Dominant Kiwis Crush the Submissive English to Square the Test Series, England v New Zealand - 2nd Test, Match Report

Dominant Kiwis Crush the Submissive English to Square the Test Series, England v New Zealand – 2nd Test, Match Report: The Second Test of the Investec Series ended with the Kiwis carrying on their sheer dominance in the game. As it happened, New Zealand won the test quite comprehensively and equally convincingly by a mammoth margin of 199 runs. Even though the bulk of the 4^th day’s play was washed out due to rain, New Zealand’s aggressive approach prevented it from affecting the final outcome of the game and helped them to win the game and turn the tables in their course.

With England comfortably poised at 44/0 at the stumps of the fourth day, victory seemed to be a harder prospect for the kiwis but in the end, due to the possession of sheer aggressive intent right from the word GO, New Zealand marched to an emphatic victory to level the series 1-1.

Right in the fourth over of the day’s play Boult opened the account for Kiwis by dismissing the centurion of the first innings, Lyth. It seemed as if the entire kiwi unit was craving for another 9 wicket taking deliveries to get things done and dusted. The energy level was ecstatic which was amplified by the sensational in-swinger from Boult which left Ballance clueless and the ball struck the stumps to announce the second wicket for England at the score of 58. Things went from dark  to darker for England when they lost two wickets in 3 deliveries in the 28^th over of the innings by Mark Craig in the form of the two anchors or rather pillars of the English batting, Ian Bell and Joe Root. With four down right in the initial overs of the first session, England could do nothing but to hope for a draw. Things settled down a bit by a kind of emergency controlling partnership from Ben Stokes and the skipper, Alastair Cook. The partnership somehow managed to neutralize the fiery attack of Southee coupled with brisk spin of Craig and things looked bright for them just when Kiwi skipper had a fluke. He introduced Williamson into the bowling in place of Craig and the right handed par timer brought the piece of gold in the form of the wicket of Stokes. England were once again put into definite spots of bother. It was the skipper, Cook, who was perhaps the lone warrior for England fighting things out for them but was dismissed as LBW from a straighter one from Williamson at the score of 56 off 171. Wickets kept falling then and England were bundled eventually in the third session of the day’s play at the score of 255.

New Zealand showed their intent amount of domination in the test. Their average run rate in the test was close to 5 runs an over. This reflects of the fact that how desperate they were for victory right from the first innings. A brilliant innings from Ronchi and Craig took the visitors to a score of 350 runs at the Headingley. In reply, England were shivered by the swing and pace of the New Zealanders. But with a sensational resilience from the tail enders led by Stuart Broad (who scored 46), England managed to pose the exact same score of 350 in their first innings after being reduced to 8 down for 267 runs.

With things starting off in a balanced fashion in the second innings, with neither of the two sides holding a lead, New Zealand started to take up the anti from the initial phases of their second innings. After being 2 down for 23, it was Guptill and Taylor who placed the kiwis into a zone of comfort by their crucial 99 runs partnership. But the pivotal innings was played by BJ Watling, who was adjudged as the Man of the Match for his phenomenal knock of 120 runs off 163 deliveries to take New Zealand in cruise control over the game. With some fiery and pinch hitting batting from Craig and Southee at the sinking end of their innings, New Zealand declared their innings at the score of 454 runs  and the challenge was thrown onto England to sneak victory.

Even due to the rain-intrusion, the kiwis managed to enforce victory and thus in the process, the series gets squared even after England held an early lead by winning the first one. The ODI series starts from 9^th June instant.

Match Summary :

England won the toss and opted to field

New Zealand, 1^st Innings – 350/10 in 72.5 overs (Luke Ronchi 88, Stuart Broad 5/109)
England, 1^st Innings – 350/10 in 108.2 (Adam Lyth 107, Tim Southee 4/83)
New Zealand, 2^nd Innings – 454/8 in 91 overs declared(BJ Watling 120, Mark Wood 3/97)
England, 2^nd Innings – 255/10 in 91.5 overs (Buttler 73, Williamson 3/15)

New Zealand won by 199 runs.