No one \u201cdunnit\u201d in the end as both sides eked out a draw, but this occasion defied convention. We witnessed five-day grit rather than two-day nonsense.<\/p>\n
The chase built modestly. Who could have predicted a team that had been dismissed for 167 in the first innings, albeit in grim batting conditions, would come within cooee of hauling in a world record 531 in their second dig? Especially when they had been reduced to 72-4.<\/p>\n
Shai Hope, Justin Greaves and Kemar Roach believed.<\/p>\n
That occurred first through a 196-run Hope-Greaves stand, the highest for the fifth-wicket between the countries.<\/p>\n
The end only came via a pinpoint ploy.<\/p>\n
Jacob Duffy came around the wicket to the right-handed Hope, who produced a first false shot on 140, edging a hook to a short delivery.<\/p>\n
An extensive warm-up catching practice with trainer Chris Donaldson paid off for stand-in wicketkeeper Tom Latham. He snared the catch in his left glove webbing to the joy \u2013 and relief \u2013 of teammates, albeit with the shine off the second new ball.<\/p>\n
The second act of faith in the visitors\u2019 cause came via a 180-run seventh-wicket Greaves-Roach partnership, another record between the sides.<\/p>\n
Initial defiance led to quiet confidence as the scoring accelerated to leave a tantalising chase of 132 from 33 overs in the final session.<\/p>\n
Greaves presented straight bat orthodoxy for most of his knock. Roach rode his luck more, but who wouldn\u2019t at 37 years old, knowing the selection clock is ticking. He offered a catch on 30 to Zak Foulkes, diving to his left at square leg; he escaped a run out on 35 when Blair Tickner missed from close range at mid-on; and he bisected Tickner at deep mid-off and Glenn Phillips at deep mid-on with a straight skyer on 45. Phillips\u2019 call of \u201cmine\u201d and Tickner\u2019s hands getting first to the steepler proved an unfortunate combination.<\/p>\n
To add a plot twist, three butchered decision reviews prevented New Zealand progressing their push for victory.<\/p>\n
Those errors of judgment, including a Michael Bracewell lbw appeal against the right-handed Roach, which pitched outside leg from around the wicket, meant a subsequent plumb shout and a caught behind were uncontestable.<\/p>\n
Several phantom catches and pantomime howzats in the aftermath added further drama to a West End level narrative.<\/p>\n
Regardless, this series now holds more mystery than originally thought \u2013 another endorsement for the World Test Championship.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No one \u201cdunnit\u201d in the end as both sides eked out a draw, but this occasion defied convention.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":170691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[107439,20251,806,7022,42574,16558,2550,3592,107438,28523,117,111,43,139,69,2114,1532,10715,5976,765,110364,3807,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-170690","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-alderson","9":"tag-andrew","10":"tag-as","11":"tag-black","12":"tag-caps","13":"tag-cricket","14":"tag-even","15":"tag-fall","16":"tag-hagley","17":"tag-indies","18":"tag-new","19":"tag-new-zealand","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-newzealand","22":"tag-nz","23":"tag-opinion","24":"tag-oval","25":"tag-remains","26":"tag-short","27":"tag-test","28":"tag-undefeated","29":"tag-west","30":"tag-zealand"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=170690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/170691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=170690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=170690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=170690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}