At the close of play on Day Three England were 248-4 in reply to New Zealand's 409 all out.

"I played pretty well," he said. "I got a bit of luck, played and missed a few times, but it was a good day.

"It is a pretty good wicket. I think if you bowl full on it then obviously you can hit them pretty easily, but there's a sort of in-between length."

The opener added: "If you hit that then it seems to do odd things now and again, especially when the cloud cover comes over.

"You've just got to get it in the right place and it really is quite tough."

The Somerset player had warm words for opening partner Andrew Strauss, who fell for 63.

The pair have only batted together three times but they have already compiled two century partnerships, putting on 153 on Saturday.

"If you get off to a great start like that it makes it a lot easier for the rest of the guys, especially on a wicket like this," said Trescothick.

"When the new ball's swinging it's pretty important.

"Straussy's come in and done fantastically well. You couldn't wish for a better debut than last week and then to continue it on today is just great.

"We're both quite positive players and keep the board ticking over all the time.

"The momentum was with us today and we kept it going and got a 150 partnership, which was great."

New Zealand fought back late in the day as it clouded over, with Scott Styris swinging the ball and claiming two wickets.

"I think the cloud cover has been hugely important," said Trescothick.

"The wicket seems to do something, it just changes and you could see in the last half an hour before we came off for the first interruption that the wicket started doing little things here and there.

"It's been tough, the guys have bowled pretty well and you've just got to get a partnership going.

"If we can build a partnership then we might get up close."