Notes from Trent Bridge #2
Mitchell and Blundell may as well move in together, carpool to work.
NZ 553
ENGLAND 90-1
It is worth remembering that a week ago Daryl Mitchell and Tom Blundell went to bed having put New Zealand in a near-impregnable position against England. History has determined that in the previous sentence, it is the word “near” that does all the heavy lifting.
On this the second morning, they made sure they didn’t repeat the Lord’s misadventure by turning their unbeaten 149-run partnership overnight into 236 before Blundell slapped Jack Leach to Ben Stokes at mid-off.
He scored 106 to complement his 96 at Lord’s.
Anybody who has the great ‘fortune’ to call themselves regular BYC listeners will know that I’ve been banging on about Mitchell for a couple of years now. Fellow panelist Paul Ford calls him my “fetish” player1 because I have an unhealthy obsession with pushing his case to be a first-choice test player rather than a quality back up.