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A loudspeaker announcement detailing his previous highest Test score helped inspire New Zealand’s Ross Taylor to his maiden test century on the second day of the first Test against England on Thursday.

Taylor scored 120 in New Zealand’s first innings of 470 and combined in a record seventh-wicket partnership of 148 with Daniel Vettori. New Zealand then had England at 87 for two in reply at stumps.

The 23-year-old Central Districts batsman had strode to the wicket on the first day and, as has been tradition at Seddon Park with all incoming batsmen, his test statistics were announced to the crowd over the loudspeaker system. They were not pretty. Playing his third Test, he had previously scored just 44 runs in his four innings with a top score of 17. “I heard it and I used it as motivation,” Taylor told reporters. “Seventeen is not a very good personal best score but that was definitely my motivation.

“I got off to a bit of a shaky start in my first four digs in Test cricket so it was good to silence a few people who doubted me and whether I was good enough to play at this level.”Taylor tempered his naturally aggressive game to play straight and also changed his habit during the one-day series of pulling straight and offside deliveries over mid-wicket.

The tactic worked, with 11 of the 18 boundaries in his score being driven through the covers or straight down the ground.“I trained fairly hard over the last week or so to do that, but saying that I’m very happy to score a 100 and it’s just one innings and I’ll have to work a lot harder to maintain that.”

England’s best bowler Ryan Sidebottom praised Taylor’s batting but was disappointed at the way he had bowled early on the second day.“Me and Hoggy (Matthew Hoggard) were stupidly searching for wickets this morning, rather than doing what we did yesterday,” said Sidebottom, who finished with four for 90.

Source:Cricket News