England breaks drought with big win over New Zealand

England’s two-year drought for touring Test victories ended today with a 126-run victory over New Zealand in Wellington to level the three-match cricket series at one apiece.

After losing the first Test in Hamilton by 189 runs, England achieved a massive turnaround in less than a week to win abroad for the first time in nine Tests, since beating India at Mumbai in March 2006.

England set up the win by scoring 342 after being sent in to bat, and bowled better with a rejuvenated attack to dismiss New Zealand for 198 and a 144-run first-innings lead.

It then built a 437-run advantage by scoring 293 in its second innings and dismissed New Zealand again for 311, ending the match shortly before lunch on the final day.

England made two key changes after its loss at Hamilton, dropping veteran fast bowlers Steve Harmison and Matthew Hoggard and recalling youngsters James Anderson and Stuart Broad.

Anderson took 5-73 to wreck New Zealand’s first innings and Broad complemented an attack in which Ryan Sidebottom was again the leading figure.

England’s only downside was its catching, but Vaughan hoped that would improve along with other aspects of England’s game in the deciding third Test at Napier which starts Saturday.

Vaughan praised the resilience of the England team to lift itself so completely after the heavy loss at Hamilton.

“A week in cricket is a long time as it’s just shown,” he said. “What we tried to do in this match was respect the game, play as well as we can and come out with a victory and we’ll do exactly the same over the next week.

“It sets the series up brilliantly now. It’s 1-1, I keep getting told it’s going to be a flat wicket (at Napier). We hope to play an even better game than we’ve done here because there are areas we need to work on and improve.”

Vaughan singled out Sidebottom for praise after the right-armer recorded figures of 5-105 in New Zealand’s second innings, to defend what would have been a world-record winning total.

He also praised wicketkeeper Tim Ambrose, describing his innings of 102 in England’s first innings – the only century of the match – as the “defining moment.”

Ambrose lifted England from 5-136 between lunch and tea on the first day to 342, through a 164-run partnership with Paul Collingwood in difficult batting conditions .

New Zealand never recovered from its heavy first-innings deficit. It managed to dismiss England for 293 in its second innings but was left in an untenable position, needing 438 to win the match over the last two days.

The highest winning score in the fourth innings of a Test match is 7-418, made by the West Indies against Australia five years ago. The small hope New Zealand had of winning died when it lost Jacob Oram in the last over before stumps on Sunday to enter the final day at 6-242, still 196 runs behind.

England took only 19.3 overs today to capture the last four New Zealand wickets, delayed by Brendon McCullum who made a defiant 85.

“It’s a very disappointed dressing room,” New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori said. “If we reflect back on the Test match it was a pretty even one apart from the third session on the first day when we let Tim Ambrose get away through some poor bowling and feeding his strengths.

“If you follow the rest of it, it was a pretty even contest the rest of the way … we left ourselves too much on the final day.”