New Zealand vs England - Third Test

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Are we going to get a result? With decent weather, I think we will, and dare I say it to England.

The only change I can see is Bracewell coming in for the Kiwi's, although there was talk of England playing five bowlers, which I would be surprised at.

Broad is the only England bowler who has looked anything near his best, but with Jimmy who needs five wickets for 300, and Finn, who will hopefully pitch the ball up, things should improve.

Monty facing next over...

Is a fielder allowed to throw the bal to the boundary to ensure the four and therefore no change of ends?

Single to Monty - at least fielder didnt try that tactic...

Last over - Monty facing...

Well not normally a cricket follower this is the most riveting half day of cricket I've seen for years...

Monty gets off strike...

Well done England...great match...

Pleasure watching this match. Thanks Eng and NZ

Just woke up. Turned the telly on. I was disgusted with the score. the bowler comes in. The ball is blocked and then everyone goes nuts...

A draw. Mt timing was surreal

I feel sorry for NZ more than I feel happy. We clearly didnt deserve that...

Matt prior Man of the match, for me

I cant believe I missed all the drama..

Well played England, they really dug in, I'm not much of a cricket follower (I live about 15 minutes from Eden Park) but saw a bit of it during the day on sky, that was a good contest.

I'll be at Eden Park at next week though to watch the Blues, who could have learnt something from Englands performance and attitude today.

Well played NZ.. Although your players are sad they got a moral win..

England will off course end with abit more confidence than we had Prior to today. But questions will be asked.

OZ and England- 7 matches no wins!!

I wished I had seen the last days play. In the record books this series will go down to a 0-0 draw. How can sport be exiting when we have no winner.. We had 15 days of cricket and the teams couldnt be seperated..(will give or take a few for bad weather!)

Anyway It certainly is.. It went to the last ball.. By all accounts it was a great days cricket..

Test match still rules!

Mystir

Cricket is the one sport in the World that doesnt have to be exciting and it doesnt have to have a winner, What i like is the level of concentration to fight all day for a draw. Whereas rugby has to have attacking plays,executed at pace with high levels of skill.

I know I must congratulate both teams , but I am gutted for the Black Caps, a win would have meant so much more to them.

I remember all the criticism they recieved especially on cricinfo about not being worthy of test cricket etc.

One thing you have to say though, England knows how to hang on by the skin of their teeth, done the same thing twice in SA in 2010.

Even I feel a bit gutted for them Bilt...

So dont worry about it.

But a draw is still a result and a big deal in it self to them

Nice to see we finally showed some balls on the final day!

Olly - You see.

All about natural batting.

Prior - nice knock.. 100 odd of 180.

bell 75 of 1000000000000

I just loved watching it. The tension everyone creates from the circumstances they find theselves in towards the end of the last day is crazy. 5 full days complete with ups and downs to end in a draw is certainly unique to this sport.

I was glued to the screen for the last 3 hours...great stuff.

Very good battling draw. No saved by the weather for England.

This will have done them good. They'll know where they need to work and that batting is still fragile and will have looked more at where their depth is or isn't.

I think that fight was excellent, more satisfying than being saved by a deluge like the last test for the kiwis.

Now a short break, heal some wounds, and then get them up here.

Heroic effort from England. Will be interesting to see the two tests in England now. Feel sorry for the black caps as they did us proud but hopefully this series breathes some life into nz test cricket. A compelling last test match.

Excellent effort from England.

Maybe, just maybe people will get off Bell's back for a bit? Two series in a row where he has saved the day on the final day of the series...

Broad did a fantastic job as well, reigning his natural instincts in.

We all know how good Prior is, a proper test batsman.

Root played well for a while, still looks the goods in my eyes, compact and organised, got a good one first up with lunch looming which is always difficult.

For New Zealand, Boult was superb. Had that catch off Bell been taken just before lunch it probably would have been over mid afternoon.

A lot of respect for New Zealand the way they have played this series. Their best performance for a while. Time to give coach Hesson and captain McCullum some credit also.

England looked a bit complacent on the back of their wonderful win in India.

To answer Taylorman's question, if a fielder deliberately throws the ball over the boundary it would be considered as overthrows (so 5 runs, and the batsmen stay at the same ends as if it were 4). You can let the ball run to the boundary, and if you're a good actor you can mess up a slide near the boundary to assist it, but not deliberately put it over the boundary.

It was an excellent fightback from England to achieve a very unlikely draw. Well done to Matt Prior, Ian Bell, Joe Root and even Stuart Broad and Monty Panesar.
An underwhelming series for England for sure, and after the dust settles, New Zealand have every right to feel they were the better side in the series. Their bowlers bowled their hearts out, but the fielding wasn't up to mark. If anything, those drops really done them in. Bell, Bairstow, Prior all surviving chances. One is understandable, 3 is far too much. A quality batsman like Prior, you just can't give him a chance.
A serious warning for England. I hope they will be more prepared and ready for the return series and would stay focused.
Hopefully Kevin Pietersen will be back by then as well.

"Maybe, just maybe people will get off Bell's back for a bit?"


Not from me mate.. He cant win a game..He can only save. But well played . But he needs to sort his game when it comes to progressing an innings and putting England in a good place - SO WE CAN WIN!!

