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The English side's preparations for a warm, arid T20 World Cup in the subcontinent in the coming month led them on midweek to a chilly, rainy Auckland, where they were compelled to conduct the last practice run ahead of their third game against New Zealand inside. It is not always obvious what purpose these bilateral series serve, what useful lessons could possibly be learned – but on this instance, for at least a squad member, that is no concern.

Tom Banton's New Role: Starting Batsman to Lower Down

Tom Banton says he is “continuing to develop”, and if it is the type of statement regularly trotted out even by athletes who have already reached the peak of their game, in his situation it is certainly accurate. After building his name as a frontline hitter, primarily as an opener, Banton now occupies a completely unfamiliar position, coming in at the middle order. “I didn't have too many discussions,” he said. “They simply brought me back into the squad and told, ‘You’re going to bat in the lower batting lineup now.’”

Before his recall in June, the vast majority of Banton’s over 160 senior T20 innings had been as an starting batsman, a further portion at third position and the rest – but for seven balls at seventh spot in a domestic T20 game previously – at fourth place. If England plan to keep him in this new position he needs every chance to become accustomed to it, and he has figured out a key point: “Playing down the order,” he surmised, “is a lot harder than opening.”

Mixed Results in the Tour

The player noted that “there’s going to be times where it comes off and it appears brilliant and on other occasions where it fails”, and the first two games of the tour in New Zealand have seen one of each. In the first, he faced a few deliveries and scored nine runs before getting out to long-on; in the next game, he played a dozen balls, scored 29, and ended the innings not out.

Reflections on Return and Growth

The current series has witnessed Banton come back to the country in which he first played for his country in late 2019. After that, he drifted back out of the side, made a brief return in recently and then spent a long period in the wilderness before returning for the new captain's first T20 as England captain. “During the journey, it was strange,” he said. “Time has passed when I made my debut. Seems a lot has occurred in that time. I've discovered a lot about myself. The period after I got dropped from England was a difficult phase for me. I had a couple of years period where I was finding my way.”

Support 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 Brendon McCullum’s skill to make him comfortable while he works out how best to seize the opportunity. “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 backing that if it doesn’t come off, it’s not a disaster. It’s something so minor but for me it’s, ‘Alright, I’ve got the backing from the head coach and I can step up and perform.’”

Shift in Location and Team Selection

Following the initial matches of the series at the South Island ground, a stadium with expansive playing area, the visitors complete it on Thursday at Eden Park, a dual-purpose rugby and cricket ground where the straight boundary at a short distance is among the most compact in the world. With uncertain weather and an unfamiliar venue they have abandoned their usual practice of revealing their lineup two days in advance while they work out if their preferred team here will be the identical as the side that started the earlier fixtures.

Upcoming Changes for One-Day Matches

Next, they move to Mount Maunganui and shift attention to one-day internationals, with a somewhat changed squad: Jordan Cox, Zak Crawley and Phil Salt drop out, while Jofra Archer, Ben Duckett, Joe Root and Jamie Smith come in. Three of those players arrived in Auckland on the same day but the scheduling of the bowler's Ashes preparations means he will follow two days later, travelling with two fellow bowlers, two seamers who are also building towards the longer format in the away series but are not in the limited-overs team. Consequently he will miss the first match at Bay Oval, the stadium where he was racially abused on his sole prior visit, in a few years back.