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The English side's training sessions for a hot, dry T20 World Cup in India in February brought them on midweek to a cool, drizzly New Zealand's largest city, where they were compelled to hold the final training session ahead of their next match against New Zealand inside. It is not always obvious what role these bilateral series serve, what valuable insights could possibly be learned – but on this instance, for at least a squad member, that is no concern.

Tom Banton's Changed Position: From Opener to Middle Order

Tom Banton says he is “continuing to develop”, and if it is the kind of line often repeated even by athletes who have already reached the peak of their sport, in his situation it is certainly accurate. After building his name as a top-order batter, mostly as an opener, Banton now occupies a completely unfamiliar position, batting at five or six. “There weren’t really too many discussions,” he said. “I just got brought me back into the squad and informed me, ‘You’re going to bat in the lower batting lineup now.’”

Prior to returning in June, 87% of Banton’s over 160 professional T20 appearances had been as an starting batsman, another 8% at No3 and the remaining handful – but for seven balls at No 7 in a T20 Blast game eight years ago – at No 4. If the team plan to retain him in this new position he needs every possible opportunity to get used to it, and he has figured out a key point: “Playing down the order,” he concluded, “is a much tougher than starting the innings.”

Mixed Results in the Tour

Banton said that “sometimes where it works well and it appears brilliant and other times where it fails”, and the first two games of the tour in the host nation have featured both outcomes. In the first, he faced a few deliveries and scored a low score before holing out to the deep fielder; in the next game, he faced a dozen balls, hit runs, and ended the innings not out.

Reflections on Comeback and Growth

This tour has seen Banton come back to the nation in which he made his international debut in late 2019. Since then, he drifted back out of the team, made a brief return in recently and then passed more than three years in the sidelines before coming back for the new captain's initial match as England captain. “On the flight over, it was strange,” he said. “It was six years ago when I started internationally. Seems a lot has happened in that period. I’ve learned a lot about me. The period after I was left out from the national team was a tough time for me. I had a two- to three-year stretch where I was finding my way.”

Support from Team Management

Currently, he has been assigned something new to work out. Banton is grateful to have been given another chance, and also for the coach's skill to make him comfortable while he figures out how best to grasp it. “The coach 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 only a small thing someone says, but it gives me the support that if it doesn’t come off, it’s not the end of the world. It’s something so small but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the backing from the manager and I can step up and perform.’”

Venue Change and Squad Decisions

Following the first two games of the contest at the South Island ground, a venue with expansive playing area, England finish the series on Thursday at Eden Park, a dual-purpose sports facility where the straight boundary at 55m is among the shortest in the sport. With changeable conditions and an unfamiliar venue they have abandoned their usual practice of announcing their team two days in advance while they work out if their ideal XI for this match will be the same as the one that began the earlier fixtures.

Squad Adjustments for ODI Series

Next, they travel to Mount Maunganui and shift attention to ODIs, 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 timing of Archer’s Test match buildup means he will arrive two days later, flying with two fellow bowlers, 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 ground where he was subjected to abuse on his only previous appearance, in a few years back.