Rob Walter, New Zealand head coach, expressed his disappointment for Latham but backed Santner to do well.

“It’s never great when you lose your captain (Tom Latham), who’s a world-class opening batter and a great team man, but that said we’re going to work really hard to have him available for the second Test,” Walter said.

“We’ll continue to assess and see whether a replacement player is necessary, but at this stage we are hopeful that he’ll recover in time.

“Mitch (Santner) did a wonderful job with the T20 squad in this recent series.Whilst the format is different, he certainly has the respect of the players and will be supported by some highly experienced Test cricketers, so I trust that he’s going to do a great job.”

New Zealand squad: Mitchell Santner (c), Tom Blundell, Devon Conway, Jacob Duffy, Matthew Fisher, Matt Henry, Daryl Mitchell, Henry Nicholls, Will O’Rourke, Ajaz Patel, Rachin Ravindra, Nathan Smith, Will Young