Hazlewood pushes past 'danger point' to find purple patch

While speculation has centred on the capacity of Australia's 'big three' fast bowlers to make it to the end of a seven-Test stretch without succumbing to the ever-present risk of injury, Josh Hazlewood believes the greatest threat to his physical wellbeing comes at season's start.

After a frustrating run with side strains and achilles tendon problems that curtailed his involvement in the preceding Australian summer and the following Test tour to India, he has barely missed a beat since returning to the Test outfit and gone from strength to strength.

His return of 5-31 from 13.2 immaculate overs against New Zealand at Christchurch's Hagley Oval today completes a remarkable run of bowling form since he singlehandedly destroyed Pakistan in their second innings of the New Year Test at the SCG.

From that memorable afternoon when the 33-year-old took a wicket every second ball in the space of a single stunning over, he has collected 27 Test wickets at the nonsensical average of 9.7 having conceded just 262 runs from 107 overs against Pakistan, West Indies and New Zealand.

It underscores why the right-armer is considered so vital to the men's team's fortunes across all formats, and highlights how sorely he was missed in recent Test campaigns before returning to the starting XI for last year's Ashes series in the UK.

It also scotches suggestions he was struggling to keep his body fit amid the constant rigours of fast bowling, having also been a vital part of Australia's ODI World Cup win in India before embarking on his current run of seven consecutive Tests stretching back to last December.

And it was that summer opener against Pakistan in Perth, after the World Cup win that saw the international players transition from white-ball cricket into red, that Hazlewood had identified as the biggest potential threat point if the injury curse was to strike again.

"It's always that first game of the summer, that's the big danger point," he told cricket.com.au recently.

"It obviously depends what you've got behind you going into it, and one-day cricket is a much better build than T20 a lot of the time.

"So this year we played a few one-dayers leading in, and the World Cup so the workloads were nice over a long period.

"Intensity was up and that held me in good stead.

"If you're coming off the back of T20 cricket which was the two years before that, you're a bit more vulnerable I think.

"And I always feel that once you get through that first game that it's pretty smooth sailing after that.

"That's the critical moment I reckon."

Having got through that opening Test without a hiccup, Hazlewood has subscribed to the mantra observed by the fellow Test quick to whom he is most often compared, Australia's most successful fast bowler Glenn McGrath.

A similarly stifling operator able to regularly land the ball where opposition batters least want to see it, McGrath would preach that he wanted to keep playing as regularly as possible because it was when he stopped and had to get going again he felt at most risk of getting hurt.

Hazlewood faces a hard-earned break from competitive cricket after this Test against New Zealand, with wife Cherina due to give birth to the couple's first child later in the month.

But he hasn't ruled out appearing in the back half of the Indian Premier League tournament should a team there require an injury replacement, which was his reason for nominating in the IPL draft even though he was unavailable for the first half of the competition.

But if that plan doesn't come to fruition, he will return to bowling in some capacity – perhaps even into an empty net near home in Sydney – to ensure he doesn't encounter strife ahead of Australia's next assignment, the T20 World Cup in the Caribbean and USA in June.

"We'll probably have a look at that over the next six to eight months," he said.

"There's not a lot of cricket for us, so it's about in those breaks potentially ticking it over a bit more than what I may have previous years rather than just shutting it down for a month or five weeks.

"Just maybe have two weeks off, have a little bowl, another two weeks and just keep ticking things over, keep the body used to the rigours of fast bowling that we know are quite tough."

Another key reason he, along with fellow Test quicks Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc, have been able to push through all seven Tests of the current summer is the efficiency they have dealt with rival batters, which means none of those matches have gone into a fifth day.

That was the case again at Hagley Oval today after the Black Caps were sent into bat and dismantled for 162 in less than 50 overs, on a pitch that Hazlewood conceded offered little to the bowlers in the opening hour before suddenly coming to life.

"I thought the first hour, the wicket was quite slow with not much bounce," he said at day's end with Australia 4-124 and still 38 runs in arrears.

"But once the sun baked it for that first hour, it quickened up a bit and that's when we saw a few nicks.

"There was that little nip there all day, a little bit of swing so there's plenty there for the quicks.

"It probably gets flatter as the game goes on here, certainly last time we were here (in 2016) it was similar to that.

"But we saw New Zealand move it around a fair bit, even this afternoon so there potentially might be enough in it for the next few days as well.

"There's not necessarily divots there, it's just good seam movement and a couple of guys extracting that.

"Fingers crossed it keeps moving around for us, but we're probably just ahead here."

If, as Hazlewood expects, the movement on offer to the seamers continues into tomorrow or beyond then he believes a first-innings lead of anything above 100 would be ideal.

Much will depend on Australia number three Marnus Labuschagne who resumes on 45no tomorrow – the only score above 40 in the game to date – with only allrounder Mitchell Marsh among his team's specialist batters to come.

"We would have liked to be two or three-down at the end of today, but there's still seam movement," Hazlewood said.

"So if we can get a triple-figure lead that would be unreal.

"If it flattens out, we'll push and push for as many as we can get but if the seam movement continues, I think the hundred lead is a good position."

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February 29 – March 4: Australia won the first Test by 172 runs

March 8-12: Second Test, Christchurch, 9am AEDT

Australia Test squad: Pat Cummins (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey, Cameron Green, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Marsh, Michael Neser, Matthew Renshaw, Steve Smith (vc), Mitchell Starc

New Zealand Test squad: Tim Southee (c), Tom Blundell (wk), Matt Henry, Scott Kuggeleijn, Tom Latham, Daryl Mitchell, Glenn Phillips, Rachin Ravindra, Mitchell Santner, Ben Sears, Kane Williamson, Will Young.