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Stuart Broad's best burst sets up key England win but all is not yet rosy
England 232 & 213 New Zealand 207 & 68: Fast bowler takes seven wickets for 44 runs in Kiwi collapse, but home batting also failed to impress
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Your support makes all the difference.England won the opening Test of the summer on Sunday with a compelling exhibition of fast bowling. They dismissed New Zealand for a total of 68 to secure a 1-0 lead in the Investec series by 170 runs.
Stuart Broad took 7 for 44, the best figures of his career; Jimmy Anderson was hardly less potent in the utter dismantling of the tourists' second innings, which lasted for only one hour and 54 minutes, or 22.3 overs. Those are the bare facts of a contest which sometimes induced a state of torpor in its first two days but by its end was irresistibly thrilling.
The consensus view at the start of the fourth day was that the match was in the balance. That was a hopeless assessment of what was to transpire in a morning of high drama.
When England contrived to lose their last four wickets for 33 runs in the first hour, New Zealand were left needing 239 to win. It would be the highest total of the match but it seemed as though it might be within the tourists' grasp, given the way matters had progressed.
Before the hour was out Broad and Anderson, at their most skilful, had laid waste to the innings. Six wickets, five of them to Broad, fell in 11.4 overs. New Zealand's batting, a match and often much more for England's bowlers in the recent Tests between the sides, was brutally exposed.
Less than another hour into the afternoon, it was all over. A late flurry of hitting was meaningless except in terms of preventing complete humiliation for New Zealand.
This was the sort of beating that England were meant to hand to these opponents weeks ago when the sides began this sequence of five home and away Tests. Until yesterday, New Zealand had offered a resilience which often translated into superiority.
How now they will rue their missed chances in Dunedin and Auckland, where they failed to bowl out an England side forced into desperate rearguard actions. Indeed, despite the eventual overwhelming margin, they will also consider this an opportunity that escaped.
England, having at last created an opening, burst through it. Both bowlers, opening together in their 28th match, used the slope of the pitch and the overhead conditions to dramatic effect.
Broad, who was doubtless encouraged by the return of his batting form in a cameo earlier in the day, was as probing as he had been innocuous in the first innings. His partner, operating from the Pavilion End, simply resumed in the manner in which he had bowled in the first innings.
The ball jagged this way and that, with the incline and, crucially, also against it. Broad received the man of the match award because his contribution was so spectacular but it was possible to understand what he meant when he paid generous tribute to his sidekick and said Anderson should have won it. Penetrating, profitable, sharp bursts have become Broad's stock in trade. He can be the despair of observers sometimes, failing to bowl an adequate length or speed, and then suddenly it all comes together so that he is in complete control, a harvest of wickets inevitable. He did it at The Oval against Australia in 2009, against West Indies at Lord's last year and in Wellington against New Zealand earlier this year.
The surrender began with the wicket of Peter Fulton, who might as well have hung out the white flag instead of his bat in the second over. Before long Broad produced a beauty which moved back late against Hamish Rutherford, induced Ross Taylor to edge to slip, persuaded Kane Williamson into driving strangely and loosely to mid-off and seared one back at Brendon McCullum to have him lbw.
At the other end it was somehow unfair that Anderson was being deprived, his sole success in that hour before lunch being the wicket of Dean Brownlie, another well pouched in the slip cordon. At 29 for six the interval brought the prospect of record low scores.
To ensure this was avoided – 42 being the lowest innings total at Lord's – the Kiwis swung the bat, though hardly merrily. After Broad took two more wickets and Anderson one the match ended comically when Neil Wagner, having been dropped in the deep, prevaricated about taking two, and was run out by the recovering throw.
After such a magnificent conclusion, with Lord's resplendent in spring sunshine, it would be tempting to posit the theory that everything in England's garden is rosy. Tempting but misguided. The mistakes of the morning, of the previous evening, of the first two days, were easily overlooked but they could not be automatically eradicated. England have developed a worrying tendency to shed wickets much too lightly, a shortcoming which stretches back as far as their tour to the UAE against Pakistan early in 2012.
Twice in this match they were found wanting. In the first innings they lacked ambition and focus and to compound that then lost six wickets for 40 runs.
On Saturday evening an authoritative partnership between Joe Root and Jonathan Trott was followed by the loss of four quick wickets and another four yesterday morning.
The chief destroyer was Tim Southee, who took 10 wickets in the match, only the second Kiwi to do so, and only the second of the 11 men from touring teams who have performed the feat to finish on the losing side.
This was a key win at the start of a key summer for England. The teams meet again on Friday at Headingley, where the home side should now be inspired.
