In pursuit of 258, England came hard, along expected lines. After seeing off the hard new ball for five overs where Tim Southee and Matt Henry threatened to strike, Zac Crawley went on the offensive, collecting three boundaries off Southee – the first one leading to errors in length of the next two. Duckett didn’t hang back for long either, going on the backfoot to a half-tracker by Michael Bracewell and pulling the off-spinner for a six.
Southee eventually cleaned up Crawley on 24 with a delivery that pitched and nipped in, courtesy the vigorous rolling over of the fingers on the seam. Duckett and nightwatchman Robinson blunted the last three overs of the day safely to help England to 48 for 1 at Stumps.
Brief Scores: England 435/8 decl. (Harry Brook 186, Joe Root 153*; Matt Henry 4-100, Michael Bracewell 2-54) & 48/1 (Zak Crawley 24) New Zealand 209 (Tim Southee 73, Tom Blundell 38; Stuart Broad 4-61, James Anderson 3-37) & 483 (Kane Williamson 132, Tom Blundell 90; Jack Leach 5-157) by 209 runs
A lovely bit of bowling from Southee 🔥
He gets one to nip back at Crawley to hit the top of off stump…
A fantastic delivery 👏#NZvENG pic.twitter.com/9I92wXspT2
— Cricket on BT Sport (@btsportcricket) February 27, 2023
