England batsman Joe Denly smashed a brilliant fifty in the final warm-up match against New Zealand A and quashed all the concerns over his fitness, leading up to the Test series.
Denly is returning from an ankle injury that had threatened to rule him out of the entire series.
Denly’s innings of 68 was instrumental in England’s fightback, as the visitors were once languishing at 105/5. Apart from him Ollie Pope’s 88, and Buttler’s 87 helped England reach a score of 355/8.
While skipper Joe Root and Ben Stokes fell cheaply, Denly struck a 90-run partnership with Pope, to take his side out of danger.
Denly, who had ended the Ashes as an opener and amassed half-centuries in each of the last three Tests, missed the Twenty20 series against New Zealand after rolling his ankle on the boundary on the eve of the opener in Christchurch.
As far as the upcoming Test series is concerned, Denly is expected to bat at three in Mount Maunganui. On the other hand Pope is expected to come in at six.
