I'm afraid you've been proved wrong already there, James.

You're all right about the pitch, though. I've played garden cricket (sadly, many years ago now) on more sparsely covered surfaces.

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Sporting Badger: 'Green-looking pitch'? Same colour as the outfield!

Mark Green: How green is that wicket!

James: Green seamer. Zak won’t last two overs.

Duckett, having got off the mark with a two clipped off his pads, adds a single in the same manner.

Crawley then gets up and running with a drive, pushed back towards mid-off for a single. It hung in the air for a while but lands well short of the fielder.

Not out. UltraEdge shows it was the back leg rather than the edge of Duckett's bat.

It was an absolute beauty from Henry that nipped away off the seam. Duckett would've done well to get bat on it!

Has Matt Henry struck in his first over? Whether he has or not, it's a ripper that whistles very close to the edge of Ben Duckett's bat.

There was a noise and it goes through to Tom Blundell. Given not out but Southee sends it upstairs.

Sir Alastair Cook
Former England captain on BT Sport

It's a big Test for Zak Crawley. There's always one batsman under the microscope. With Ben Duckett coming in and scoring some runs he was probably looking at that toss and thinking 'please Stokesy, do us a favour' and hoping the pitch dries out.

It's a big challenge for him, can he get the score - which he tends to do when people start doubting his place. It will set England up and stop people asking questions.

It took 47 overs for the first maiden of the England innings in Mount Maunganui.

Tim Southee ticks that one off straight away at the Basin. Plenty of swing for the Black Caps skipper but Crawley is watchful around his off stump.

Tim Southee takes the new ball as expected and raps Crawley on the pad first up.

There's a big appeal, turned down by the umpire and not reviewed. High and going down leg but already signs of swing and a bit of nip off the seam.

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Anyway, we're ready to go. You can almost distinguish the wicket for the outfield.

This will be a big test for Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett.

The teams are out and have each belted out their national anthems.

Immediately after the New Zealand anthem, it sounded like they were about to go into a third anthem...

It was The Verve's Bittersweet Symphony. The umpire's anthem?

Another five nights of Test cricket for those of us in the UK to enjoy. Let us know where you're following the match from!

Last week we had quite the mix - from parents of newborn babies to those checking phones at raves!

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England's last Test series victory in New Zealand came back in 2008.

At 1-0 down in that series, the tourists decided to make a change to their bowling attack and brought in seam duo James Anderson and Stuart Broad for the game in Wellington - their first Test together.

1,009 wickets in games played together since, they're back at the Basin Reserve and still going strong...

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New Zealand captain Tim Southee: "We're going to have a bowl, hopefully a bit of life in it, we're accustomed to a pretty good pitch over the course of the Test match.

"England play a positive brand, we saw it last week and over the last year or so. It's an exciting challenge for bowlers to come up against them and hopefully we can get it into the right areas for longer periods this Test match.

"Three seamers, Bracewell and try and see a bit more of Daryl Mitchell with the ball. With the wicket we feel that's the right balance to go with.

"We had a couple of days off and two days training leading into this match. You can read too much into it, pink ball shifting into a red ball and all our guys have had success in those conditions, so it's just about those guys backing themselves and trusting what they're doing is right."

New Zealand: Latham, Young, Williamson, Conway, Nicholls, Mitchell, Blundell (wk), Bracewell, Southee (c), Henry, Wagner.

England: Crawley, Duckett, Pope, Root, Brook, Stokes (c), Foakes (wk), Broad, Robinson, Leach, Anderson.

Tim Southee confirms that the hosts have made a couple of changes to their XI.

After debuting in the first Test, Scott Kuggeleijn and Blair Tickner drop out with Will Young and Matt Henry coming in. A bit of extra batting depth for the home side then.

England confirmed their team yesterday, they're unchanged after victory at Mount Maunganui.

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No wonder he's smiling, England have won six Tests in a row and are looking for number seven.

Batting first on such a green track means they'll really have to work for it.

England captain Ben Stokes: "Obviously a lot of grass on the pitch, we'd have done the same thing as Tim but it presents us with an opportunity to go and there and put some runs on the board.

"I don't think [we'll bat any differently]. We'll just have to go out there with the same processes. We might get put under a bit more pressure in this game but it is then about identifying those stages.

"But when we feel like it is time to put pressure back on New Zealand, hopefully we can do that.

"You're going to come up on different kinds of pitches, this one will play very differently to last week and it's about identifying where your scoring options are going to be on a different wicket.

"I think that is what our batters are very good at doing."

It's looking very green in Wellington and after Ben Stokes calls wrong, the Kiwi seamers will have the first use of these friendly-looking bowling conditions.

Here we go again.

A few short days after Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad proved that Bazball is not just a young man's game, England are back in action and trying to complete a first series win in New Zealand for 15 years.

Before we get stuck into that, it's time for the toss...

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