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The English side's preparations for a warm, arid T20 World Cup in the subcontinent in the coming month brought them on midweek to a cool, drizzly Auckland, where they were forced to hold the last training session ahead of their next match against the Kiwis inside. The purpose isn't always clear what purpose these two-team contests serve, what valuable insights could possibly be learned – but on this occasion, for at least a squad member, that is no concern.

Tom Banton's New Role: Starting Batsman to Middle Order

Tom Banton says he is “still learning now”, and if it is the type of statement often repeated even by players who have long since scaled the pinnacle of their game, in his situation it is certainly accurate. After building his name as a frontline hitter, mostly as an opener, Banton now occupies a completely unfamiliar role, batting at five or six. “There weren’t really too many conversations,” he said. “They simply brought me back into the squad and informed me, ‘You’re going to bat in the middle order now.’”

Prior to returning in the summer, the vast majority of Banton’s 162 senior T20 innings had been as an starting batsman, a further portion at No3 and the rest – but for a brief stint at No 7 in a T20 Blast game eight years ago – at No 4. If the team plan to keep him in this altered role he requires every possible opportunity to become accustomed to it, and he has already worked out one thing: “Batting in the middle order,” he concluded, “is a much tougher than opening.”

Varied Performances in the Tour

Banton said that “there’s going to be times where it works well and it appears brilliant and other times where it fails”, and the initial matches of the tour in the host nation have seen both outcomes. In the opener, he lasted nine balls and made a low score before getting out to the deep fielder; in the second, he faced a dozen balls, scored 29, and finished not out.

Reflections on Comeback and Growth

The current series has witnessed Banton return to the nation in which he made his international debut in November 2019. After that, he moved away of the side, made a brief return in 2022 and then spent more than three years in the sidelines before coming back for Harry Brook’s initial match as England captain. “During the journey, it was strange,” he said. “It was six years ago when I started internationally. It feels like a lot has happened in that period. I’ve learned 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 period where I was working myself out.”

Backing from Team Management

Currently, he has been assigned something new to work out. Banton is thankful to have been given another chance, and also for the coach's ability to put him at ease while he figures out how best to seize the opportunity. “The coach approached me before [Monday’s second T20] and said, ‘Head out and play your natural game.’ It's reassuring to have that liberty,” Banton said. “I know it’s just a brief comment someone says, but it provides the support that if it doesn't work, 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.’”

Shift in Location and Squad Decisions

After playing the initial matches of the contest at Christchurch’s Hagley Park, a venue with unusually long boundaries, the visitors finish the series on the next day at Eden Park, a multi-use rugby and cricket ground where the field edge at 55m is among the most compact in the world. With uncertain weather and an new location they have dropped their recent habit of announcing their lineup ahead of time while they work out if their ideal XI for this match will be the identical as the side that began the earlier fixtures.

Squad Adjustments for ODI Series

Next, they move to Mount Maunganui and shift attention to one-day internationals, with a slightly amended squad: 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 the same day but the timing of Archer’s Ashes preparations implies he will arrive later, travelling with two fellow bowlers, two seamers who are also preparing for the Tests in the away series but are not in the white-ball squad. Consequently he will miss the first match at Bay Oval, the ground where he was subjected to abuse on his sole prior visit, in 2019.