England Tour In New Zealand 13

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Is Chris Martin injured again or just dropped?

Saw some brief periods in this game, New Zealand were brilliant for the most of the first part of the test but then England managed to knuckle down and force a draw. This does however bode well for a good series though.
 
England lost the toss and is batting. 22 for no loss. Pitch looking good for batting...

At least there seems to be more pace and bounce. No swing though...
 
I finally got to actually see Bruce Martin bowl yesterday, and he looks alright. He did well to take four in the first innings, considering he wasn't getting all that much turn. I hope the Blackcaps can make the most of this position -- Kano is in a good spot to make triple figures, Brownlie can score, and both B-Mac and BJ are still in the hut. It sounded like the English pacemen had taken to the conditions rather well, though, so it'll be an interesting battle tomorrow.
 
Again NZ are showing passion and fight against us, its been brilliant -even the news is talking about the NZ fight back. To be fair the rain probably helps England because it has broken up the NZ play. NZ struggled somewhat in the first innings but this second innings has been a delight to watch, England didnt seem to have anything in the locker to battle them.
 
A guy commenting on Cricinfo commentary made the valid point that it makes sense to schedule the Tests in NZ at the start of the tour when rain is less likely. Rain in mid-March is more likely (but not guaranteed) to be non-torrential yet sporadic, leaving the chance of a result in an ODI or T20 much more likely. Actually, now that I've typed that, it doesn't really make sense -- the same thing can be said about a day's play in a Test. A match will be rain-affected regardless of the format.

Instead, I'll revert to my original grudge at the start of the summer, and lay blame at the fact that South Africa toured Australia and New Zealand toured South Africa in the same summer. Considering each of these Test teams host their own summer of cricket, surely it makes sense to have only one tour per summer (every how many years) that involves two southern-hemispherian teams. As a consequence, NZ's international summer started ridiculously late; they could have begun their tour of South Africa in November, when the Proteas were in Brisbane playing Tests. As much as I hoped I would be wrong, I knew we were going to have this problem with NZ's weather.
 
Kram81 said:
Yeah Eden Park always seems to be flat.
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True. I was watching on the news, the groundsmen preparing the pitch, saying that he promised it to be a bit livelier but the pitch at the Basin was suppose to be the same.

On a side note, Pietersen is out with an injury. Likely replacement...Bairstow?
 
NZ's 400 up now. Shame that Kano didn't reach triple figures, but England have definitely done well to fight back after yesterday. I do fear, however, that their slow run rate may have eaten up a bit too much time for a result to eventuate. Hopefully not.
 
With all due respect to the Blackcaps, I never would have thought there would be talks of England following on, at this time yesterday! Trent Boult is doing an excellent job and getting some (unexpected?) movement off this pitch.
 
troll3y said:
With all due respect to the Blackcaps, I never would have thought there would be talks of England following on, at this time yesterday! Trent Boult is doing an excellent job and getting some (unexpected?) movement off this pitch.
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Boulty deserved that 6fer as he's bowled beautifully on a number of occasions for little luck.

A lot of people are bagging McCullum's decision not to enforce the follow on but I think it was a good idea, seeing as we only need 150 to 200 more runs tomorrow and then we should have at least a day and a half to bowl England out. It does give England a tiny sniff with the three wickets before stumps but the great captains have always taken risks.
 
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