CT25: NZ v Pakistan, notebook dump

A 1st XI of mostly ordered thoughts, including an uncanny parallel with Ahmedabad, 2023, Tom Latham's heady return to form, and Santner’s prog-rock spell.

Tom Latham has his head screwed on right. Getty Images

NZ 320 for 5 (Latham 118*, Young 107, Phillips 61); Pakistan 260 (Khushdil 69, Babar 64, Salman 42; O’Rourke 3-47, Santner 3-66).

They say preparation is the mother of manifestation and as painful as it might be to belabour the point, the Black Caps clearly found it easier to put together a coherent, finely tuned performance with the benefit of recent cricket together than they did in, ahem, Guyana last year. There might be something in this newfangled approach to tournament play.

As baffling as some of Pakistan’s decision making might have been, take nothing away from New Zealand. That was a mighty performance from a team that appears to have taken up residence not only in some of the country’s finest hotels over the past month, but also inside the local players’ heads.