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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 Auckland, where they were forced to hold the final training session before their third game against New Zealand inside. It is not always obvious what purpose these two-team contests fulfill, what useful lessons could possibly be learned – but on this occasion, for at least one of the players, that is not an issue.

The Batter's New Role: From Opener to Middle Order

Tom Banton says he is “still learning now”, and if it is the type of statement regularly trotted out even by athletes who have long since scaled the pinnacle of their game, in his case it is certainly accurate. After building his name as a top-order batter, mostly as an opener, Banton suddenly finds himself a totally new role, batting at five or six. “I didn't have too many discussions,” he said. “I just got brought me back into the squad and told, ‘You’re going to bat in the middle order now.’”

Prior to returning in the summer, the vast majority of Banton’s over 160 professional T20 appearances had been as an starting batsman, a further portion at No3 and the rest – but for a brief stint at seventh spot in a T20 Blast game eight years ago – at fourth place. If the team intend to keep him in this altered role he requires every chance to get used to it, and he has figured out one thing: “Batting in the middle order,” he surmised, “is a much tougher than starting the innings.”

Mixed Results 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 doesn’t”, and the first two games of the winter in New Zealand have featured one of each. In the first, he lasted a few deliveries and scored nine runs before holing out to long-on; 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 witnessed Banton return to the country in which he made his international debut in late 2019. Since then, he moved away of the team, made a brief return in 2022 and then passed more than three years in the wilderness before returning for Harry Brook’s first T20 as England captain. “On the flight over, it was weird,” he said. “Time has passed when I started internationally. Seems a lot has occurred in that time. I've discovered 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 period where I was working myself out.”

Backing from Team Management

And now, he has been assigned something new to tackle. Banton is thankful to have been offered a return, and also for the coach's skill to make him comfortable while he works 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 realize it’s just a brief comment from the staff, but it gives me the backing that if it doesn’t come off, it’s not the end of the world. It’s something so minor but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the approval from the head coach and I can step up and do it.’”

Shift in Location and Team Selection

Following the first two games of the contest at Christchurch’s Hagley Park, a venue with unusually long boundaries, the visitors finish the series on Thursday at the Auckland arena, a dual-purpose rugby and cricket ground where the straight boundary at 55m is among the most compact in the sport. With uncertain weather and an unfamiliar venue they have abandoned their usual practice of revealing their team two days in advance while they work out if their ideal XI for this match will be the identical as the one that began the earlier fixtures.

Upcoming Changes for ODI Series

Next, they travel to Mount Maunganui and shift attention to ODIs, 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. Most newcomers landed in Auckland on Wednesday but the timing of the bowler's Test match buildup means he will follow two days later, flying with two fellow bowlers, two seamers who are also building towards the longer format in Australia but are excluded from the limited-overs team. As a result Archer will be absent for the first match at Bay Oval, the stadium where he was subjected to abuse on his only previous appearance, in 2019.