Well, it has been amazing day for sport. We’ve had Wales win the Triple Crown, Scotland actually win a rugby match, Manchester United and Chelsea knocked out of the FA Cup (Karen Traviss will be over the moon, Brian, at the success of her beloved Pompey), and starting it all off an amazing comeback by England’s cricketers. After producing three and a half days of the dullest test cricket I have seen in a long time, they suddenly brought the game to life and people are talking about an England win. I think it is unlikely. Here’s why.

Assuming that England dispose of the remaining two New Zealand wickets fairly quickly, they will have just under 90 overs in which to score just under 300 runs. That doesn’t sound hard. 300 in a day is pretty much par for the course in test cricket, and 3 runs per over is pitiful compared to the 6 an over we often see in one-day games, or the 10 an over of a good Twenty20 batting performance.

However, fast run-getting must always be seen in the context of the time available. A scoring rate of 6 an over is possible over 50 overs, a scoring rate of 10 an over is possible over 20 overs, but try to score at either of those rates over 90 overs and you will almost certainly run out of wickets before you run out of overs. If you want to bat longer, you have to bat more slowly. And England very much do not want to run out of wickets. In a three match series you cannot afford to go 1-0 down.

Furthermore, one-day and Twenty20 matches are played on specially prepared pitches. They are not played on a pitch on which scoring has been very difficult, and which has been used for the previous four days. The pitch is doing to take turn, and in Vettori and Patel the Kiwis have two very competent spin bowlers.

Of course Vaughan, KP and the boys could still surprise me. I hope so. Time to listen.