With Tim Southee’s farewell tour finally reaching his hometown and England having already clinched the series, the lead up to this final Test had a distinctly ‘end of term’ feel. The temporary rebranding of the pavilion end and the placement of a giant inflatable camel, each in tribute to Southee, were just a couple of the key priorities ahead of play. The cricket, at times, felt secondary. However, after an absorbing first day, which ended with honours just about even with New Zealand reaching 315-9, any fear of players’ minds being elsewhere had disappeared. Twenty-four hours is a long time in cricket…

At the close on day two, having been bundled out for just 143 in 35.4 overs, a reckless England ended the day 340 runs adrift of the Black Caps, with seven wickets still to take before they can even start to contemplate what will almost certainly need to be a world-record chase. At stumps, England’s assistant coach Paul Collingwood, refuted the suggestion that after 17 Test matches this year, mentally, the England batters were not fully present. “No, I think we’ve just been outperformed today,” he said. “It’s pretty easy to say those kind of things when it is the end of a long Test season.”

“It hasn’t been our best day, it’s as simple as that. We’re always pretty honest in that dressing room and of course the guys are disappointed. One thing I would say is that we witnessed a pretty special, hostile spell of Test bowling today.”

Collingwood was talking about Will O’Rourke, who ripped through England’s top order after lunch, taking three wickets in eight balls, including the previously untouchable Harry Brook for a golden duck. “The way he really pumped his legs and got the energy out of the wicket and the bounce, caused a lot of problems for us and to get three wickets during that spell really broke us,” said Collingwood. “It was great to watch, I’m glad I wasn’t the one facing it but sometimes you’ve got to take your hat off, you don’t see those kinds of spells every day and I thought that was a real stand-out one for them.”

It was great theatre, and Collingwood is right, sometimes you do have to doff your cap to a man at the top of his game. However, seven other England wickets fell on Sunday and except for Ben Duckett who got a peach from Matt Henry, all the others were down to batter error rather than bowler excellence. England lost their last five wickets in a hurry for just nine runs, unforgiveable in such favourable batting conditions with minimal demons in the pitch. For context, New Zealand’s final three wickets yielded 75 runs and their England-assisted final partnership added 44.
Despite the almost impossible situation England find themselves in, Collingwood remained upbeat. “We’ve got world-class batters who still have the belief that we can go out and chase whatever they get. Of course it’s going to be pretty difficult from this position but you never say never.”

The highest ever successful fourth innings run chase in Test history remains West Indies improbable 418 against Australia in Antigua in 2003 and barring a spectacular New Zealand collapse tomorrow, England look destined to be set a total far in excess of that mark. According to Collingwood, if that record is to be broken, Seddon Park could well be the venue. “When you’ve got a side full of match winners like we do, it only take a couple of them to go out there and do something special. I think also this is a ground that is set up for something special as well, it’s a fast outfield, obviously small boundaries, it will take something special but you know there’s still the belief that we can break a record if we need to.”

The first England wicket to fall this afternoon presented us with the familiar sight of Zak Crawley slowly dragging himself off the field having been dismissed by Matt Henry. The Black Caps seamer has removed the England opener in each of his five innings on this trip for the cost of just five runs. Crawley’s overall record against New Zealand - 214 runs from 20 innings at an average of 10.70 - is unprecedented for a front-line batter against one opponent.

Despite such evidence, England’s assistant coach believes Crawley could be the man to propel England to the most unlikely of victories. “He’s ready, he’s ready to hurt someone. He’s actually hitting the ball really really well. He’s unfortunately finding ways to get out at the moment, sometimes that happens, but the one thing that we’ve always said with Zak right from the start is we’re not looking for consistency, it’s about match-winning moments and winning matches. We know once he gets in he can hurt teams and hopefully the second innings will be the one.”

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