Carse and Malan were on fire as England’s T20I team powered out of their mothballs with a crushing seven-wicket victory against New Zealand.
A fine home-town debut from the seamer Brydon Carse denied New Zealand any momentum despite a misleadingly run-laden first over from Finn Allen.
Brilliant challenges from Dawid Malan and the unavoidable Harry Brook allowed Jos Buttler to sit back in the dressing-room with his feet up, resting up for more meaningful contests to come.
England showed once again that their depth of options is second-to-none in the world game.
They had already lost two of their best, Josh Tongue and John Turner, to injury, and rested a third, Gus Atkinson, for later in the series.
The team was led instead by Carse and the left-armer Luke Wood, who claimed three wickets apiece.
Sam Curran applied the handbrake with a five-run second over before the debutant Carse conceded a solitary run off the bat with his relentless deck-thumping approach.
New Zealand’s power play amounted to 18 for 0 from three balls, and 20 for 3 from the remaining 33, to set in motion a batting display that was never able to recover any poise.
