6 hours Ago By Sentinel Digital Desk
Harry Brook scored a brilliant century to drag England right back into the first Test in Christchurch on Friday, driving the tourist to within 29 runs of New Zealand’s tally of 348 on 319 for five at the end of day two. The tourist was well and truly on the ropes at 71-4 in the second session but Brook and Ollie Pope put together a battling partnership of 151 for the fifth wicket to cut the deficit in half by tea. Both benefitted from some uncharacteristically sloppy fielding from the Black Caps before produced a gully catch for the ages off the bowling of Tim Southee to remove Pope for 77.
Brook, having brought up his half-century with one of his two sixes, forged on to pass 2,000 career runs and secured his seventh century in 22 tests when he sent one of his 10 fours racing to the Hagley Oval boundary. The 25-year-old reached 132 from 163 deliveries at stumps with his captain alongside him on 37 not out and English hopes of taking a 1-0 lead in the three-match series very much revived. It had all looked much bleaker when, with opener Zak Crawley having already fallen for a duck, Jacob Bethell and Joe Root departed cheaply in the last over before lunch at the hands of all-rounder Nathan Smith.
Smith removed fellow test debutant Bethell for 10 with an outside edge before Root, playing his 150th test, chopped on for a duck four balls later. Ben Duckett, the other opener, tried to get the scoring moving but holed out in the deep for 46 trying an ambitious pull shot off Will O’Rourke to leave the tourist floundering. Smith finished the day with figures of two for 86, having experienced both the joy and the frustrations of the longest form of the game.
Agencies.
