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England's preparations for a warm, arid T20 World Cup in India in February brought them on Wednesday to a chilly, rainy New Zealand's largest city, where they were compelled to conduct the last practice run ahead of their third game against New Zealand inside. The purpose isn't always clear what purpose these two-team contests fulfill, what valuable insights could possibly be gained – but on this occasion, for at least one of the players, that is not an issue.

The Batter's Changed Position: Starting Batsman to Lower Down

The cricketer says he is “continuing to develop”, and if it is the type of statement regularly trotted out even by players who have already reached the peak of their sport, in his case it is certainly accurate. After forging his reputation as a frontline hitter, mostly as an starting player, Banton now occupies a completely unfamiliar position, coming in at five or six. “There weren’t really too many discussions,” he said. “I just got brought me back into the squad and informed me, ‘You’re going to bat in the lower batting lineup now.’”

Prior to returning in the summer, 87% of Banton’s 162 senior T20 innings had been as an opener, another 8% at third position and the remaining handful – but for seven balls at No 7 in a domestic T20 game previously – at fourth place. If England intend 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.”

Varied Performances in the Tour

The player noted that “sometimes where it works well and it appears brilliant and other times where it doesn’t”, and the first two games of the tour in New Zealand have seen both outcomes. In the first, he faced nine balls and made nine runs before holing out to long-on; in the next game, he played 12 deliveries, hit runs, and ended the innings unbeaten.

Thoughts on Return and Growth

The current series has seen Banton come back to the nation in which he made his international debut in November 2019. Since then, he moved away of the side, had a short comeback in recently and then passed more than three years in the sidelines before coming back for Harry Brook’s first T20 as England captain. “On the flight over, it was weird,” he said. “It was six years ago when I started internationally. It feels like a lot has happened in that period. I've discovered a lot about myself. The period after I got dropped from England 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 something new to work out. Banton is thankful to have been given another chance, and also for Brendon McCullum’s skill to make him comfortable while he works out how best to grasp it. “Baz came up to me before [the recent game] and said, ‘Head out and play your natural game.’ It’s nice to have that freedom,” Banton said. “I realize it’s only a small thing someone says, but it gives me the backing that if it doesn’t come off, 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 head coach and I can go out and do it.’”

Shift in Location and Squad Decisions

After playing the initial matches of the series at the South Island ground, a venue with unusually long boundaries, England finish the series on Thursday at Eden Park, a multi-use sports facility where the straight boundary at a short distance is among the most compact in the sport. With changeable conditions and an unfamiliar venue they have abandoned their usual practice of announcing their team two days in advance while they determine if their preferred team here will be the identical as the side that started the earlier fixtures.

Upcoming Changes for One-Day Matches

On Friday, they travel to the coastal town and turn focus to one-day internationals, with a somewhat changed team: Jordan Cox, Zak Crawley and Phil Salt are omitted, while Jofra Archer, Ben Duckett, Joe Root and Jamie Smith come in. Most newcomers landed in the city on the same day but the scheduling of the bowler's Ashes preparations means he will arrive 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. As a result Archer will miss the first match at Bay Oval, the ground where he was subjected to abuse on his sole prior visit, in 2019.