4 hours ago
15
Key events
Teams
England: 1 Emilio Gay, 2 Ben Duckett, 3 Jacob Bethell, 4 Joe Root, 5 Harry Brook, 6 Jamie Smith (wk), 7 Ben Stokes (capt), 8 Gus Atkinson, 9 Jofra Archer, 10 Josh Tongue, 11 Shoaib Bashir.
New Zealand: 1 Tom Latham (capt), 2 Devon Conway, 3 Henry Nicholls, 4 Rachin Ravindra, 5 Daryl Mitchell, 6 Tom Blundell (wk), 7 Mitchell Santner, 8 Nathan Smith, 9 Blair Tickner, 10 Will O’Rourke, 11 Ben Sears.
Email! “In the pre-match photo of Ben Stokes, he’s batting in a sleeveless top (and probably shorts as well) — presumably what he’s most comfortable wearing while doing a physical activity in this weather,” begins Smylers. “Has there been any discussion of relaxing player kit requirements during the heatwave? I’m in an office where we’ve been allowed to wear shorts this week; my children’s schools have told pupils to come in in PE kit rather than their normal uniforms. When the rest of us are making adjustments, it seems curious for profession cricketers to have to play wearing more clothes than they need to. Is it just tradition?”
I guess it’s mainly tradition and perhaps the need to slide. But as a lifelong member of the shorts-wearing community, I’d say that, when it’s really hot, the feeling is more one of freedom than of cooling so, once they’re focused, maybe it doesn’t make too much difference.
This feels like a big toss. I’m a little surprised Jamieson has been rested for a series decider; so is Simon Doull, who explains that NZ have a busy schedule coming up. DK, meanwhile, isn’t happy, saying you can’t plan for September and October in June, and you play players whoa are fit and in form.
Stokes confirms he’d have batted, and that it’s good to be back. It’s a big week for him and the team, he says. He’s glad to have got some runs, hopes can imprint himself on the game.
On Ollie Robinson, he says they’re making squads bigger to have different options and they don’t want to pigeonhole a particular way of playing given varying conditions, and this is a “conditions-based” decision. Or, in other words, he doesn’t really answer the question.
Otherwise, Shoaib Bashir, who hasn’t bowled in a Test for over a year, has a good record at Trent Bridge, and should get a good, long spell.
New Zealand win the toss and bat
Of course they do. Tom Latham tells us it looks dry, and that the two injured players are replaced by Mitchell Santner and Zak Foulkes, with Blair Tickner in for Kyle Jamieson, whose workload is being managed.
Time for the toss…
Bad news for New Zealand: Matt Henry has a calf injury, so will be out for two to four weeks, while Glenn Phillips has a side strain, the length of his absence to be determined following a scan.
The pitch is flat, but it’s dry so might crumble later in the game. I can’t see any way you win the toss and don’t bat.
Now Nas, quoting Mike Brearley, is explaining that, as captain, you don’t realise how much you love the job till you don’t have it anymore, adding that the hardest thing to take when you do the job is the toll it takes on your own form.
Broady, meanwhile, tells us that Stokes can get “quite obsessive” with the fitness and so on – Roy Keane and Meg Lanning have both found that – adding that he’s not looked happy or relaxed over the last bit and is at his best when batting with freedom. Perhaps, then, the break will have done him good.
Speaking to Athers yesterday in tape we’re seeing now, Stokes tries to sound grateful to be back, is grateful for the love he had from supporters, and it’s nice to play in front of people who appreciate you; it’s said gently, but it sounds like a message to those above him. Previously, Stuart Broad observed that, at his core, he probably doesn’t feel he did much wrong.
Otherwise, he reckons the change of environment, to one a little more relaxed at Durham, has helped getting his batting going again – he needed to simplify things, he reckons.
Preamble
We all like feeling vindicated. It brings a sense of wellbeing, a sense of confidence, a sense of smug.
But when we feel vindicated and others do not, that’s a whole new plain of feeling – especially if those others are our bosses, and those others, our bosses, have first assumed it was they who were right and we who were wrong, then intimated the same to the public, then dished out a consequence having let someone else away with worse, then endured a disastrous week at work to reverse the great work done previously, while taking an unfathomable amount of time to investigate a scandal that was not exactly Enron. Yes, that might be described – but almost definitely wasn’t – as a whole new plain of feeling entirely.
Of feeling not uniformly positive, it seems fair to assume, just as it does that sentiments have been shared and analyses aired. But here we are: Ben Stokes is back and Gus Atkinson is back, Robert Key and Brendon McCullum are under pressure, and a series decider is even more exciting than it would otherwise have been.
A win for England and things might move on; a win for New Zealand and it might be people moving on; this is not a contest that “lacks context”, and it’s going to be intense.
Play: 11am BST
