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“I’m still trying to work out how best to play with a tail,” he said. “It’s still a fine balance between still trying to score runs but then [not] making the guys down the bottom face too many balls.”
As good as Green and Hazlewood were, it was an insipid display from New Zealand, except for Henry who deserved to have a fifth much earlier in the morning. They had no obvious plan. There was no real vigour or intensity. They bowled with the assumption that the tenth wicket would fall at some point. But it did not. It was yet another example of New Zealand letting Australia off the hook after having them in a vulnerable position.
Green’s actions early in the morning backed up his own words about not quite knowing how to shepherd the tail. There were times it looked like Hazlewood was the senior man talking him through it. There was even one comical moment when Hazlewood almost completed two full runs after some miscommunication with Green who did not run despite an easy two being on offer to retain the strike for the next over.
Hazlewood needed to survive 12 balls in the first three overs before Green found his method and started farming the strike. Green opted to play out the first four balls of each over with eight fielders on the rope, before either taking a single, walloping a boundary, or doing both.
While Henry was still causing him enormous trouble with balls pitched on a good length, the bowlers at the other end decided to bounce him to try and keep him on strike. Green gleefully smashed five pull shots over the legside fence into the crowd with zero fear of holing out to the men stationed in the deep.
It was a redemption of sorts for Hazlewood with the bat. He had cut a forlorn figure in Australia’s last Test against West Indies as he stood still in the middle, holding the pose of an attempted forward defence while his off stump was splayed, and Shamar Joseph charged away in celebration of a famous Test win.
Australia’s lower-order batting has been a major problem in recent times, save for the heroics of Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyon at Edgbaston in the Ashes. There have been times where Australia have been six-out all out. The diminishing returns of Cummins, Lyon, Hazlewood and Mitchell Starc with the bat has been a source of concern within the camp, although it had been papered over by their outstanding bowling contributions.
So often it has been Australia who have been on the receiving end of frustrating last-wicket stands. Headingley 2019 lives long in the memory. But in the last 12 months, Australia has conceded three half-century tenth-wicket stands including two in the recent summer against Pakistan and West Indies. Only South Africa and now New Zealand have conceded one other 50-plus last-wicket stand in that time.
There would have been glee in the dugout as Green and Hazlewood kept accumulating with ease. The partnership looked in no trouble at all until Hazlewood chipped one to mid-off trying another expansive drive, having been very disciplined in defence for most of the session.
And he now knows how to bat with the tail.
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