New Zealand may well have delayed declaring their second innings on the final day of the first Test against England at Lord’s but skipper Kane Williamson said that the team gave themselves ‘best chance to win’ by having enough overs left in the bank to dismiss England.
However, England batsmen were equal to the task and saved the game that left Williamson disappointed and lamenting losing a whole day to bad weather which washed out the third day’s play at Lord’s.
"As we know in Test cricket you have your ebbs and flow but coming into day and having a bit of work to do in that morning session to give ourselves a chance, I thought the guys played some superb cricket throughout to give us that potential opportunity. Unfortunately it wasn't to be today, losing a day to weather doesn't help the cause but I thought the efforts were certainly there,” Williamson said in the post-match press coneference.
He also had high expectations from the surface that it would be deteriorating big time on the final day but it ‘flattened' out’ and did not offer them enough to challenge England batsmen for a longer period of time.
"We made the decision based on what gave us potentially the best chance to win the game or enough overs. We knew losing a day was going to be tough but we wanted to give it a crack. Unfortunately towards the end things fizzled out a bit, we were expecting the pitch to deteriorate a bit more and it did show signs on day four in particular that that was going to happen, but it sort of flattened out,” Williamson said.
Asked about England not going after the chase of 273 runs in the last two sessions, Williamson said that like him, the hosts too thought the pitch would misbehave far too much.
He said that if he was the one to take that call of going for the chase or giving up on it, he would have tried to have a solid base before trying to tee off in the last phase of the game to minimise the risk of losing.
"It's always tough to know how an opposition will look to attack a chase, obviously all three results still possible. If we were in that position, you do want to get a really good base and try to take the game to a deep stage where you might have a smaller chase of less overs but throw all your resource at it. Clearly there was a lot of work to do to get to that, a lot of overs left and I think both sides were expecting the pitch to deteriorate more,” Williamson argued.
However, he agreed to Joe Root’s observation that scoring runs at a brisk pace was not a viable option and the things could not quite work well for both sides in the last session as the tourists failed to break through on regular intervals and hosts struggled to score a lot of runs.
"It kind of ebbed and flowed, and scoring wasn't quick throughout. We felt if we could pick up wickets throughout that would give us the best opportunity and life could be quite difficult, but that wasn't the case. Things didn't perhaps unfold for either side."
Although they should have won the game after such a resounding start, New Zealand would walk away more happy having ticked more boxes than the hosts England.
However, they would have to find answers to the questions surrounding the all-rounder and spinner in the playing XI. Mitchell Santner played ahead of Ajaz Patel for the all-around abilities he brings to the table, but he could not get amongst wickets. However, Williamson outlined ‘game-changing’ opportunities he created in the first innings and bemoaned the lack of deterioration of the pitch in the second innings.
"It was important for Mitch to get out there and bowl and get comfortable and he created a few opportunities, certainly in that first innings, which were potentially game-changing, and we know he can bat really well as well. It would have been nice if things showed a bit more deterioration on the pitch, and from a straighter line, but it was a pretty good surface with a bit in it for everybody,” Williamson backed Santner.
New Zealand would be strengthened even more with a likely return of Trent Boult in the second Test at Edgbaston starting June 10 and Williamson would be eyeing a massive opportunity to clinch the series against the hosts before getting onto the World Test Championship final against India.