England, whilst chasing an improbable target of 553, Southee launched an attack on the England bowlers hitting nine sixes and four fours, with his debut fifty coming off twenty-nine balls. The fifty was the fastest in New Zealand test history, replacing Ian Smith's previous record of thirty four balls. He eventually finished on 77* from 40 balls. Only four other test cricketers have hit more sixes in an innings, Wally Hammond, Nathan Astle, Matthew Hayden and Wasim Akram.

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