This magnificent Almanack has earned many friends over the years and will assuredly continue to do so. Every cricket lover will relish the arrival of this latest edition. The 67th edition of the New Zealand Cricket Almanack is the 32nd under the current editors - Francis Payne and Ian Smith.

2014 New Zealand Cricket Almanack is the most compact and efficiently organised production. The text is lively and interesting throughout.

The publishers are to be congratulated on this outstanding production, which is a pleasure to peruse, handsome to handle and reasonably priced. Thanks to superb efforts of Francis Payne and Ian Smith, cricket's library has been enriched by the appearance of this Almanack over the years.

Apart from international cricket - Tests, ODIs and Twenty20 Internationals - played by New Zealand during the last twelve months, the Almanack also includes complete coverage of domestic cricket, including Plunket Shield, the Ford Trophy, the HRV Cup, the women's 50-over and Twenty20 Competitions, Hawke Cup and age-group cricket.

Corey Anderson, Michael Bracewell and James Neesham have been chosen as Promising Players of the Year and Tim Southee amd Kane Williamson as Players of the Year by the Almanack.

An absorbing compilation of the season's happenings, as in the previous years, is the highlight of this Almanack. The statistical highlights, covered in this section, are not to be seen in any other cricket publication and website. Some of the interesting Happenings covered in this Almanack are:

• Ross Taylor and Brendon McCullum created Test history when they walked out to resume their innings on the second day of the first Test against West Indies at University Oval. It was the first time two New Zealand batsmen had each begun the day with a hundred to their name. Taylor being unbeaten on 103 and McCullum on 109.
• Ross Taylor had scores of 217 not out and 16 not out at Dunedin, 129 at Wellington and 131 and 2 not out at Hamilton in the three Tests against the West Indies in December 2013 to become the first New Zealand batsman to register hundreds in each match of a three-Test series. Ken Barrington (England), Shoaib Mohammad & Mohammad Yousuf (Pakistan) and Matthew Hayden (Australia) are the only other batsmen to have done this.
• Brendon McCullum joined the most elite company when he scored a double century (224 at Auckland) and a triple century (302 at Wellington) in consecutive Tests vs India during the past season. The only other players to have ever done this, in any order, are Walter Hammond and Don Bradman.
• McCullum became only the second batsman in Test history to make a triple century in a team's second innings. Pakistan's Hanif Mohammad was the first batsman to accomplish the feat when he batted an estimated 970 minutes to score 337 against West Indies at Kensington Oval in Bridgetown in 1957-58.
• There have been only six triple century partnerships for the sixth wicket in Test cricket. Brendon McCullum is the only player to be involved twice - 352 with WJ Watling vs India at Wellington in 2013-14 and 339 with Martin Guptill vs Bangladesh at Hamilton in 2009-10.

A detailed statistical section, covering Tests, ODIs and First-class cricket apart from New Zealand limited-overs records and Obituaries section, as always, are always exhaustive.

Many happy hours can be spent absorbing the endless data. As one would expect from Fancis Payne and Ian Smith, there is a wealth of information covering both team and individual achievements that makes the work an essential purchase for anyone interested in New Zealand cricket or statistics in general. Highly recommended Almanack