Good morning and welcome to our live blog coverage of this one-day international between England and New Zealand at Southampton. I’ll start with the bad news, which is that the weather has been a bit drizzly there and the toss is being pushed back very slightly to 10.40am. There is still considerable optimism that we will kick off at the planned time of 11am, however.
New Zealand won the first match, which was at Cardiff, with plenty in hand. England put up 291 in 50 overs, with four players making half centuries but no man getting beyond 72 (Jos Buttler) to make a game-shaping contribution. Tim Wigmore wrote of that one: “Hundreds for Daryl Mitchell and Devon Conway as New Zealand punish England”; the tourists certainly didn’t hang about in their chase, they knocked those off with 26 balls unused.
Absolutely no reason that England cannot hit back today though and the odds are that we see a high quality and competitive contest.
There has been a nice sub plot around this series with the appearance of Andrew Flintoff, who had an awful accident while filming Top Gear, teaming up with the England squad for a bit of general coaching and mentoring. Liam Livingstone is one who enjoyed it.
“It’s incredible to have him,” Livingstone said. “He’s obviously been one of my heroes growing up. To have someone of his experience lingering around the dressing room is great for all the lads.
“When you see someone like Fred around, it’s always good to chat. Especially while you’re batting: there’s three and a half hours to pick the brains of someone who’s been there and done it.
“He’s probably a national hero, everybody loves that Fred’s joining us and I’m sure he’ll enjoy it as much himself. Over the next week or so, I’m sure he’ll have plenty of laughs inside there.”
More on Freddie as we have it and also we will have the toss and team news as soon as we can.
Jason Roy has got some back troubles and looks like to miss out, Adil Rashid has had some issues with cramp but not sure if he will play or not.