Jim Harris looks on as his son Ryan runs through New Zealand on Test debut © Cricinfo Ltd

When Ryan Harris ran through the New Zealand lower order on Tuesday morning and helped Australia to victory, there was only one man at the Basin Reserve prouder of his efforts than the bowler himself. Sitting high up in the RA Vance stand, Jim Harris was a satisfied man, quietly watching his son getting rewarded for all his hard work.

It was an emotional time for the Harris family. Ryan said last week that when he received his baggy green he would be thinking of his mother Gai, who died from lung cancer in 2006. His father and brother Gavin were on hand to witness his Test debut, having flown out from Australia with only the hope that he would get the nod to play.

As it turned out, Jim nearly missed his son’s cap presentation as the public gates at the Basin Reserve were still closed when the Australians circled around their newest Test player on the ground on Friday morning. A quick appeal to the security staff and he was ushered around to another entrance, hustled in to the venue and was just in time to see the memorable moment.

Jim rode the highs and lows of the match with Ryan, from his first wicket when Michael Hussey held on to a catch at gully, to a worrying crash in the field with Mitchell Johnson that left them both a bit sore, to the three wickets he collected on the final morning to set up Australia’s win. That Harris finished the game with six wickets pleased his father – Jim had bet a mate that his son would take 12 for the series because “if he gets three in every innings he’s done his job”.

Ryan has a tattoo of his mother’s star sign on his chest and said during last week that “she’s always with me”. This week Dad was there, too, and boy was he proud.

	Prolific spectator: Luke Gillian © Cricinfo Ltd

While Michael Clarke was on the way to his highest Test score, another milestone was being celebrated on the grassy hill at the Basin Reserve. Australia’s most dedicated fan was watching his 150th Test match. Not a bad effort for a man who hasn’t even hit his 40th birthday.

In his colourful shirts, replica baggy green and with his Australian flag in hand, Luke Gillian has become a fixture of Australian tours all over the world. So much so that when he celebrated his 100th Test, in Auckland five years ago, he became the first non-team member to sing "Under the Southern Cross" with the players in the rooms after a win, when Justin Langer invited him to join them.

“My first time in the dressing room was in Karachi ’98,” Gillian told Cricinfo at the Basin Reserve. “I was there when the boys were lining up to sing the team song and I thought ‘You beauty, fantastic.’ But then Ian Healy came around and said ‘Out! Team only!’ So I listened to the team song through the window and 69 Test matches later I was in there.”

The first Test he ever attended was the Centenary Test, when he was six years old, and his first overseas Test was in Barbados in 1995. Although he admits that following the team all over the world is getting “a bit weary”, he rests up between tours by working as a chef in London.

Gillian is a staunch Australian fan and loves to be on hand to support his boys, but what he’s most interested in is seeing terrific Test cricket. To that end, his favourite series was one that Australia didn’t even win: the 2-1 loss in India in 2000-01.

“It was fantastic Test cricket from the shellacking that we handed out to India in three days in Mumbai to that classic match in Kolkata that pretty much goes down in cricket folklore,” he said. “Fifty years from now, people will still be going ‘Did that really happen? Did they follow on and score 657 and then roll us out?’ And then to go on to Chennai, which was my 50th Test, and to have it go down to day five and that last session.”

The numbers roll off his tongue with certainty, perhaps because he carries with him a diary in which he records scores and statistics from all the games he has attended. His current book dates back to the home series against Sri Lanka in 2007-08 and he has at least 10 diaries at home, although he was devastated to lose the book that had his scores from the 2003 World Cup. There are sure to be plenty more to come.

	There would be a new twist to the rivalry between Richard Hadlee and the Chappell brothers © Getty Images

Flying from Melbourne to Wellington feels more like a domestic trip than an international voyage. Passports are not stamped, accents change only slightly and it’s a shorter flight than from Melbourne to Perth. Even when an Australian settles down in New Zealand, their TV screens show Aussie sights like Eddie McGuire asking million-dollar questions and Kevin Rudd answering queries of his own on parliament question time.

The two countries have their own distinct characteristics but share much more than not. The former New Zealand prime minister Mike Moore once said that Australians and New Zealanders had more in common than New Yorkers and Californians. Some of that goes back to the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) of World War I but even earlier, in the 1890s, New Zealand considered joining the soon-to-be Federation of Australia. Even Fiji was in the mix to become a state, while Western Australia was a somewhat reluctant participant.

Obviously New Zealand chose to go its own way and WA joined, although the state did hold a referendum in the 1930s over the possibility of seceding. And that brings me to my point. What if the Federation of Australia featured six states – Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand – while Western Australia remained independent? What would that mean for the sporting landscape?

There would be no Michael Hussey in the Australian cricket team, and in years gone by Dennis Lillee and Rod Marsh would have lined up against the baggy-green wearing Jeff Thomson, Greg Chappell and Doug Walters. The Australian side would have enjoyed the benefit of a certain Sir Richard Hadlee, while Daniel Vettori and Shane Warne could have bowled spin in tandem.

The underarm ball, which helped solidify the cricketing antagonism between the two countries, would never have happened. There would be no rivalry between the All Blacks and the Wallabies and the intertwined histories of the two nations’ netball sides would cease to exist. No, it’s better this way. Everyone needs a friendly rival, with whom competition is fierce and comradeship is even stronger. But domestic holidays in Fiji would have been nice.