Tactical rethink puts New Zealand on top against Bangladesh

A hasty rewrite of the battle plan saw Neil Wagner bag a five-wicket haul as New Zealand ripped through the Bangladesh tail to counter Tamim Iqbal's virtuoso century on day one of the first Test in Hamilton on Thursday.

Despite Tamim's heroic 126, New Zealand claimed the first-day honours when they reached stumps at 86 without loss in reply to Bangladesh's 234.

But for half the day everything had flowed Bangladesh's way as Tamim led an assault on the New Zealand attack after being sent in to bat.

The green wicket did not assist swing bowlers Tim Southee and Trent Boult and it took a switch to short-ball specialist Wagner to get results.

"As a unit we started assessing how we had to bowl and how we had to try and bring ourselves back into it. I thought we did that really well and obviously got the rewards for it," said Wagner who finished with five for 47 from his barrage of bouncers.

"Tamim obviously batted extremely well and... made it quite hard for us and we had to fight hard to get those wickets."
- 'We have ourselves to blame' -
================================
"It was a very, very good wicket. It was greenish, but it didn't do too much. We should have scored a lot more than what we have put on. We have ourselves to blame."