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England's training sessions for a hot, dry T20 World Cup in India in the coming month brought them on Wednesday to a cool, drizzly Auckland, where they were compelled to conduct the last training session ahead of their next match against New Zealand inside. It is not always obvious what purpose these bilateral series fulfill, what useful lessons could possibly be learned – but on this instance, for at least one of the players, that is not an issue.

Tom Banton's Changed Position: Starting Batsman to Lower Down

Tom Banton says he is “still learning now”, and if it is the type of statement often repeated even by athletes who have long since scaled the pinnacle of their sport, in his case it is certainly accurate. After building his name as a frontline hitter, mostly as an opener, Banton suddenly finds himself a completely unfamiliar position, batting at five or six. “I didn't have too many conversations,” he said. “They simply brought me back into the squad and told, ‘Your role will be in the lower batting lineup now.’”

Prior to returning in the summer, 87% of Banton’s 162 professional T20 appearances had been as an opener, a further portion at No3 and the remaining handful – but for seven balls at seventh spot in a domestic T20 game eight years ago – at fourth place. If England 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 concluded, “is a lot harder than starting the innings.”

Varied Performances in New Zealand

The player noted that “there’s going to be times where it works well and it appears brilliant and other times where it doesn’t”, and the initial matches of the tour in the host nation have featured one of each. In the first, he faced a few deliveries and scored nine runs before holing out to the deep fielder; in the next game, he played 12 deliveries, hit runs, and finished unbeaten.

Reflections on Return and Development

This tour has seen Banton return to the country in which he made his international debut in November 2019. After that, he drifted back out of the team, had a short comeback in recently and then passed a long period in the wilderness before coming back for the new captain's first T20 as skipper. “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 learned a lot about myself. The few years after I got dropped from the national team was a tough time for me. I had a couple of years period where I was working myself out.”

Backing from Team Management

Currently, he has been given a fresh challenge to work out. Banton is grateful to have been offered a return, and also for Brendon McCullum’s ability to put him at ease while he works out how best to seize the opportunity. “The coach approached me before [the recent game] and said, ‘Go 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 provides the support that if it doesn't work, it’s not the end of the world. It is so small but for me it’s, ‘OK, I’ve got the approval from the manager and I can step up and do it.’”

Venue Change and Squad Decisions

Following the initial matches of the series at the South Island ground, a stadium with unusually long boundaries, England complete it on Thursday at the Auckland arena, a dual-purpose sports facility where the field edge at 55m is among the shortest in the world. With uncertain weather and an unfamiliar venue they have dropped their usual practice of announcing their lineup two days in advance while they determine if their ideal XI here will be the same as the one that began both previous games.

Upcoming Changes for ODI Series

On Friday, they travel to the coastal town and shift attention to one-day internationals, with a slightly amended team: three players are omitted, while Jofra Archer, Ben Duckett, Joe Root and Jamie Smith join the squad. Three of those players landed in the city on Wednesday but the timing of Archer’s Ashes preparations implies he will arrive later, flying with Mark Wood and Josh Tongue, two seamers who are also building towards the longer format in Australia but are not in the limited-overs team. As a result he will be absent for the first match at Bay Oval, the stadium where he was subjected to abuse on his sole prior visit, in a few years back.