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England's training sessions for a hot, dry T20 World Cup in the subcontinent in February brought them on Wednesday to a cool, drizzly Auckland, where they were compelled to hold the final training session before their third game against the Kiwis indoors. It is not always obvious what role these two-team contests serve, what valuable insights could possibly be learned – but on this instance, for at least one of the players, that is no concern.

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

Tom Banton says he is “still learning now”, and if it is the kind of line regularly trotted out even by athletes who have long since scaled the peak of their game, in his situation it is undeniably true. After building his name as a frontline hitter, primarily as an opener, Banton suddenly finds himself a totally new role, coming in at five or six. “I didn't have too many conversations,” he said. “I just got brought me back into the team and told, ‘Your role will be in the middle order now.’”

Prior to returning in June, 87% of Banton’s 162 professional T20 appearances had been as an starting batsman, another 8% at third position and the rest – 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 get used to it, and he has already worked out a key point: “Batting in the middle order,” he concluded, “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 initial matches of the tour in New Zealand have featured both outcomes. In the opener, he lasted nine balls and made nine runs before getting out to the deep fielder; in the next game, he played a dozen balls, scored 29, and ended the innings not out.

Thoughts on Return and Growth

The current series has witnessed Banton return to the nation in which he first played for his country in late 2019. Since then, he moved away of the side, had a short comeback in recently and then passed a long period in the wilderness before coming back 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 occurred 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 two- to three-year period where I was working myself out.”

Support from Coaching Staff

And now, he has been given a fresh challenge to tackle. Banton is grateful to have been given another chance, and also for the coach's ability to make him comfortable while he works out how best to grasp it. “Baz came up to me before [Monday’s second T20] and said, ‘Head out and play your natural game.’ It's reassuring to have that freedom,” Banton said. “I know it’s just a brief comment someone says, but it provides the backing that if it doesn't work, it’s not the end of the world. It is so minor but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the approval from the manager and I can go out and do it.’”

Venue Change and Team Selection

Following the first two games of the contest at Christchurch’s Hagley Park, a stadium with unusually long boundaries, England complete it on Thursday at Eden Park, a dual-purpose rugby and cricket ground where the field edge at a short distance is among the most compact in the sport. With uncertain weather and an unfamiliar venue they have dropped their recent habit of announcing their team ahead of time while they work out if their preferred team here will be the identical as the one that began both previous games.

Squad Adjustments for ODI Series

Next, they move to the coastal town and turn focus to ODIs, with a somewhat changed team: Jordan Cox, Zak Crawley and Phil Salt are omitted, 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 Archer’s Test match buildup implies he will follow later, flying with two fellow bowlers, two seamers who are also building towards 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 subjected to abuse on his sole prior visit, in 2019.