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England's training sessions for a warm, arid T20 World Cup in India in the coming month brought them on midweek to a chilly, rainy Auckland, where they were forced to conduct the last practice run ahead of their third game against the Kiwis inside. It is not always obvious what role these two-team contests fulfill, what useful lessons could possibly be learned – but on this instance, for at least one of the players, that is no concern.

Tom Banton's Changed Position: 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 already reached the peak of their sport, in his case it is undeniably true. After building his name as a frontline hitter, primarily as an opener, Banton now occupies a totally new role, coming in at five or six. “There weren’t really too many conversations,” he said. “They simply brought me back into the team and informed me, ‘Your role will be in the middle order now.’”

Before his recall in the summer, the vast majority of Banton’s 162 professional T20 appearances had been as an opener, a further portion at No3 and the rest – but for seven balls at No 7 in a T20 Blast game eight years ago – at No 4. If the team plan to keep him in this new position he needs every chance to get used to it, and he has already worked out a key point: “Playing down the order,” he surmised, “is a lot harder than starting the innings.”

Mixed Results in the Tour

The player noted that “sometimes where it works well and it looks great and other times where it doesn’t”, and the first two games of the winter in the host nation have seen one of each. In the opener, he lasted a few deliveries and made a low score before getting out to long-on; in the next game, he played a dozen balls, hit runs, and ended the innings not out.

Thoughts on Comeback and Growth

This tour has seen Banton come back to the nation in which he first played for his country in November 2019. Since then, he moved away of the team, had a short comeback in 2022 and then passed a long period in the sidelines before returning for Harry Brook’s initial match as England captain. “On the flight over, it was weird,” he said. “Time has passed when I made my debut. Seems a lot has happened in that period. I’ve learned a lot about myself. The period after I was left out from England was a difficult phase for me. I had a couple of years stretch where I was finding my way.”

Support from Team Management

And now, he has been assigned a fresh challenge to work out. Banton is thankful to have been offered a return, and also for Brendon McCullum’s ability to make him comfortable while he figures out how best to seize the opportunity. “Baz approached me before [Monday’s second T20] and said, ‘Go out and express yourself.’ It’s nice to have that liberty,” Banton said. “I know it’s just a brief comment someone says, but it provides the backing that if it doesn’t come off, it’s not a disaster. It’s something so minor but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the backing from the head coach and I can step up and do it.’”

Venue Change and Team Selection

Following the first two games of the series at Christchurch’s Hagley Park, a venue with unusually long boundaries, England finish the series on the next day at Eden Park, a multi-use sports facility where the field edge at a short distance is among the shortest in the sport. With uncertain weather and an unfamiliar venue they have dropped their recent habit of revealing their lineup two days in advance while they work out if their ideal XI here will be the identical as the side that started the earlier fixtures.

Upcoming Changes for ODI Series

On Friday, they move to Mount Maunganui and shift attention 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 come in. Most newcomers landed in the city on Wednesday but the scheduling of the bowler's Ashes preparations means he will follow two days later, flying with two fellow bowlers, fast bowlers who are also preparing for the Tests in Australia but are excluded from the white-ball squad. As a result Archer will be absent for the opening game at the venue, the stadium where he was subjected to abuse on his sole prior visit, in a few years back.