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England's training sessions for a warm, arid T20 World Cup in the subcontinent in the coming month led them on midweek to a cool, drizzly New Zealand's largest city, where they were forced to hold the final training session ahead of their next match against New Zealand indoors. It is not always obvious what role these bilateral series serve, what useful lessons could possibly be learned – but on this occasion, for at least a squad member, that is no concern.

The Batter's Changed Position: Starting Batsman to Lower Down

Tom Banton says he is “continuing to develop”, and if it is the type of statement regularly trotted out even by players who have already reached the pinnacle of their sport, in his situation it is undeniably true. After building his name as a top-order batter, mostly as an opener, Banton now occupies a completely unfamiliar position, coming in at five or six. “I didn't have too many discussions,” he said. “I just got brought me back into the team and informed me, ‘You’re going to bat in the lower batting lineup now.’”

Prior to returning in June, the vast majority of Banton’s 162 senior T20 innings had been as an opener, another 8% at No3 and the remaining handful – but for seven balls at No 7 in a domestic T20 game previously – at fourth place. If England plan to keep him in this new position 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 lot harder than starting the innings.”

Mixed Results in New Zealand

Banton said that “sometimes where it comes off and it appears brilliant and other times where it doesn’t”, and the initial matches of the tour in New Zealand have seen one of each. In the first, he faced a few deliveries and made a low score before getting out to long-on; in the second, he faced a dozen balls, scored 29, and finished unbeaten.

Reflections on Comeback and Development

This tour has seen Banton return to the country in which he first played for his country in November 2019. Since then, he moved away of the side, had a short comeback in 2022 and then passed more than three years in the sidelines before coming back for the new captain's first T20 as England captain. “On the flight over, it was strange,” he said. “Time has passed when I started internationally. It feels like a lot has occurred in that time. I’ve learned a lot about me. The few years after I was left out from England was a difficult phase for me. I had a two- to three-year stretch where I was working myself out.”

Backing from Coaching Staff

And now, he has been given something new to tackle. Banton is thankful to have been offered a return, and also for the coach's skill to make him comfortable while he works out how best to grasp it. “Baz came up to me before [the recent game] and said, ‘Go out and play your natural game.’ It's reassuring to have that freedom,” Banton said. “I know it’s only a small thing from the staff, but it provides the support that if it doesn’t come off, it’s not the end of the world. It is so small but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the approval from the head coach and I can go out and do it.’”

Venue Change and Team Selection

Following the first two games of the contest at the South Island ground, a venue with unusually long boundaries, England finish the series on the next day at the Auckland arena, a dual-purpose rugby and cricket ground where the straight boundary at 55m is among the shortest in the world. With changeable conditions and an new location they have dropped their recent habit of revealing their team two days in advance while they determine if their preferred team here will be the same as the side that started the earlier fixtures.

Upcoming Changes for One-Day Matches

On Friday, they travel to Mount Maunganui and shift attention to one-day internationals, with a somewhat changed team: three players drop out, while four others join the squad. Most newcomers arrived in the city on Wednesday but the scheduling of Archer’s Ashes preparations implies he will arrive later, flying with Mark Wood and Josh Tongue, two seamers who are also building towards the Tests in the away series but are excluded from the limited-overs team. As a result Archer will be absent for the first match at the venue, the stadium where he was subjected to abuse on his only previous appearance, in a few years back.