New Zealand beat Scotland in seven-over slugfest by CricketArchive Staff Reporter

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Scorecard:	New Zealand v Scotland
Player:	NS Poonia, RR Watson, KJ Coetzer, IG Butler, LRPL Taylor, JD Ryder
Event:	ICC World Twenty20 2009

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DateLine: 6th June 2009

 

Poor bowling, consisting of too many length balls, no-balls and dropped catches, combined with some fiery New Zealand batting sealed Scotland’s fate they actually looked like favourites to win after the first innings.

 

Chasing 90 to win in seven overs, openers Brendon McCullum (18 off 8 balls) and Jesse Ryder (31 off 12 balls) started in spectacular fashion. McCullum picked up four boundaries in the first over and scaled 19 runs in the over.

 

Gordon Drummond's second over was no exception. This time though Ryder got into the act. The over yielded 12 runs and even before Scotland had fathomed what was happening, Ryder smacked Craig Wright for 20 runs to enable the Kiwis reach 50 in the third over itself. The left-hander then got out, caught at long-off in the same over but by then enough damage had been done.

 

Brendon McCullum also fell soon afterwards as he and Ross Taylor got involved in a bad mix up in the middle of the pitch. But thereafter first Taylor and Jacob Oram and then Taylor and Scott Styris made sure New Zealand finish the game with an over to spare. Taylor ended the proceedings with two spectacular sixes in the sixth over.

 

Earlier, after being asked to bat first in a rain truncated 7-over-a-side affair, Scotland started off in spectacular fashion. They seemed to have been inspired from what had happened the previous night in the England-Holland match.

 

Opener Ryan Watson started to fire from his bat from the word go. The first over went for 18 with Iain O'Brien being swatted around all across the park. Then James Franklin came under the scanner going for 12 runs in the second over.

 

Thankfully for New Zealand, Watson fell in the first ball of the third over bowled by Ian Butler. He had scored 27 runs off 10 balls by then and the knock was studded with six smashing hits to the fence.

 

But this did not mean that the carnage would stop. Even though he fell on the very first ball of Butler's over, the bowler still went for a helpless 12 with Kyle Coetzer getting into the act straightaway.

 

Oram's over though brought a little relief to the Kiwis. The tall medium-pacer gave away just seven runs in the over though he also started off giving away a boundary off the very first ball.

 

But the lull was pretty short. In came Ryder and Coetzer got after him in a ruthless manner. His first three balls went for five but the beauty of a short match began post that. The next three bowls went for fourteen which included a smashing six over mid-off.

 

And it did not stop there. Even Oram got the taste of this carnage in the next over. This time though Navdeep Poonia got into the act. A six and a four in the over meant that this was also a big one. The 50-run partnership was also raised in the over and it came up in only 22 balls.

 

Coetzer (33 off 15 balls) fell in the last over, not before he hit another huge one off a Butler short delivery. Off the last two balls the Kiwis just pulled things a tad bit as wickets fell in both the deliveries. Stander (27 off 15 balls) also got run out after playing a fine knock.