England captain Stokes also responded to the sanctions by posting on his Instagram Story, “Good work ICC. We finished the game with 10 hours of play still remaining.” England are now docked 22 WTC points in the 2023-25 cycle due to slow over-rates, having previously lost 19 of the 28 points they gained in the 2023 Ashes series for the same reason.
Before the first Test, Stokes described the WTC as “complete chaos” and said he had never seriously considered competing. England finished fourth in the first two events of the WTC and sixth in the ongoing cycle. That means they will miss out on the opportunity to play the final at their home stadium for the third time in a row.
New Zealand currently have 47.92% of the points and can only go up to 55.36% if they win the remaining two matches of the series.
After taking time into account, both teams were found to be three overs short of their target, with teams penalized one run for each over found to be short.
On-field umpires Ahsan Raza and Rod Tucker, third umpire Adrian Holdstock and fourth umpire Kim Cotton leveled the charge, with the two captains – Stokes and Tom Latham – Tom Latham accepted this and match referee David Boon sanctioned it.
The top two positions in the WTC table are currently held by India and South Africa respectively, with Australia in third and Sri Lanka in fourth. With 15 tests taking place in the current WTC cycle, no team can guarantee success. Ranked in the top two.
After winning the Test series 3-0 in India, New Zealand suffered an eight-wicket defeat in Christchurch due to sloppy fielding, ruining their realistic chances of reaching their second WTC final.