"We all know how good Prior is, a proper test batsman"

he needs to step up in the shorter forms..He would solve a lot of problems there

6 and a half hours of that. My nails are gone. I've been through incredible highs, incredible lows, and incredible nerves. No other sport like it in the World. My heart has just stopped racing and I can reflect. Bell's grit, Prior's awesome skill, Broad lasting longer than anyone thought, and Monty. Monty again has done some great rearguard batting, just like Cardiff 2009. 0-0, we should have won this series, it feels like we have. Roll on May!

Mysti, you have been bigging up Root, what has he done to accelerate an innings to win a test match ? Zilch, he most have one of the lowest stroke rates on test cricket. He may have all the shots on a ODI but that doesn't mean he can play them against a test bowling attack and field.
Bell is a fantastic player who has had fantastic knocks for England many times. Not everyone is a KP, its about having a balanced line up.
Take Bell out of the current top 6 and bring in say Morgan and it starts to look like a very weak line up with Root, Bairstow and Morgan and Compton.

I am not neccesarily talking about this innings digs. Got to say Bell did the perfect thing. But the poiint is - he along others have to take the blame for being put in the situation in the first place.

Root is young. He can be forgiven

Very well played England.

Those dropped catches before lunch really cost us - I blame Trebs

guildfordbat wrote:

Anyway back to watching for a little bit more. This might yet end up a more interesting Test than we thought ....

Immense satisfaction at our fighting spirit to obtain a draw but that's nothing to my smugness about the comment above made early on the second day when most pundits had already given up on this Test!

mystiroakey wrote:I am not neccesarily talking about this innings digs. Got to say Bell did the perfect thing. But the poiint is - he along others have to take the blame for being put in the situation in the first place.

Root is young. He can be forgiven

Lots of people take the blame , probably only Prior and Compton have really had good series. Anderson, supposedly the worlds number 2 quick, had been quite frankly ineffective.
I'm a fan of Root but equally that's what 5 or 6 tests now against a very poor India attack and supposedly weal Kiwi bowling and no big scores. He needs to bat well in the first two summer tests or the pressure is on big style.

Diggers Batting in india is tough. forget the supposed quality of there bowling. Its tough whatever.

And he did do well today.

Really , Id say batting in India when there spinners aren't clicking is one of the easy gigs. Lots of high innings and big scoring draws. Bowling in India as a touring side is far tougher.
Batting in say South Africa is far tougher.

Its easy to say the spinners wernt clicking when we win.. and very easy to say they are when touring teams lose..

Maybe, I'm just saying historically I think you'll find its the bowlers averages that suffer in India far more than the batters.
As I say Root, bags of potential...but he does need a big score just like any other cricketer.

guildfordbat wrote:

guildfordbat wrote:

Anyway back to watching for a little bit more. This might yet end up a more interesting Test than we thought ....

Immense satisfaction at our fighting spirit to obtain a draw but that's nothing to my smugness about the comment above made early on the second day when most pundits had already given up on this Test!

Feel free to be smug. I'm eating a healthy dose of pie at the moment. Clearly us young rebels still have a thing (or three) to learn from wise experienced heads...

To be fair, I don't think you can say pitches in India are easy for batting anymore. I would say of the two series which have just ended, the pitches in new Zealand were consistently better for batting than those in India.

Having said that, the one test Root played in India the pitch was flat.

Anyway I like Root. But then I like Phil Hughes and look where that's got me.

Diggers wrote:Maybe, I'm just saying historically I think you'll find its the bowlers averages that suffer in India far more than the batters.
As I say Root, bags of potential...but he does need a big score just like any other cricketer.

off course. And he has started very well in my mind..

We cant exactly single him out as a poor performer this time either. Plenty need to take the blame before him

Not singling him out as such, just holding him up as a comparison next to Bell. With kids in the side we need players of Bells experience and class.
And by the way kudos to the Kiwis here , by far the better side in the series so hats off.

Not sure I get the doom and gloom about our batting either.

One week we have cook as the greatest thing, next its bell, next its KP, next its trott, next its prior!! add root.

These guys have quality averages and do produce..


Back to bell. Good player he is but as you said its about balance.

Root can play shots and is willing to. bell needs 60 balls before he gets going.

When we have players like cook, trott , compton and Bell in the side. We can get bogged down..

Cook likes to move things along. Trott and bell together is what frustrates me the most.. And trott is just better

England left it late but they finally showed some commitment in this series

Full credit to NZ, do wish they'd prepare some interesting pitches though. This series has largely been a snoozefest

NZ maximised there chances and fair play. Whats the point having a home game if not to maximise the chance..

I am sure the barmy army out noised the kiwi fans as well

There's home advantage and just preparing draw pitches

Draw was there goal

Which is the problem.

Kiwi fans? There was more than one?

Shame. A full ground would have made that last day even better. Well played Matt Prior. His 'only scores easy runs' tag should now be thrown in the bin.

GSC wrote:Which is the problem.

yep but they are realistic and if they prepared tough wickets they would have feared losing 3-0

GSC wrote:England left it late but they finally showed some commitment in this series

Full credit to NZ, do wish they'd prepare some interesting pitches though. This series has largely been a snoozefest

A snoozefest ? Lets face it but for the weather we'd have had results taking about 5 days in the first two tests and came within a whisker of that in the final test.
They play 5 day matches for a reason, why is it boring when a match takes that long to get a result ?

The snoozefeast happened due to the weather only- i agree. It was annoying.

This is Test cricket.

It wasn't 5 days that made it dull, the standard of pitches dragged down the standard of play making it dull.