Aotearoa's batting innings against Pakistan down in Dunedin yesterday wasn't a blueprint innings in terms of ODI batting perfection - Kane Williamson's constant huffing and puffing tells you all you need to know about that. Graced with a pitch that was difficult to score freely on though, Aotearoa rolled through a blueprint innings in which their batting line up provided an example of using their tools to build a decent innings.

The first marker was Colin Munro, who played a typically Colin Munro innings. Everyone knows what Munro does and when it's Munro's day, everyone is very quick to celebrate his exploits, so when that conversation turns to a aggression vs reckless debate, things get weird.

Munro is reckless. It's cute to view his batting as pinch-hitting, power-hitting, aggressive batting or whatever when Munro is scoring runs and then viewing him as reckless when it doesn't work. Cute, but so silly. The whole point of Munro opening the batting is that he bats in a reckless fashion and kiwis hope that it works in his favour more often than not, that's a pinch-hitter.

In two consecutive innings, Munro has been dismissed playing a reckless shot outside off-stump and it's completely all good. To give Munro this job is to accept the good with the bad and while I think everyone under-estimates how bloody difficult it is to smoke international bowling attacks to all parts with some regularity, over a couple of years, I also think that there is enough quality around Munro to absorb his shenanigans.

That quality guided Aotearoa through a very difficult period and ensured that an early wicket wouldn't become two or three. I have highlighted Martin Guptill's role a lot recently and he once again batted through the first 15 overs, re-building with Kane Williamson and while Guptill couldn't cash in on that start, he did his job.

The joy of Guptill is that he rarely misses out on punishing a bad ball; if you're too short, mandatory four, maybe six and if you're throwing up juicy half-volleys, Guptill has the range of shots to hit you anywhere. What we have right now is a sense of comfort with Guptill where his all-round batsmanship allows him to pay good bowling the respect it requires and we're now dealing with a Guptill who can easily noodle spinners around for singles - not just whackin'.

Like you, I consider a Kane Williamson cover-drive akin to a sexual experience, so there was nothing blueprint-y about Williamson acting like a spoilt brat. It was low key fun to watch Williamson throw his hands up and down in confusion, look at his bat like 'upto bro?' and generally struggle to handle the pace/bounce of the pitch. It was also extremely fun to watch Williamson - our Golden Child, our cuzzie who can genuinely consider Virat Kohli, Steve Smith and Joe Root his peers - score 73 runs off 101 balls in the process.

This was the most flustered I've ever seen Williamson and his quality was on display in the way he managed not to get out, to somehow stick with it and score more runs than Pakistan's batsmen did (excluding 6 extras). Williamson doesn't just score runs when it's easy and he doesn't just make batting look easy when everyone else is struggling; he finds a way when even he is struggling.

The run-out was a mishap, so whatever. What this did do though was inject Ross Taylor into the innings in the 21st over, after the difficult period and right now Taylor looks like he knows he's a run-scoring tiger. There's an intent to Taylor's batting that is tangible and after noting that Taylor looked as though he had sculled numerous coffees prior to batting in the first ODI, this is now normal for Taylor as he's got one objective when he gets to the crease; tick that scoreboard over.

This almost got Taylor in trouble first ball, playing at a perfect leggy from Shadab Khan:

Remember that Taylor charged Khan in game one for a single, first ball. That's what Taylor is all about now and when you blend an intent to dominate with the ability to dominate, you get the sort of numbers Taylor is dishing up right now.

While Williamson's lofted drive is my favourite shot of his, there's nothing on this planet like Taylor's cut-shots (obviously both can access any boundary in righteous fashion). For whatever reason, Williamson was struggling to read the pitch and Taylor's playing his signature cut-shot off middle stump. Taylor only hit 4 fours in his 52 though and his intent was more visible in the lack of dot-balls, with Taylor consistently turning the strike back over to Williamson.

The last piece to this blueprint was a splash of selfless leadership from Williamson, who took it upon himself to hit out or get out. I doubt it was that simple for Williamson, but there was a clear switch in his batting around the 30th over and with Taylor able to easily rotate the strike, Williamson had to hit a few boundaries. If Williamson was in vintage touch, I doubt he would have gone this route but he had to take a risk to get the Blackcaps if the Blackcaps were to make Pakistan look up at the scoreboard and see 300ish.

This risk didn't pay off and Williamson was dismissed. After the three pillars of this Blackcaps batting group build the bulk of the innings, the skipper sacrificed himself to put the team in a dominant position and we'd expect nothing less.

What then happened, doesn't really matter. The blueprint to Blackcaps success was laid down in tough conditions when nothing came easy, by the three leading run-scorers of this series. Now Lesson needs to suss out who is best-equipped to fill the void when the cricket gods strike and those three can't execute.

Peace and love 27.