The Black Caps have a chance to sweep India 3-0. In India! The Silver Ferns have a chance to sweep the Diamonds 4-0. In Australia! Which of these crazy New Zealand sports stories would be, well, crazier.
Sports editor Hayden Meikle argues the case for the netballers, and cricket writer Adrian Seconi does the same for the men in white.
Silver Ferns
Winning a test series in India is the ultimate challenge in cricket - and obviously something we had not done before - so mad kudos to Tom Latham and Gary Stead and, most of all, the unlikeliest spin bowling hero in history, Mitchell Santner.
For me, however, given this is not one of the great Indian teams, and the Black Caps have mostly been darn good for nearly a decade now, it does not quite match the holy-moly-what-an-upset scale of the Silver Ferns’ achievement.
This has very much NOT been one of the great New Zealand netball teams for a while now.
With the notable exception of Grace Nweke, arguably on track to become our greatest player since Irene van Dyk, the Silver Ferns have been on the average side for a concerningly long time.
Just a year ago, they finished fourth at the World Cup, which in netball terms is not dissimilar to finishing last. They now get beaten by England for fun - indeed, they were mediocre in the series loss to the Roses that preceded the Constellation Cup. More than one fan has pondered what once would have seem heresy: is it time to replace Noeline Taurua as coach?
And now this semi-miraculous run in the Constellation Cup.
Look at the margin of victories: 14 goals, 11 goals and, most staggeringly, 18 (18!) goals in Perth. Literally nobody saw that coming.
The Silver Ferns had not won in Australia since 2019, remember. To paraphrase the words of my netball-writing colleague (thanks, Kayla), New Zealand netball fans simply do not have much faith in their team when they leave these shores, and Australia tend to lay the smack down over there.
When you look at how poor and seemingly clueless the Silver Ferns were in the series against England, and you digest the absolute dominance they displayed against Australia, it really makes no sense. And that makes it the most unlikely story of the New Zealand sporting year ... well, at least since the White Ferns did their thing.
Black Caps
It is a minor miracle.
To quote coach Noeline Taurua, the Silver Ferns have played "beautiful, stunning netball" and they have a chance to sweep Australia 4-0.
Head nods all round. Incredible stuff. And shooter Grace Nweke is rapidly climbing her way up the New Zealand sports power rankings.
But what the Black Caps have achieved was previously thought impossible in those longer-than-they-should-be chats around the water-cooler.
A 3-0 sweep was always on the cards - it was just that we ALL imagined India would be doing the sweeping.
The Black Caps have an unassailable 2-0 lead and that sits somewhere on the spectrum between dropping a piece of toast on the floor and it landing buttered-side up and getting a run of green lights when you are running late.
That is a proper miracle.
You will all remember this Black Caps team have been on a slow slide since winning the World Test Championship final in 2021.
There are just three survivors from that match - Tim Southee, Tom Latham and Devon Conway - and they had not exactly been in imperious form leading into the series.
And despite coach Gary Stead telling us Mitchell Santner was our leading spinner in all three formats, we held firmly to our doubts.
All previous descriptions of Santner as a one-armed bandit in the Otago Daily Times have now been redacted to protect his new Godlike status.
But to be fair, the left-armer had previously taken just one first-class five-wicket bag in more than 60 games.
He took 13 wickets for 157 in the second test to lead the Black Caps to 113-run win. If that is not a miracle, what is?
To add to the sense of sheer amazement, the wicket in the first test was India’s version of a dirty green seamer. What are the chances of that?
The Black Caps rolled the home team for just 46 - their lowest test total at home - to set up an eight-wicket win.
Before this, the Black Caps had won just two of their 36 tests in India and they had NEVER won a series.
Now they have doubled their wins and notched a historic series win.
And that makes it the second-most unlikely New Zealand cricket story this month.
