Brook century rescues England against wasteful New Zealand

Harry Brook’s seventh Test century – and wasteful fielding from New Zealand – saved England on day two of the first Test in Christchurch.

A top order collapse, which had seen Zak Crawley and Joe Root dismissed without scoring, threatened to put the match firmly in the favour of the hosts, who had earlier been bowled out for 348 in their first innings.

Instead, England ended the day just 29 runs behind with five wickets remaining on 319-5.

Carse finished with figures of 4-64, while Shoaib Bashir also impressed with 4-96. Gus Atkinson took the other two wickets for England.

In the fourth over of England’s response, they lost their first wicket, with Crawley hit on the pad by Matt Henry and sent back to the pavilion for a duck.

Jacob Bethell stepped in at three – a decision which has caused much discussion in the build-up to the match – but was soon dismissed for 10 as fellow debutant Nathan Smith found his outside edge to take his maiden Test wicket.

England were 45-3 at lunch and seemingly in a whole world of trouble.

The collapse continued after the break with Ben Duckett (46) taking on Will O’Rouke with a big hook which, instead of finding the boundary, dropped into the hands of Devon Conway.

Then came the England fightback, with Brook and Ollie Pope putting on a fifth-wicket partnership of 151.

Pope is standing in as wicketkeeper due to Jordan Cox suffering a broken thumb in training so has moved down the order to number six from his usual position at three.

He made 77 before being caught out in spectacular fashion by a flying Glenn Phillips at gully off the bowling of Tim Southee.

Brook reached his century in 123 balls but was thankful for slack fielding from the hosts, as he was dropped on four occasions.

Overall, New Zealand missed six catches with three of those opportunities dropped by captain Tom Latham.

Crawley finished the day unbeaten on 132 alongside captain Ben Stokes, who will resume on 37.