Key events
England win the toss and bowl first
When there’s rain around, you bat second. Harry Brook is often unorthodox, but not that unorthodox.
Preamble
Morning everyone, evening everyone else, and welcome to the decider in this Twenty20 series. A New Zealand win, the one realistic result we haven’t had so far, will mean the spoils are shared, which would seem fair after NZ had the better of the washout in the first game. But any other result here will hand the series to England – and that includes no result, which is rearing its soggy head again.
In Auckland tonight, as in Christchurch last Saturday, there’s a whole lot of rain forecast for the second half of the evening. Common sense might be gently suggesting that this should be a 10-over game from the start. Half the point of white-ball cricket, after all, is to have a winner before bedtime. But, as we all know, there are parts of cricket that common sense cannot reach.
For England and their novice captain Harry Brook, a win (or even a washout) would confirm the suspicion that they have remembered how to play T20. For New Zealand and the far more seasoned Mitchell Santner, it would show that they have never forgotten. If you go by results over the past year, England’s win the other night nudged them ahead of NZ. They now have 12 wins to NZ’s 11, while both have six defeats – and two washouts. Here’s hoping they don’t add to that last figure.
Play starts at 7.15am (UK time), all being well, and I’ll be back soon with news of the toss and the teams.
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