BASIN RESERVE — It takes a lot to upstage a Test hat-trick but Jacob Bethell managed just that on a second day in Wellington that saw England move inexorably towards a first Test series win in New Zealand since 2008.

Gus Atkinson, dismissing Nathan Smith, Matt Henry and Tim Southee in successive deliveries, became the first England player since Moeen Ali in 2017 to take a hat-trick and just the 15^th overall.

Atkinson’s haul wrapped up New Zealand’s first innings in this second Test for 125 inside the first 40 minutes of the day to hand England a 155-run lead.

It was yet another special achievement for a bowler who already has a 12-wicket haul, claimed on debut at Lord’s last July, and a Test century, scored at the same venue later in the summer. He’s also only the 10^th man in history to have a Test century and a hat-trick. All done in his first 10 matches. Remarkable.

Yet even more remarkable is Bethell, the 21-year-old kid from Birmingham via Barbados who was England’s shock choice to bat at No 3 in this series when he made his debut in Christchurch last week.

One of Bazball’s boldest calls looked to have merit when Bethell, who bats at No 7 for Warwickshire, scored 50 and struck the winning runs for England in that series opener last week.

But he went up another level here, coming agonisingly close to producing the ultimate vindication of his unexpected promotion by falling four runs short of a maiden century in professional cricket.

Bethell’s innings was not chanceless, indeed he almost fell twice in the 90s before he was ultimately undone on 96 attempting to drive Southee. The sight of Ben Stokes, England’s captain standing up and leading the applause as Bethell trudged off, told you it was still a knock of significance.

Yet the chance of history being snatched away so close to the landmark must have made this dismissal more painful than any other in Bethell’s career even if he had helped England’s lead climb above 350 by the time he departed.

At 21 years and 45 days, he would have been England’s youngest Test centurion since Denis Compton, who was 13 days younger when he scored 120 against the West Indies at Lord’s in June 1939, three months before the outbreak of the Second World War.

He would also have been the first specialist England batter to score his maiden first-class hundred in a Test since Billy Griffiths in 1948.

Atkinson was actually the last England player to achieve that last feat when he made 118 against Sri Lanka at Lord’s in August.

Stuart Broad, at Lord’s against Pakistan in 2010, also did it.

But the class, temperament and style shown by Bethell overrides the mere statistical anomaly of him still failing to have scored a first-class hundred. He looks every inch an international top-order batter and his rapid rise will give England a serious selection problem after this series.

It looks a tough ask to get Bethell in the XI next summer, when Jamie Smith will be back from paternity leave and resuming his role as wicketkeeper-batter at No 7.

That will, according to Stokes, see Ollie Pope move back to No 3 despite his upturn in form at No 6 this series, a move precipitated by him taking the gloves after the injury to reserve keeper-batter Jordan Cox at the start of the tour.

Might Bethell be an option opening?

Zak Crawley is in a slump after his latest low score against New Zealand, the opener bundled out for eight by Matt Henry for the fourth time in this series at the start of England’s second innings.

England’s unswerving loyalty to Crawley is likely to put paid to that possibility. After all, they see the Kent man as crucial to their Ashes tilt in Australia next winter.

A run of low scores next summer when Zimbabwe and India come to England could force a change of opinion from coach Brendon McCullum and Stokes.

Once this tour concludes in Hamilton next week, there will be almost six months to go until England’s next Test against Zimbabwe at Trent Bridge in May.

That’s a lot of time for things to change, for someone to get injured or for the narrative to shift. Bethell will probably have to bide his time for another crack at Test cricket.

But he has surely leapfrogged the unfortunate Cox as England’s go-to reserve batter. He is also likely to be involved in January’s T20 and ODI series in India, McCullum’s first assignment as white-ball coach, and the Champions Trophy in Pakistan that follows.

As for the here and now, he has helped England into a position of such strength it is a case of when, not if, they win this Test and the series.

By stumps, they were 378 for five in their second innings, a mammoth lead of 533 – their biggest in the third innings of the Bazball era. And there’s still three days of this Test to go. We’ll be lucky to see two more.

The highest successful Test chase in New Zealand is 348. Anywhere in the world it’s 418. There’s no way England are leaving Wellington without an unassailable 2-0 lead. When it happens, Bethell can be proud of the part he’s played in that success.