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Peter Fulton walks back to the pavillion after being dismissed
It may not have been a bloodless coup but the carnage certainly wasn't as widespread as expected.
A day after captain-cum-selector Daniel Vettori vowed to swing the axe upon New Zealand's woeful batsmen, it was announced that all but one of them had survived the Basin Reserve massacre. For some, though, it will feel like a mere stay of execution.
Someone had to be the fall guy after the Black Caps crashed to a 141 run loss in Wellington; and to no one's surprise it was Peter Fulton.
To describe Fulton as a walking wicket would be erroneous, as that would imply that he uses his feet. It is supposedly every young cricketer's dream to represent their country; Fulton seemed as though he was living through a recurring nightmare with every trip to the crease.
Another four of his top order colleagues will count themselves lucky to survive. They surely wouldn't have, were New Zealand's batting stocks not as shallow as a half-filled paddling pool.
Daniel Flynn and Martin Guptill survived because of their youth and promise. Grant Elliott survived because he can bowl a bit. Tim McIntosh survived because - well, he just survived.
Into Fulton's lead shoes steps BJ Watling; a battler of little fame but considerable character. There's more than a touch of Mark Richardson about the South African-born opener: He's technically adept, and unfazed by tight bowling and stodgy batting.
Watling's selection is an astute one. It allows Guptill to drop a place to No.3, where he has the ability and dynamism to survive and flourish in the role.
It also gives Daniel Flynn some respite from Pakistan's new-ball
bowlers in the new position of No.5, where his aptitude at playing
spin should shine through.
Foolish
But the rest of the stuttering batsmen would be foolish to think that they're out of the woods just yet.
Jesse Ryder and James Franklin will be available for the Black Caps' next Test, against Bangladesh in the New Year. Both will almost certainly come in to bolster the top six; meaning at least two batsmen face the same fate as Fulton unless they emphatically reverse their form in Napier.
The batting effort was wretched in Dunedin; diabolical in Wellington. It's a wonder that the batsmen could even look their bowlers in the eye as they trudged regularly back to the pavilion; victims of reckless swipes, hapless pokes and listless prods.
The outstanding Ross Taylor aside, the top six batsmen have scored a total of 270 runs in four innings. Taylor has scored 280. The consequences are hardly worth pondering if he fails in Napier.
And counterintuitive as it may seem, the selectors look set to leave out a batsman - probably Elliott - in order to accommodate off-spinner Jeetan Patel, who usually finds ample encouragement in the McLean Park wicket.
On paper, the Black Caps need as many capable batsmen as they can find, but on the other hand, if it's a matter of shoehorning the best 11 players into the side, few would quibble over the inclusion of Patel over an honest, but underperforming, Elliott.
Selector Mark Greatbatch made no secret of this on Monday.
"Flynn and Elliot will probably be vying for a middle order spot," he told ONE News, effectively signing off on Patel's inclusion, with Vettori and Brendon McCullum to move up one spot each in the order.
The benign nature of the McLean Park wicket should at least provide a psychological boost. After all, they have virtually the same batting line-up that piled on 619 runs against India there just nine months ago.
The way most of the top six is travelling at the moment, one gets the feeling they would struggle to make 619 on an autobahn. Against a German Invitational XI.
But the selectors' loyalty has surely worn dangerously thin. One more poor Test for the likes of Flynn, McIntosh and Guptill, and they will be joining Peter Fulton in exile.
