Taylor the driving force

Claire Taylor © Getty Images

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Claire Taylor has been the bedrock of the England team on their tour of Australia and New Zealand - scoring five half-centuries and a hundred in her last seven innings.

It can be no coincidence that her personal batting coach Mark Lane has been on hand to offer tips and advice in the Antipodes after being appointed acting head coach following Mark Dobson's departure.

And Taylor recognises the benefits of having a close ally, telling ecb.co.uk: "It's great for him to have some exposure as acting lead coach of the women's side.

"But from a personal point of view, he really knows the way I bat inside out now, so he just makes a couple of comments about the way I'm batting in the nets or the way I practise and that sets things right almost immediately.

"If anything is going wrong, he spots it at once."

Taylor and Lane have made a few alterations to her game in the last six months, which are paying dividends in thrilling fashion now.

"We've worked on a couple of things since last summer," she said. "Just small technical changes and quite a lot of tactical things, like hitting balls to particular areas of the ground at specific times in the game.

"I'm glad really that I have been scoring some runs at the end of the tour; things didn't start off quite so well.

Taylor puts her success down to the talents of batting coach Mark Lane © Getty Images

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"It has been better with the pitches being more batsman-friendly in New Zealand, so I've tried to cash in."

And cash in she has, with scores of 70 and 111 in the last two matches and two more games in the series in which to impress even further.

"One of the things I have been looking for is more consistency in the game so I can contribute to team scores more times than I don't," Taylor revealed. "It's nice that it is coming good now.

"I'm also looking at one innings at a time. Rather than looking back on each innings, I'm looking forward and concentrating on the next innings and making sure I do everything right. I'm not taking anything for granted."

The weather has affected the women's tour, with a one-day game in Australia abandoned without a ball being bowled and rain hampering preparations for Sunday's encounter against New Zealand, with England needing to win one of the remaining two back-to-back matches to clinch the series.

"We are praying for the weather to clear up a bit as it is a bit damp over here," she said.

"We are playing on a new wicket, I think, so we will have to have a look at the wicket, see what a par score is likely to be, go for a win and then we can relax a bit on the Monday."

But England are determined not to let the prospect of a series win cloud their concentration.

"We are talking about it a little bit, but it is more about focusing on the next match and making sure we win that one," Taylor said.

"We were in this position in Australia as well and we let it slip in the fourth one-dayer in Sydney, so we are very focused on making sure that does not happen again."