England lose in Wellington

New Zealand v England, T20 (second of five), The Cake Tin, 3 November 2019

Scorecard

It is always a pleasure to welcome England to these shores, but the publication of the schedule a few months ago registered a high on the apprehension scale among the cricketing faithful. International cricket at the start of November? We did a collective impression of Sgt Wilson from Dad’s Army, asking “do you think that’s wise?”. The New Zealand climate is a capricious thing at the best of times, but give it international cricket to mess with and it becomes as flighty as a granny fed champagne for breakfast at Christmas.

For this reason, the tour has largely been kept out of the South Island, after the first T20 in Christchurch last Friday. (The third game is in Nelson, but that doesn’t count; it is on the same latitude as Wellington, but whereas the capital looks south, nothing between it and the penguins, Nelson is a north-facing suntrap, generating more vitamin D than is good for anybody). Of course, the weather has made fools of this protective scheduling. Unprecedented 30-degree temperatures swept the South Island today, and some of the North too. You have already guessed where the lowest maximum in New Zealand today was registered: the Kelburn weather station, which overlooks the Cake Tin. Mind you we would have settled for that 18 degrees if offered, and it was wise to play the game in the afternoon. I write in what would have been the mid-innings break and a swirling mist is enveloping the house as if it were captioned “London 1862”.

The two teams had an experimental feel about them. For New Zealand, Kane Williamson is missing the series because of a hip injury (but we all staying as calm as we can in the circumstances). Pleasingly, Trent Boult has made it a priority to play in the Plunket Shield rather than the first three of these games. England are also prioritising the tests. Root, Buttler, Archer, Stokes and Woakes are all missing the T20s but will be here for the tests later in the month, which is the right way round.

Joe Denly also misses the T20 series through injury. I hope that he is fit for the tests. If not, he may not get another chance, having been written off prematurely by some despite creditable performances in the Ashes series. Denly’s grandmother was kind to me as a lunchtime playground supervisor at Herne Bay Infant School in the sixties, so you will find nothing that isn’t positive about him in these columns.

England won the toss and put New Zealand in, which had worked a treat in their easy victory at Hagley Oval on Friday. Sam Curran, who has progressed from promising newcomer to senior bowler with only a scant intervening period, opened along with one of the two debutants, Saqib Mahmood of Lancashire, who, by way of welcome to international cricket, went for six twice in his first over, once by Guptill and once by Munro. The latter was lbw to Curran in the next over, after which Pat Brown of Worcestershire, playing his second international game, replaced Mahmood. He was also given a reminder that he had taken a big step up, with 15 coming from his first four deliveries. He should have had Seifert caught next ball, but Vince put down what looked a straightforward chance at backward point.

We last came across James Vince at Canterbury just over a month ago, looking I thought a bit doleful as he came out to bat having just learned that he had fallen well down the test pecking order. He would look back on that as a time of celebration compared to the nightmare day he had today. That was the first of three chances he put down. The second would have been the catch of the season and he did well to dive and get a hand to it as he ran from long on to long off. The third was on the mid-wicket boundary and looked as easy as the first. To be kind, both may have come to him straight out of the sun. A four-ball one rounded off his day. That will happen to anybody occasionally, even a player as good as Vince undoubtedly is. I hope he resisted the temptation to buy a Lotto ticket though; not today.

It wasn’t only Vince who had a bad day in the field. Billings couldn’t hold a high gloved chance from Guptill, Curran might have taken a hard one at backward square leg and Malan dropped the easiest of the lot in the last over. New Zealand missed nothing and that was the main difference today.

Colin De Grandhomme came in at No 4. One day he will stay there for the rest of the innings and put the game so far out of reach that it won’t be worth the other side coming out to bat. Today he made 28 from 12, giving those that followed a little time to breath.

