The commentary is not available for this match. Please check the scorecard for latest updates.
Thank you for joining me, Mohul Bhowmick and my partner Raghav, for this exciting second session of play. We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did bringing it to you. Until next time, goodbye!
Tim Southee and Ben Stokes share the trophy as New Zealand and England split the honours in this series 1-1!
Tim Southee (New Zealand captain): This win ranks right up there with the finest victories ever. It was a special Test win. The character that the boys showed after a tough couple of days was brilliant. We tried to stay as calm as we could and give our best in the middle. We were prepared to walk off and shake hands if we were not good enough, but it is special to be a part of such a game of Test cricket. We gave our everything out in the middle. We trust each other and a lof of the boys stand up whenever things go bad for us. This is a good group to be a part of. We trusted Neil (Wagner) to bowl the short deliveries with accuracy and he did us proud.
Ben Stokes (England captain): We went through a lot of emotions. Obviously, the Kiwis were going through a lot of that as well. Unfortunately, it did not go our way. We knew that Tim (Southee) would have to roll the dice sometime and Wags (Neil Wagner) opened the game up for them. It was up to me and Joe (Root) to take things slowly. It was incredible to just be a part of such a game of cricket.
Harry Brook (Player of the Series): At the start, this did not seem like a good wicket that would last. However, it turned out to be a good game. I would not consider myself to be a bowler just yet. The opportunity sort of opened up for me and I took it. If you had given me this game at the start, I would have taken it. It was amazing to be a part of it.
Kane Williamson (Player of the Match): The contributions were fabulous, from both sides. It's great to get across the line. Our aim was to put up a competitive total on the board and look to defend. We were up against it coming into the game. This is a quality attack, capable of pulling off such a feat.
Tom Blundell: I was lucky to get that catch. I thought Foakes would get them through the line when he hit it over the head of Wagner but we managed to get the opening. A bit unexpected but this time fights till the end. Love to be the part of this unit as the keeper.
New Zealand beat England by 1 run!
Harry Brook 186 | Neil Wagner 4/62 Joe Root 153 and 95 | Matt Henry 4/100
Kane Williamson 132 | Jack Leach 5/157 and 3/80 Tom Blundell 90 | Stuart Broad 4/61
What a Test match we have had here! New Zealand snatched victory from the jaws of defeat, and gave England a taste of their own medicine. Test cricket is well and truly alive. This is perhaps the finest Test match we have seen in a long, long time. The game remained in the balance for a long time, and tilted one way and then the other. Full credit to New Zealand for believing in themselves and not giving up the faith even though the Three Lions did appear to have a steady flow of runs going for them.
In this session, we saw the departure of Ben Stokes and Joe Root as the Kiwis broke the partnership that threatened to take this game away from them. Stuart Broad, christened ‘Nighthawk’ by the media, threw his bat at everything but was sent back soon after. Neil Wagner and Matt Henry bowled tirelessly for the Kiwis and gave their everything on the pitch. However, it was the unlikely duo of wicketkeeper batter Ben Foakes and left-arm spinner Jack Leach who tried to hold the fort till the end of the session.
Foakes batted beautifully, tackling the short-pitched deliveries with elan and dispatching them to the boundary with disdain. He trusted Leach to play at least two deliveries in each over, and the bespectacled southpaw did not let the Surrey man down. Tim Southee tried his best, and brought on his best bowlers but somehow things did not materialise after an early blitz. However, Foakes capsized playing a poor shot, and that is what opened the doors for New Zealand.
Wagner and Southee peppered new batter Jimmy Anderson with short-pitched deliveries throughout but it was not easy. Anderson stepped down the track and swatted a pull shot past Kane Williamson at midwicket to pick up a boundary and reduce the deficit to just two runs. Leach managed to play out a maiden from Southee soon after that. However, it was Wagner, who got the decisive wicket of Anderson in the next over, and ensured that the home team defeated the tourists by the barest margins of them all- one run!
Joe Root was unfortunate to have been dismissed five runs short of a hundred while Ben Stokes’ injured knee disabled him from playing the famed pull shot he so likes raving about. New Zealand were served well by the lion-hearted Wagner, and it was only apt that he managed to strangle Anderson down the legside to be caught by keeper Tom Blundell.
Neil Wagner: Pretty elated. This is a special victory. Everyone chipped in, we will celebrate this for some time. They batted really well in the first innings, Kane and Blundell did well to fight back. Credit to Harry Brook as well, he is some talent!
This is only the fourth time in history that a team has won a Test match after following on!
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Basin Reserve, Wellington
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