Ferguson’s 5-21 sends Windies crashing to defeat
– 1st T20I
AUCKLAND, New Zealand, CMC – West Indies captain Kieron Pollard defied a devastating spell from Lockie Ferguson to hit a career-best, unbeaten 75, but poor bowling led to a fivewicket defeat for his side under the Duckworth/ Lewis/ Stern Method in the rain-marred first Twenty20 International against New Zealand yesterday.
Pollard dragged the Windies back into contention with an explosive 37-ball innings, after they were put into bat and crumbled to 59 for five in the sixth over.
The visitors’ top-order batting was dismantled by aggressive bowling on a helpful Eden Park pitch from Ferguson, whose five for 21 from his allotted four overs was a career-best and made him a shoo-in for the Player-ofthe-Match award.
Pollard struck four fours and eight sixes to dominate a sixthwicket stand of 84 with Fabian Allen, and helped West Indies raise the same number of runs in the final six overs to finish with a competitive 180 for seven, after a third rain delay in their innings reduced the match to 16 overs-aside.
But the Windies’ raggedy bowling let their captain down, and Jimmy Neesham, not out on 48 from 24 balls, and fellow lefthander Devon Conway, 41 off 29 balls, led steady, if not spectacular batting to guide the New Zealanders through a successful chase of a DLS-revised target of 176.
Sadly, Pollard, bowling his uncomplicated medium- pace, was the grieving bowler, when left- hander Mitchell Santner swung to wide long-on for the last of his three sixes in 31 not out that formalised the result for the Blackcaps with four balls remaining.
The victory meant the Caribbean side trail 0-1 in the three-match series, which concludes with back-to-back matches tomorrow and Monday at Bay Oval in Mount Maunganui.
The result also condemned the visitors to their eighth defeat in nine bilateral T20Is in New Zealand and gave the home team only their second T20I win at this venue in their last 11 matches here.
Andre Fletcher played with typical enterprise and with Brandon King gave West Indies a bright start, sharing 58 for the first wicket.
But the Windies lost five wickets for one run in the space of 12 balls between the fourth and sixth overs to disrupt the flow of their batting.
Fletcher was beaten for pace and bowled for 34 with Ferguson’s second delivery in the fourth over and left- hander Shimron Hetmyer was caught
behind for a four-ball duck from an inside-edge, trying to make room to hit the fast bowler’s sixth delivery into the off-side.
Next over, King was caught on the third man boundary for 13, slicing a loose drive at a wide delivery from New Zealand captain Tim Southee, and three balls
later, Rovman Powell was caught at deep fine leg for a duck from a top-edged hook at a short ball from the same bowler.
West Indies were in further trouble, when Nicholas Pooran played across a low full toss from Ferguson and was lbw for one, a decision that was confirmed by
TV replays after the batsman referred it to the video umpire.
At this stage, Pollard was yet to face a delivery and had to endure a barrage of short balls from Ferguson before getting a couple boundaries off Southee in the seventh over to settle things down.