I had just written a note that England’s bowling inexperience was showing when the Lewis Gregory, the other debutant, came on and took a wicket first ball. I had hoped that Somerset’s other representative, Tom Banton, would play today. I suspect that in twenty years’ time it would be something to say that you had seen his first international appearance.

Chris Jordan bowled magnificently, with a slower ball that is one of the best in the business. It is a reflection of England’s ODI strength that they could omit as fine a bowler from the World Cup squad. Sam Curran was also very good. Was the total of 176 for eight enough? Opinion was divided in the members’ lounge, “about par” a common phrase.

England began in the worst possible way as Jonny Bairstow dinked an easy catch to mid on off Southee. The ball may have held up a little, sending the stock of the home total up a few points. Vince’s unhappy day ended soon after, bringing Eoin Morgan in. There followed the most interesting passage of play in the game. New Zealand fed his strength square on the offside, placing, at one point, three backward points, sometimes polishing the apple of temptation by removing third man. Morgan responded by cutting over the top of them to the effect of 32 from 17 balls when he was out to Santner, whose strategy was more orthodox. Morgan was caught at long on by De Grandhomme, on almost the exact patch of turf on which Adam Milne dived to catch him in the World Cup game here four years ago. Then, it precipitated a collapse like an Antarctic ice shelf from global warming. Today the consequences were not as spectacular, but it was as significant a turning point.

Morgan was the first of five England batsmen to be caught on or near the Cake Tin’s long straight boundaries, a sequence that drove the English press contingent into social media apoplexy. Why aim for the long straight boundaries when the short square ones are available? Could they have been taking out the frustration of a late night watching the rugby? I thought Morgan’s post-match analysis to be more reasonable. He praised the New Zealand bowlers for forcing the England batsmen to hit straight, which they did better than the England bowlers. Why, after all, would a batsman hit to a long boundary if he could choose a short one?

In defence of the Cake Tin, though it is an oval, the square boundaries are not ridiculously short. It is a decent shape for a cricket field, which is why it is not so good for rugby and football’s rectangles, from which most spectators are at some distance.

The game seemed to be settled with the required rate nearing 12 an over after 13 overs. With four balls of his spell left, Ish Sodhi would have been pretty happy with two for 15. Jordan hit those four deliveries for a four followed by three sixes, to bring England right back into it. Two more boundaries followed before Jordan became the latest to hole out in the deep, for 36 from 19. A six from Gregory, who had a good debut, was the last of the resistance. The winning margin of 21 runs made it look a touch easier than it felt when first Morgan, then Jordan were hammering the bowling.

T20 is notoriously difficult to predict, but three-two would be a safe enough prediction as long as one isn’t tied down to who has three and who two.

This was an enjoyable game, and a good start to my international cricket watching (the game in Singapore not withstanding), which will see India in Wellington in 2020 and me in Sydney for the New Year test between Australia and New Zealand.

New Zealand v England, Third T20 International, the Cake Tin, Wellington, 15 February 2013

http://www.espncricinfo.com/new-zealand-v-england-2013/engine/current/match/569239.html

“It's not the despair, Laura. I can take the despair. It's the hope I can't stand”—Brian Stimpson (played by John Cleese) in the 1987 film Clockwise.

Cleese (a Somerset supporter by the way) might have been speaking for New Zealand cricket fans. Our hearts were brim-full of hope as we made our way to the Cake Tin for the decider in the three-game T20 series against the visitors from the frozen north. England won the first game, in Auckland, resoundingly. But in Hamilton, New Zealand bounced back like Tigger, to take the game by 55 runs. That’s the nature of T20 cricket, of course: bingo in coloured clothing.

Over the course of two-and-a-half hours all those hopes drained into the harbour as England dominated the game as it did the seas at the height of Empire.

Among the optimistic throng were my Waikato Correspondent (who had presented me with the best Valentine’s Day gift ever—a 1961 Wisden) and (this was something a thought that I would never live to see) my Island Bay Correspondent who has previously regarded the prospect of an evening’s cricket with the enthusiasm of a tuna with a booking at a sushi restaurant.

