KEY POINTS:
And then there were none.
The axing of Matthew Hoggard and Steve Harmison for today's second test at the Basin Reserve marks the final break-up of England's celebrated fast-medium quartet who won everlasting Ashes fame three years ago.
Hoggard, Harmison, Andrew Flintoff and Simon Jones took 75 of the 89 Australian wickets to fall during the 2005 series, when England regained the Ashes for the first time in almost 20 years with a 2-1 victory.
Jones has battled chronic injury problems since that series and may not be seen again. Flintoff's last test was over a year ago, as he has gone through a series of operations.
And now the two survivors have been shipped out as England look to younger men Stuart Broad and James Anderson to revive their test series hopes after being dumped by 189 runs in the first test at Hamilton last Sunday.
"It was a very tough call. It's purely on instinct," England captain Michael Vaughan said yesterday. "Our gut feeling was that we needed to make a change. We feel the attack needed a little bit of a shake-up."
Vaughan admitted telling the experienced pair - who share 460 test wickets from 124 tests collectively - they were out was not easy.
"It's not a nice thing for me, to tell two players I've played basically all my test cricket with that they're not in the test team. I hope those guys fight their way back in. We all know how both of them can bowl. At the minute they are just not bowling to the standards they've set themselves."
Asked how the pair took the news of their dropping, Vaughan replied drily: "As you'd expect, they weren't overly delighted."
But he hopes there is a silver lining to the decision.
"It's a great opportunity for the young lads. They are a little bit lacking in experience [Broad has played one test, Anderson 20 over a five-year, in and out career] but they've got enough talent to put the New Zealand batsmen under a lot of pressure."
