The China Mail - Latham hails 'old school' New Zealand after downing England

Having reduced England to 103-4 overnight, they finished the job an hour after lunch on Monday's fifth day, with only Jamie Smith (60) offering much resistance.

Victory sealed just New Zealand's fourth series win in England following successes in 1986, 1999 and, in a two-match series, 2021.

Their triumph was all the more admirable given Kane Williamson, arguably New Zealand's greatest batsmen, retired from international cricket following a heavy defeat in the first Test at Lord's.

Matt Henry and Glenn Phillips, two of the stars of their thumping 253-run win in the second Test at the Oval, with 11 wickets and a hundred respectively, were then ruled out of the Nottingham decider through injury.

New Zealand also rested towering fast bowler Kyle Jamieson at Trent Bridge because of concerns over his workload.

They suffered further disruption when Blair Tickner pulled out during the series finale with concussion, while Will O'Rourke suffered a hamstring injury on Monday to leave the attack severely depleted.

- 'Boring as possible' -

But seamer Zak Foulkes, the Black Caps' first concussion substitute in Test cricket, responded to his unexpected call-up with impressive match figures of 6-87.

New Zealand's nagging accuracy, well supported by wicket-keeper Tom Blundell standing up to the stumps, frustrated England, with Foulkes saying during the game New Zealand had "just tried to stay as boring as possible really and try to dry out the runs."

New Zealand's approach contrasted markedly with the aggressive 'Bazball' style of England, who were utterly unable to send Ben Stokes out with a win after their talismanic captain's shock announcement on Sunday he would be retiring from international cricket at the end of this match.

Latham whose first-innings 151, was one of three New Zealand hundreds in the match, was asked if teams had to be brave to be boring in modern cricket.

"Yeah I think so, I guess when you need to go a little bit old-school that's something that we pride ourselves on," he told reporters.

Superb fielding helped New Zealand overcome their bowling setbacks, with direct hits from Henry Nicholls and Mitch Santner running out both Joe Root and Josh Tongue on Monday.

"Those two run outs today show the guys are engaged and giving everything they’ve got," said Daryl Mitchell, struck black and blue during the course of a defiant unbeaten hundred in New Zealand's second innings.

"We put a lot of work into that," added Mitchell, the player-of-the-match. "This series win is very special for our group."

England coach Brendon McCullum, himself a former New Zealand captain, was well aware of the qualities that led to his adopted side's seventh defeat in nine Tests.

"New Zealand are a side that do simple things really well for a long period of time," he said.

"They also seize really key moments and I look at even two direct hit run-outs today, it's a significant impact on the final day of a Test match."

McCullum defended England's blazing hitting on Sunday, which included promoting Stokes to open the innings, as the only way they could hope to chase down a target of 373 on a wearing pitch.

"Anywhere between 250 to 290 on the last day is achievable, anything over that and you're going to start to be a little bit in danger so we knew we had to take a risk because we far behind the game," he insisted. "And it was a risk worth taking."

T.Wu--ThChM