Wellington, New Zealand
New Zealand’s Henry Nicholls rode his luck to post a crucial century as the hosts, weakened by the loss of Kane Williamson, survived a shaky start to reach 294 for six on day one of the second Test against the West Indies on Friday.
Nicholls, 29, survived multiple dropped catches at Wellington’s Basin Reserve as he snapped a 21-month string of low scores with his sixth Test century.
At stumps, Nicholls was 117 not out with Kyle Jamieson on one. From being on the ropes at three for 78, Nicholls said New Zealand now considered 400 would be “a good result”.
New Zealand won the first Test inside four days on the back of Williamson’s towering 252, but they are now playing without their talismanic captain who is on paternity leave awaiting the birth of his first child.
It was left to Nicholls to prop up the innings, but he had to survive dropped catches and even a technical malfunction, when a broken stump mic prevented a review, to bat New Zealand out of a hole.
“You just try and move on from them same as when your hitting a boundary or anything else,” Nicholls said, describing how he shut his near-misses out of his mind.
“It’s just batting, it’s cricket, it’s pretty fickle so I just keep focusing on what I’m doing and bringing their bowlers back for more spells.
“It was nice in the initial bit to get through to lunch. Just little milestones on this surface.” Everything went the West Indies’ way at the start of the day when Jason Holder won the toss and made New Zealand bat on an emerald surface with cloud cover and a howling northerly wind.
After a couple of expensive early overs, Shannon Gabriel and Chemar Holder led an attack that had New Zealand pinned down with three wickets in the first 90 minutes.—AFP
