Black Caps captain Tom Latham has acknowledged his team fell short in all three areas of the game in their historic test defeat to Bangladesh.
Bangladesh claimed their first test victory over New Zealand – and first in any format in New Zealand – with a dominant eight-wicketwin at Bay Oval in Mount Maunganui.
The upset saw New Zealand's 17-test unbeaten run at home come to an end, and Latham indicated his side's poor finish to their first innings was an area where the game was lost.
"It was a disappointing performance, from day one, the position we were in at lunchtime and then on, we weren't at our best and where we know we can be," Latham said.
"We weren't quite there in all three facets really. Bangladesh certainly showed us how to go about things on that wicket, they were able to build partnerships and apply lots of pressure. Unfortunately we couldn't do it for long enough.
"We managed to build partnerships throughout that first innings but losing five for 70 on day two, it didn't allow us to get to that 400-450 mark.
"Looking back at that first innings, the position we were in, if we get 450 then it would probably be a different story but full credit to Bangladesh, the way they went about things for all five days – they deserved the win."
Ross Taylor and Tom Latham of the Black Caps walk off Bay Oval after being defeated by Bangladesh. Photo / Getty
The Black Caps bowlers had to toil for 176.2 overs to dismiss Bangladesh, but when the Bangladeshi bowlers promptly ripped through the hosts for 169 in the second innings, Latham was left pondering whether his bowling strategies were wrong.
"Whether we could have attacked the stumps a little bit more early on … it's a surface we haven't played a lot of cricket on – there's not a huge amount of information. [Maybe] we could have gone a little bit straighter earlier, they played the short-ball plan really well on a surface that was quite slow, but in the same sense both teams get to play on it, and they just showed the lengths you need to bowl, they bashed the wicket and got enough out of the surface to trouble us.
"That's the beauty of putting a big first-innings total on the board – the bowlers get time to rest up and time to hit that second innings hard."
Despite Bangladesh spinner Mehidy Hasan Miraz picking up four wickets in the test, Latham noted that there wasn't much spin on offer, and played a forward defence when asked whether his side could have used the unwanted Ajaz Patel.
"It's hard to say. Whatever side we have, we [give] 100 per cent backing. I thought Rachin [Ravindra] did a great job for us toiling into the wind, the surface didn't necessarily spin a whole lot."
After eight consecutive test series wins at home, the best the Black Caps can now do is draw this two-test series, and Latham is forced to look towards the second test at Christchurch's Hagley Oval in search of the team's first win in the new World Test Championship cycle.
"It hurts. Hopefully we can take the learnings we've taken from this test match and apply them to a different surface at Hagley.
"Our focus has got to turn quickly to Hagley and hopefully we can put out a good performance there."
