NOTES FROM LORD’S #2

If day one was mayhem, day two started enigmatically and ended emphatically.

Tom Blundell (left) and Daryl Mitchell dragged NZ back into the first test at Lord’s. Photo / Getty Images

NZ 132 and 236-4

England 141

A couple of questions from a delicately balanced test.

1. Are New Zealand ahead in this test… 

… and if so, how the hell did this happen?

Myself and a few like-minded souls were trying to work out what New Zealand will be comfortable with defending and, at the same time, what they might be able to defend in a worst-case scenario.

We settled on them being reasonably comfortable defending 280-plus, while they’ll feel they can, at a pinch, defend 220.

If there’s any legitimacy to this belief then, yes, the Black Caps might have edged in front, though with the new ball due in the second over of the third day, and given the propensity for wickets to fall in clumps, it’s a fragile dominance.

Still, if you looked where New Zealand was on tea on the first day, to have them leading by 227 with six wickets in hand by the end of day two is remarkable.