Lord's scoreboard
Lord's (Third and fourth day of five): England beat New Zealand by 170 runs
England won toss
ENGLAND First Innings 232 (Southee 4-58)
NEW ZEALAND First Innings Overnight 153-4 (Taylor 66)
K S Williamson c Prior b Anderson 60
167 balls 0 sixes 6 fours
*B B McCullum c Prior b Broad 2
22 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
†B J Watling c Prior b Finn 17
52 balls 0 sixes 2 fours
T G Southee c Root b Finn 12
9 balls 0 sixes 3 fours
B P Martin b Anderson 0
3 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
N Wagner not out 6
14 balls 0 sixes 1 fours
T A Boult c Anderson b Finn 0
4 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
Extras (b4 lb8 nb3) 15
Total (69 overs) 207
Fall: 1-5, 2-7, 3-100, 4-147, 5-155, 6-177, 7-194, 8-195, 9-207.
Bowling: JM Anderson: 24-11-47-5 (5-3-9-2; 2-1-9-0; 3-1-3-0; 5-1-11-1; 9-5-14-2), SCJ Broad: 21-4-64-1 (2nb) (7-2-13-0; 6-1-32-0; 2-0-3-0; 6-1-16-1), ST Finn: 15-3-63-4 (1nb) (5-1-19-0; 6-1-23-1; 4-1-21-3), GP Swann: 8-0-19-0 (6-0-17-0; 2-0-2-0), IJL Trott: 1-0-2-0 (1-0-2-0).
ENGLAND Second Innings
*A N Cook c Brownlie b Boult 21
31 balls 0 sixes 1 fours
N R D Compton b Wagner 15
26 balls 0 sixes 2 fours
I J L Trott b Williamson 56
137 balls 0 sixes 6 fours
J E Root b Southee 71
120 balls 0 sixes 8 fours
J M Bairstow b Southee 5
13 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
†M J Prior c Sub b Southee 0
11 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
S T Finn c Sub b Southee 6
16 balls 0 sixes 1 fours
I R Bell c Brownlie b Southee 6
11 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
S C J Broad not out 26
25 balls 0 sixes 4 fours
G P Swann c McCullum b Southee 1
18 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
J M Anderson c Southee b Williamson 0
5 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
Extras (b3 w1 nb2) 6
Total (68.3 overs) 213
Fall: 1-36, 2-36, 3-159, 4-167, 5-171, 6-171, 7-183, 8-200, 9-210.
Bowling: TA Boult: 15-3-56-1 (7-1-27-1; 5-2-15-0; 3-0-14-0), TG Southee: 19-4-50-6 (3-0-14-0; 3-0-8-0; 3-1-3-0; 10-3-25-6), N Wagner: 13-2-44-1 (1nb, 1wd) (4-1-15-1; 3-1-9-0; 6-0-20-0), BP Martin: 13-2-40-0 (1nb) (3-0-15-0; 10-2-25-0), KS Williamson: 8.3-2-20-1 (7-1-17-1; 1.3-1-3-1).
NEW ZEALAND Second Innings
P G Fulton c Prior b Broad 1
9 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
H D Rutherford b Broad 9
8 balls 0 sixes 2 fours
K S Williamson c Finn b Broad 6
24 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
L R P L Taylor c Cook b Broad 0
2 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
D G Brownlie c Cook b Anderson 5
19 balls 0 sixes 1 fours
*B B McCullum lbw b Broad 8
6 balls 0 sixes 2 fours
†B J Watling c Trott b Anderson 13
24 balls 0 sixes 2 fours
T G Southee c Root b Broad 7
10 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
N Wagner run out 17
24 balls 1 sixes 1 fours
B P Martin b Broad 1
9 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
T A Boult not out 0
0 balls 0 sixes 0 fours
Extras (lb1) 1
Total (22.3 overs) 68
Fall: 1-1, 2-16, 3-16, 4-21, 5-25, 6-29, 7-41, 8-54, 9-67.
Bowling: JM Anderson: 11.3-5-23-2, SCJ Broad: 11-0-44-7.
Bowling: JM Anderson: 11.3-5-23-2 (one spell 11.3-5-23-2), SCJ Broad: 11-0-44-7 (one spell 11-0-44-7).
Progress: Day Three: New Zealand: KS Williamson 50 off 158 balls (5 x 4's), 200 runs in 65.5 overs, 207 all out in 69 overs. Lunch: England 12-0 in 2 overs (AN Cook 5, NRD Compton 7), 50 runs in 12.3 overs, Tea: 91-2 in 26 overs (IJL Trott 25, JE Root 28), 100 runs in 31.1 oves, JE Root 50 off 78 balls (6 x 4's), 150 runs in 46.6 overs, IJL Trott 50 off 128 balls (6 x 4's), Close: 180-6 in 59 overs (ST Finn 6, IR Bell 0). Day Four: England 200 runs in 62.4 overs, 213 all out in 68.3 overs. Lunch: New Zealand 29-6 in 11.4 overs (BJ Watling 0), 50 runs in 17.1 overs.
Umpires: Aleem Dar (Pakistan) and SJ Davis (Australia)
TV umpire: M Erasmus (South Africa)
Match referee: DC Boon (Australia)
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