Key events
37th over: Australia 128-4 (Labuschagne 49, Lyon 1) Henry, knowing that Labuschagne wants to walk down and across, tries to bowl him behind his legs. Labuschagne is good enough to flick it crisply through square leg for four.
An eventful first over ends with a jaffa that snaps off the seam to beat the outside edge.
Labuschagne is not out! Scratch that, he was outside the line and more than three metres down the wicket. New Zealand lose a review – they have only one left – and I need new glasses.
Hang on, this looks out…
New Zealand review for LBW agianst Labuschagne! I reckon he’s just outside the line because he walked down the track to Henry. But it’s close.
Ding a ling a ling Dayle Hadlee, elder brother of Sir Richard, rings the bell for the start of play. Matt Henry has the ball.
“I’m a Labuschagne convert since I saw him on the Grade Cricketer podcast,” writes Laurence Boyd. “Hadn’t appreciated his personality really til then.”
He’s an eccentric nerd isn’t he? I ask that question with envy, lest it be miscontrued.
As does Matt Henry
It’s a good wicket. It’s my home ground so you won’t hear a bad word said. It does tend to flatten out to be a good surface. [Josh Hazlewood] bowled beautifully, he didn’t go searching for wickets. It was just a really tidy spell of bowling. That’s what pressure does in Test cricket, right? If you do that from both ends, somebody will get the rewards.
It’s a fine line. If you go searching [for a magic delivery] here you can get hurt with boundaries, because it’s a fast outfield and a true surface. You need to be patient and bring the stumps into play without going over the top.
It’s a big first hour. The key is to operate for the guy at the other end – I know that’s a cliche but against a good side like Australia you have to be patient.
Josh Hazlewood speaks before play
The ball was coming out quite nicely either side of lunch, my rhythm was good. In the first hour the wicket felt a bit soft and slow but then it got baked by the sun. It seemed to quicken up and we were able to get those nicks.
Anything back of a length stuck in the pitch and sat up, so it was about pushing the ball up a bit further and letting the wicket do the work.
Preamble
Hello, good morning and welcome to live coverage of the second and probably penultimate day in the second Test between New Zealand and Australia. It’s 30 years next week since Ken Rutherford calmly guided New Zealand to victory over Allan Border’s Australia in Auckland. That match is the last time the Aussies lost a Test or failed to win a series in New Zealand.
Thirty years! It’s a bewildering statistic, one that has perpetuated itself in the 21st century, and you don’t need Carel Struycken to tell you it appears to be happening again. Australia had the better of the first day, with Josh Hazlewood bowling majestically to nobble New Zealand for 162. If they see off the first spell from Matt Henry, who bowled beautifully last night, they should sit snugly in the box seat.
Australia will resume on 124 for four, a deficit of 38, with Marnus Labuschagne on 45 and Nathan Lyon on 1. Labuschagne’s return to something resembling form is very welcome, but the batter New Zealand really fear in this situation is the next man in, Mitchell Marsh. Two hours of his coruscating strokeplay could finish them off.
