🔗 Share this article

England's training sessions for a hot, dry T20 World Cup in the subcontinent in the coming month brought them on Wednesday to a chilly, rainy New Zealand's largest city, where they were compelled to conduct the last practice run before their next match against the Kiwis indoors. It is not always obvious what role these bilateral series fulfill, what useful lessons could possibly be learned – but on this occasion, for at least a squad member, that is not an issue.

Tom Banton's Changed Position: From Opener to Middle Order

The cricketer says he is “continuing to develop”, and if it is the type of statement regularly trotted out even by players who have long since scaled the peak of their game, in his situation it is certainly accurate. After forging his reputation as a frontline hitter, primarily as an starting player, Banton now occupies a totally new role, coming in at the middle order. “There weren’t really too many discussions,” he said. “They simply brought me back into the team and told, ‘You’re going to bat in the middle order now.’”

Before his recall in the summer, 87% of Banton’s 162 professional T20 appearances had been as an opener, a further portion at third position and the remaining handful – but for seven balls at seventh spot in a T20 Blast game previously – at fourth place. If England intend to keep him in this altered role he requires every chance to become accustomed to it, and he has already worked out one thing: “Batting in the middle order,” he concluded, “is a much tougher than starting the innings.”

Mixed Results in the Tour

The player noted that “sometimes where it works well and it looks great and other times where it doesn’t”, and the initial matches of the tour in the host nation have featured one of each. In the opener, he lasted a few deliveries and made a low score before getting out to long-on; in the second, he played 12 deliveries, hit runs, and finished unbeaten.

Thoughts on Comeback and Growth

This tour has witnessed Banton return to the nation in which he made his international debut in November 2019. Since then, he moved away of the team, had a short comeback in recently and then spent a long period in the wilderness before returning for the new captain's first T20 as skipper. “During the journey, it was weird,” he said. “It was six years ago when I made my debut. It feels like a lot has happened in that time. I’ve learned a lot about me. The few years after I got dropped from the national team was a difficult phase for me. I had a couple of years stretch where I was working myself out.”

Support from Team Management

And now, he has been given a fresh challenge to work out. Banton is grateful to have been offered a return, and also for Brendon McCullum’s skill to put him at ease while he figures out how best to grasp it. “The coach came up to me before [Monday’s second T20] and said, ‘Head out and express yourself.’ It's reassuring to have that freedom,” Banton said. “I realize it’s just a brief comment someone says, but it provides the support that if it doesn't work, it’s not the end of the world. It’s something so small but for me it’s, ‘Alright, I’ve got the backing from the manager and I can step up and perform.’”

Venue Change and Squad Decisions

After playing the initial matches of the series at Christchurch’s Hagley Park, a stadium with expansive playing area, the visitors complete it on Thursday at the Auckland arena, a multi-use rugby and cricket ground where the field edge at a short distance is among the shortest in the world. With uncertain weather and an new location they have abandoned their usual practice of announcing their team ahead of time while they work out if their ideal XI here will be the identical as the one that started both previous games.

Upcoming Changes for ODI Series

On Friday, they travel to the coastal town and shift attention to one-day internationals, with a somewhat changed squad: Jordan Cox, Zak Crawley and Phil Salt drop out, while Jofra Archer, Ben Duckett, Joe Root and Jamie Smith join the squad. Three of those players landed in Auckland on Wednesday but the timing of the bowler's Test match buildup means he will arrive two days later, travelling with Mark Wood and Josh Tongue, two seamers who are also preparing for the longer format in the away series but are excluded from the limited-overs team. Consequently Archer will be absent for the first match at Bay Oval, the stadium where he was racially abused on his sole prior visit, in a few years back.