Stuart Broad put New Zealand in and, together with Steve Finn, subjected openers Hamish Rutherford and Martin Guptill to a disciplined and hostile opening spell, with plenty of short stuff and a tight line that offered little leeway for shots square of the wicket.

The assembled correspondents got a shock when Rutherford drove the first boundary of the innings: it was then we discovered that we were only a few metres away from six flame throwers that shot towers of fire into the air in celebration of every New Zealand boundary. On another night this would have been a welcome aid to spectator comfort; I have worked up a fair Captain Oates impersonation watching under the Cake Tin’s lights over the years. But this was another balmy day in Wellington’s long hot summer and it was pleasant to sit in the open air.

Rutherford gloved a short ball to short fine leg off Broad in the fourth over, but Brendon McCullum and Guptill found the change bowlers easier to score from. By the end of the ninth over New Zealand were 60 for one, with plenty of wickets left to push towards the 175 or so that we expected would be necessary to give the home team the advantage when England replied.

That was when the trouble started. Wickets fell regularly as the English attack bowled with intelligence and discipline. The flame throwers were unused from the thirteenth to sixteenth overs, as no boundaries were hit in this period, a musical with no songs. Guptill remained, but never got going. When he was out in the penultimate over he had scored 59 from 55 balls with only three boundaries, nowhere near the going rate in this form of the game.

Broad (three for 15) and Finn (18 off four overs) were outstanding. New Zealand batsmen have little experience of hostile, accurate short bowling and find it difficult to deal with. This does not bode well for the weeks to come. Kent’s new captain (I wore my Kent shirt in his honour) James Tredwell was proficient with one for 31. Jade Dernbach was expensive but interesting with his back-of-the-hand variations and took three wickets. The surprise package was Joe Root, the next-big-thing as a batsman, and a phantom off spinner, as Ross Taylor discovered. Taylor put Root in the stand over deep mid-wicket, but failed to spot that Root had held the next ball back when he tried a repeat and was caught by Bairstow on the boundary.

The fielding was almost impeccable, the spilling of a hard chance at mid off by Finn the only lapse. New Zealand finished on 139 for eight. We knew that it was not enough, but did not perceive by how very much it was not enough.

Alex Hales and Michael Lumb, both of Nottinghamshire, opened the batting. The last time there was such an uneven contest between the English and the locals in these parts, one side had guns and the other did not. Hales hit two fours in the first over off Boult as a sign of things to come. Mitchell McClenaghan started with a maiden, but Lumb hit the first two balls of his next over for six.

New Zealand had the chance of a breakthrough when Hales skyed a balled in from of square leg. Taylor was closest. Elliott set off at pace from the outfield and could have taken it reasonably comfortably. But Brendon McCullum had has eye on the ball, and the intent and singularity of purpose of a shopper at the January sales making a beeline for a little Versace number at 75% off. Nothing was going to get in his way. Both players who might have taken the catch wisely placed their own preservation above the needs of their team and stayed out of the road, just as a sensible person would not attempt to reason with a charging bull. McCullum executed a dive with pike and twist as he leapt past Elliott, but the ball dropped through his gloves to the ground.

That was it, pretty much. England raced to their target, reaching it in the thirteenth over. Lumb completed the carnage with a six onto the roof of the stadium, a smite even bigger than Martin Guptill’s against South Africa last year. Lumb made 53 from 34 balls, Hales 80 from 42. Lumb hit five sixes, Hales four. The astonishing thing is that both players were on the plane the following day, not needed for the ODI series that followed. England have Cook and Trott ready to replace them.

The flame throwers, reserved for New Zealand wickets, were still throughout the second half of the match, so it was an energy-efficient defeat, at least.

A one-day series of three games follows, and I will be in Dunedin when the Test series begins there on 6 March, despair notwithstanding.