While Michael Clarke was by far the highlight of the Australian first innings against New Zealand in the first Test, under-pressure Marcus North repaid the faith shown by his selectors to be a major player for the visitors.
North, with his Test spot questioned by many, played well and earned his fourth Test century after his comfortable five-hour stand at the crease.
The left-hander said he was pleased to finally be seeing the fruits after a lot of recent hard work.
"It's nice being back in the camp," he said.
"I've been working hard back at home and worked really hard in the three days leading up to the Test with Justin (Langer) and Ricky (Ponting) so it's just nice to get rewarded for some hard work."
"The facts are I haven't been spending a lot of time in the middle so walking into a Test match under the pump isn't easy."
"It was nice to be able to go to sleep with 50 under my belt, but I'm more proud of the fact that I was able to come in and make the most of a start on a good wicket."
Meanwhile, despite being four wickets down and still more than 300 runs behind Australia, Ross Taylor believes New Zealand still has a chance of winning the match at the Basin Reserve in Wellington.
New Zealand's top order once again folded under the pressure of the Australian bowling attack and was at one stage struggling at 4-40 before captain Daniel Vettori and Martin Guptill forged a potential innings-saving partnership in the last session of day two.
The home side was chasing a first-innings total of 5-459 (declared), thanks to a record fifth-wicket partnership between Clarke (168), who hit his highest Test score after a fortnight of off-field anguish, and North (112 not out).
Ponting's declaration came after lunch on Saturday.
However, Taylor, who was caught for 21, felt New Zealand still had an opportunity to get itself back into the match.
"Without a doubt," he said of New Zealand's ability to save the Test.
"We shouldn't be here if we didn't think we were going to win."
"To save the game we know is going to be hard work and it's going to be an important first session tomorrow."
"I guess every session today was important, but I think this next one's going to be extra important."
"But we were completely outplayed today. We probably got a little bit of momentum back towards the end there with Guptill and Vettori's partnership, but Australia played well."
"I can't put my finger on what went wrong, we just lost too many wickets at crucial times. Being 4-40, the wicket wasn't that bad so I'm not sure what went wrong."
"Hopefully we're going to get a chance to put that right in the next innings."
Play resumes on Sunday morning with New Zealand sitting on 4-108 with Vettori and Guptill unbeaten on 42 and 19 respectively.