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The English side's preparations for a hot, dry T20 World Cup in India in the coming month brought them on midweek to a cool, drizzly New Zealand's largest city, where they were compelled to conduct the last training session before their third game against New Zealand inside. The purpose isn't always clear what role these bilateral series fulfill, what useful lessons could possibly be learned – but on this instance, for at least a squad member, that is no concern.

Tom Banton's New Role: From Opener to Lower Down

Tom Banton says he is “continuing to develop”, and if it is the type of statement often repeated even by athletes who have already reached the pinnacle of their game, in his case it is undeniably true. After building his name as a top-order batter, primarily as an opener, Banton suddenly finds himself a totally new role, batting at five or six. “I didn't have too many conversations,” he said. “I just got brought me back into the team and told, ‘You’re going to bat in the lower batting lineup now.’”

Prior to returning in the summer, 87% of Banton’s 162 senior T20 innings had been as an opener, another 8% at No3 and the rest – but for a brief stint at seventh spot in a domestic T20 game previously – at No 4. If England intend to keep him in this new position he requires every possible opportunity to become accustomed to it, and he has already worked out one thing: “Playing down the order,” he surmised, “is a much tougher than opening.”

Varied Performances in the Tour

The player noted that “sometimes where it works well and it looks great and on other occasions where it doesn’t”, and the first two games of the tour in New Zealand have seen one of each. In the opener, he faced nine balls and made a low score before getting out to long-on; in the second, he played a dozen balls, scored 29, and ended the innings unbeaten.

Thoughts on Return and Growth

The current series has witnessed Banton come back to the country in which he first played for his country in November 2019. Since then, he drifted back out of the team, had a short comeback in recently and then passed a long period in the wilderness before coming back for Harry Brook’s first T20 as England captain. “On the flight over, it was weird,” he said. “Time has passed when I started internationally. It feels like a lot has occurred in that period. I’ve learned a lot about me. The period after I got dropped from the national team was a tough time for me. I had a couple of years period where I was working myself out.”

Backing from Team Management

And now, he has been assigned a fresh challenge to tackle. Banton is grateful to have been given another chance, and also for the coach's skill to make him comfortable while he works out how best to seize the opportunity. “Baz came up to me before [Monday’s second T20] and said, ‘Go out and express yourself.’ It’s nice to have that freedom,” Banton said. “I realize it’s only a small thing from the staff, but it gives me the backing that if it doesn’t come off, it’s not a disaster. It’s something so small but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the approval from the manager and I can go out and perform.’”

Shift in Location and Team Selection

After playing the initial matches of the contest at Christchurch’s Hagley Park, a stadium with expansive playing area, the visitors complete it on the next day at the Auckland arena, a multi-use rugby and cricket ground where the straight boundary at a short distance is among the most compact in the sport. With changeable conditions and an unfamiliar venue they have dropped their usual practice of announcing their team two days in advance while they determine if their preferred team here will be the identical as the side that began both previous games.

Squad Adjustments for ODI Series

Next, they move to the coastal town and shift attention to one-day internationals, with a slightly amended squad: Jordan Cox, Zak Crawley and Phil Salt drop out, while four others join the squad. Three of those players arrived in the city on the same day but the scheduling of Archer’s Test match buildup implies he will arrive two days later, flying with Mark Wood and Josh Tongue, two seamers who are also building towards the longer format in the away series but are not in the limited-overs team. As a result Archer will miss the first match at Bay Oval, the stadium where he was racially abused on his sole prior visit, in a few years back.