The New Zealand and Otago seamer expanded his walk-on part with the Black Caps to a starring role, picked up a bunch of trophies at the New Zealand Cricket awards, played in a T20 World Cup final and helped the Royal Challengers Bengaluru win the title in his debut IPL season.
‘‘I haven’t won an actual competition since, you know, the HRV Cup back in, what was it, 2013?’’ Duffy mused.
‘‘It was nice to feel that again.
‘‘I had a World Cup final three months ago, and now an IPL final at the same stadium, so there’s been some pretty big events happening all in a short space of time.
‘‘At the time, it’s pretty hard to, I guess, appreciate it all, especially when you’re away from home for so long.
‘‘But, yeah, it’s something I’ll look back on one day and be like ‘that was pretty cool’.’’
Pretty cool, indeed.
The Royal Challengers beat the Gujarat Titans by five wickets with two overs to spare.
There were just over 90,000 spectators at the IPL final in Ahmedabad and most of them were there to support Duffy’s team.
To put that into context, that is almost the entire population of Southland (104,800), where Duffy grew up.
‘‘It was pretty amazing to have that sort of crowd on your side, cheering you on.
‘‘But, to be fair, once you’re in the game, you forget all about that kind of stuff and the crowd size.
‘‘It’s pretty loud, I’m not going to lie. But I get a little bit more intimidated by a more intimate Dunedin crowd, where you can hear every individual person, compared to 90,000 screaming Indians, where you can’t make out what they say.
‘‘Obviously, it’s cool and everything, but that doesn’t worry me too much in terms of getting intimidated by that.’’
What can be intimidating
is playing against and with some of the best players in the world.
His team-mates included the likes of Virat Kohli and Josh Hazlewood.
‘‘That’s one of the cool parts of IPL, isn’t it? You get to rub shoulders with the best in the world.
‘‘I was so grateful. RCB’s a very good set-up. It’s very well run.
‘‘The coaching staff and all those guys are top drawer. Everyone’s just so down to earth.
‘‘I sort of thought going into it, I was a little bit worried, you know, there might be a bit of ego and stuff going around.
‘‘But honestly, there was none of it.
‘‘It was very easy to be part of, put it that way.’’
Between the T20 World Cup and the IPL, Duffy was in India for four and a-half months. His wife, Natasha, is expecting the couple’s first child this month, so it was a wrench to be away for so long.
Duffy is skipping the tour of England to be at home in Dunedin for the birth.
It is a big life event and he is looking forward to becoming a father.
He would not miss it, but he saw some of the action from the first tests between New Zealand and England at Lord’s and would have liked a bowl on what was a sticky wicket.
Watching some of his friends and, well, rivals for the seaming spots in the Black Caps lineup take a big bag of wickets was both a rewarding and challenging viewing experience.
‘‘You do get a little bit of Fomo [fear of missing out] sitting here watching it.
‘‘The Ireland one [test] was probably the hardest to watch because I was just sitting there — at the time I wasn’t in the RCB lineup — so I was just sitting there on the sidelines watching them.
‘‘But the boys are bowling nicely. We’ve got so much test cricket. It’s obviously a huge year for test cricket in New Zealand and, obviously, competition for spots is good.’’
