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The English side's training sessions for a warm, arid T20 World Cup in India in the coming month brought them on Wednesday to a chilly, rainy New Zealand's largest city, where they were forced to conduct the last training session before their third game against New Zealand inside. It is not always obvious what purpose these two-team contests serve, what useful lessons could possibly be gained – but on this occasion, for at least one of the players, that is no concern.

The Batter's Changed Position: From Opener to Middle Order

The cricketer says he is “continuing to develop”, and if it is the type of statement often repeated even by athletes who have already reached the peak of their sport, in his situation it is undeniably true. After building his name as a frontline hitter, mostly as an opener, Banton now occupies a totally new role, 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 162 senior T20 innings had been as an starting batsman, a further portion at No3 and the rest – but for seven balls at seventh spot in a domestic T20 game previously – at No 4. If the team plan to keep him in this altered role he needs every possible opportunity to get used to it, and he has figured out one thing: “Playing down the order,” he concluded, “is a much tougher than opening.”

Varied Performances 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 doesn’t”, and the initial matches of the winter in the host nation have featured one of each. In the opener, he lasted nine balls and scored nine runs before holing out to the deep fielder; in the second, he played 12 deliveries, scored 29, and ended the innings unbeaten.

Thoughts on Return and Growth

This tour has seen Banton come back to the country in which he made his international debut in November 2019. Since then, he moved away of the team, made a brief return in 2022 and then passed more than three years in the sidelines before returning for Harry Brook’s first T20 as England captain. “During the journey, it was weird,” he said. “It was six years ago when I made my debut. It feels like a lot has happened in that time. I’ve learned a lot about me. The few years after I got dropped from the national team was a difficult phase for me. I had a two- to three-year period where I was finding my way.”

Support from Team Management

Currently, he has been assigned a fresh challenge to work out. Banton is grateful to have been offered a return, and also for the coach's ability 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 express yourself.’ It's reassuring to have that liberty,” Banton said. “I know it’s just a brief comment from the staff, but it provides the backing that if it doesn’t come off, it’s not a disaster. It’s something so small but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the approval from the manager and I can go out and perform.’”

Venue Change and Squad Decisions

Following the first two games of the series at Christchurch’s Hagley Park, a stadium with unusually long boundaries, England finish the series on the next day at Eden Park, a dual-purpose sports facility where the field edge at a short distance is among the shortest in the world. With uncertain weather and an new location 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 same as the side that began both previous games.

Squad Adjustments for One-Day Matches

Next, they move to Mount Maunganui and turn focus 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. Most newcomers landed in Auckland on Wednesday but the timing of Archer’s Ashes preparations means he will follow later, flying with two fellow bowlers, two seamers who are also preparing for the longer format in the away series but are not in the limited-overs team. Consequently he will miss the opening game at the venue, the stadium where he was subjected to abuse on his only previous appearance, in 2019.