Tim Southee shows the way with full length

SIMON HUGHES: The question now is whether the New Zealanders can find enough help in the pitch to dismiss eight more Indians before tea on the final day. If they do, we could be in for a classic...

It was Durham’s Graham Onions who first acted on it: in the early days of the data era he discovered the statistic that 75 per cent of wickets in top-level cricket fall to full length deliveries. Though perfectly capable of pinging the ball around the batsman’s earholes, he resolved to concentrate on pitching the ball up. The result was 723 first class wickets in a 15-year career at a highly successful average of 25.

It is a constant source of surprise that few top-class fast bowers automatically follow suit. Most like to hover around a good length (rather than a full one), focusing on denying the batsmen runs rather than concentrating purely on wicket-taking. The Indian fast bowlers were certainly guilty of that on the fifth morning at the Hampshire Bowl.

The conditions were magnificent were seam and swing bowling – a pitch that had been under cover for more than 24 hours, low cloud hovering around, a surface with good carry and a ball nicely polished on one side. And yet for much of the first hour Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Shami sent balls just fractionally short of a good length flying relatively harmlessly though to Rishabh Pant. In fact, they caused the Indian keeper more trouble than the New Zealand batsmen.

There had been much comment during the first couple of days about Shami’s high bowling average in England (47) compared to his obvious ability. He has seemed to come steaming in, constantly beating the bat rather than taking wickets. Was he just one of those unlucky bowlers? A Hawkeye investigation concluded that he was generally just half a yard short in length than is ideal in England, which meant he was harder to score off but often beat the bat rather than took the edge.

Something around the first drinks break persuaded him to seek a fuller length and suddenly his luck changed. First Ross Taylor was drawn into driving a ball that wasn’t quite there for the shot and hit the ball uppishly towards Shubman Gill who took a sharp falling catch at short mid-off. Then he castled a tentative BJ Watling and went wide of the crease and pinned Colin de Grandhomme lbw. New Zealand, having been almost strokeless in the first hour, were now 162 for 6, still 45 behind. This was India’s chance.

Kane Williamson’s dedicated defiance and some enterprising batting from Kyle Jamieson and Tim Southee pulled New Zealand out of trouble. In the process Southee went to third in the list of New Zealand’s six-hitters (behind Brendon McCullum and Chris Cairns). But it is of course for his swing bowling that he is really lauded, and there were two beautiful examples of it late in the day.

New Zealand's cricketers show us what matters

He toyed with Shubman Gill, bowling a succession of outswingers, some from wide of the crease, some from close to the stumps, then slipped in his “three-quarter seam” delivery which flies down with a scrambled seam and angles into the batsman, nailing him lbw.

He then exceeded that with a similar tactic to Rohit Sharma, a series of outswingers dangled teasingly outside off-stump followed by a deliciously disguised in-swinger which the unsuspecting batsman shouldered arms to. There is nothing more satisfying for a swing bowler than this sort of deception. Of course, it was achieved from a full length. Really the question now is, can the New Zealanders find enough help in the pitch to dismiss eight more Indians before tea on the final day. If they do, we could be in for a classic.