Okay, I've done some statistics just to see whether our frustration with England not 'batting time' pans out.
It does. I took the recognised batsmen & all-rounders from: India (World No.1), South Africa (World No.2), England (World No.3) and New Zealand (World No.4). I used the last 4 test matches as my dataset as anything bigger would have taken too long. I then looked at their runs scored & balls faced. My theory is that England consistently don't bat for long enough, as we saw today.
Some initial thoughts: Moeen Ali and Rahul's form has been atrocious- 78 & 94 runs over 4 Tests. New Zealand are either seriously in-form or are future possible World No.1... They had less players in my analysis too. England aren't as good as we like to think. South Africa's batting unit has been average lately, but they keep winning!
These two tables show the gulf in quality between England and New Zealand over the past 4 tests.
Finally, I then looked at the averages of these four teams. Interesting results!
Thanks for reading!