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The English side's preparations for a hot, dry T20 World Cup in India in the coming month led them on Wednesday to a cool, drizzly New Zealand's largest city, where they were forced to conduct the final training session ahead of their next match against New Zealand indoors. The purpose isn't always clear what role these two-team contests fulfill, what valuable insights could possibly be learned – but on this occasion, for at least a squad member, that is not an issue.

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

Tom Banton says he is “still learning now”, and if it is the type of statement often repeated even by athletes who have already reached the peak of their game, in his case it is certainly accurate. After building his name as a top-order batter, mostly as an starting player, Banton now occupies a totally new position, coming in at five or six. “There weren’t really too many conversations,” he said. “They simply brought me back into the team and told, ‘Your role will be in the lower batting lineup now.’”

Before his recall in June, 87% of Banton’s 162 professional T20 appearances had been as an opener, a further portion at third position and the rest – but for a brief stint at No 7 in a T20 Blast game eight years ago – at No 4. If England plan to keep him in this altered role he needs every chance to become accustomed to it, and he has figured out a key point: “Playing down the order,” he concluded, “is a lot harder than starting the innings.”

Varied Performances in the Tour

Banton said that “there’s going to be times where it comes off and it appears brilliant and on other occasions where it fails”, and the first two games of the tour in New Zealand have seen both outcomes. In the opener, he lasted nine balls and scored nine runs before getting out to the deep fielder; in the next game, he played a dozen balls, scored 29, and finished not out.

Thoughts on Comeback and Growth

The current series has seen Banton come back to the nation in which he made his international debut in November 2019. After that, he moved away of the team, made a brief return in 2022 and then passed more than three years in the wilderness before coming back for Harry Brook’s initial match as skipper. “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 discovered a lot about me. The period after I got dropped from England was a tough time for me. I had a two- to three-year stretch where I was working myself out.”

Backing from Coaching Staff

Currently, he has been assigned something new to tackle. Banton is thankful to have been given another chance, and also for the coach's skill to make him comfortable while he works out how best to grasp it. “The coach approached me before [the recent game] and said, ‘Go out and express yourself.’ It’s nice to have that freedom,” Banton said. “I realize it’s just a brief comment someone says, but it gives me the support that if it doesn't work, it’s not the end of the world. It’s something so minor but for me it’s, ‘Alright, I’ve got the backing from the head coach and I can step up and do it.’”

Shift in Location and Team Selection

After playing the initial matches of the contest at the South Island ground, a stadium with expansive playing area, 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 sport. With uncertain weather and an new location they have dropped their usual practice of revealing their team ahead of time while they determine if their ideal XI here will be the identical as the side that started both previous games.

Upcoming Changes for One-Day Matches

On Friday, they move to the coastal town and turn focus to ODIs, with a slightly amended team: three players are omitted, while four others join the squad. Three of those players arrived in Auckland on the same day but the scheduling of the bowler's Test match buildup means he will follow two days later, flying with Mark Wood and Josh Tongue, two seamers who are also preparing for the longer format in Australia but are not in the white-ball squad. As a result Archer will miss the opening game at Bay Oval, the stadium where he was racially abused on his only previous appearance, in a few years back.