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April 09, 2007 (Link to Scorecard)

New Zealand overcame a few hurdles before beating Ireland by a thumping margin of 129 runs at the Providence Stadium in Guyana. The Black Caps had hiccups during their innings but eventually got over it to post a total that was beyond the minnows' reach. And then a fine opening spell from Bond followed up with clean up job from Vettori saw Ireland go down for the first time in the tournament without a fight.

Stephen Fleming won the toss and elected to bat first on a good batting deck. The Captain missed out in scoring big and so did the likes of Hamish Marshall, Scott Styris and Craig McMillan. The Kiwis found themselves at a sticky 118 for 4 in the 25th over. Peter Fulton, the tall opening batsman finally got good to don the sheet anchor's role to perfection. To their credit, the Ireland bowlers never allowed the batsmen to break free until the closing stages of the innings. Peter Fulton got a well earned 83 playing 110 balls with the help of 9 fours before he gave the platform for his side at 172 for 5 with more than 11 overs to go. The finishing act was from the ever so cool Brendon McCullum, a smashing 47 from 37 with 2 fours and a six and James Franklin, showing some hitting prowess in his unbeaten 22-ball 34 that came with 3 fours and a six. The last three overs were bludgeoned for as many as 45 runs! Poor Irish bowlers had worked so hard for not even conceding a boundary for a period of over 10 overs but those 18 balls cost them the match. They were a couple of rain breaks in between, but not really significant enough to curtail the match.

New Zealand reached 263 for 8, a bit too many for a promising Ireland batting line up. The Irish bowling was led by medium pacer Langford-Smith who took a neat 2 for 41 in 10 while the strangling work in the middle overs was done to perfection by the two off spinners - Kyle McCallan (10-0-35-2) and Andrew White (10-0-45-2). They were more than a couple of soft dismissals from the Kiwis. But their bowling wasn't soft at all, starting with James Franklin and Shane Bond. While Franklin relied on the low bounce and deviation off the track, Bond was all about swinging the ball at a sharp pace with the surprise short delivery. Bond got rid of the two left handed opening batsmen which left Ireland off to a slow and cautious start.

The two O'Brien brothers gave the Ireland side lot of respectability with a stand of 75 for the fourth wicket in good time before the older brother ran out the younger one. It was Kevin O'Brien that was run out through a mix up and unfortunately missed his third ODI half century by just one run. His 49 were seriously entertaining coming in just 45 balls with 2 fours and three sixes just to show that he is a strong bloke. His brother, Niall O'Brien followed him soon after making 30 from 75 balls. Ireland were now 125 for 5 in the 33rd over and in no time were bowled out for 134 in 37.4 overs. Daniel Vettori ran through the bottom half with 4 for 23 in 8.4 overs and was complemented by Jeetan Patel, who got 2 for 32 in 7. This was after Bond had set the tone with a fine new ball spell of 2 for 18 in 5 overs and a nagging Jacob Oram's efforts of taking 1 for 15 in 6 overs. The Man of the Match was Peter Fulton for his responsible knock early on. With three wins plus the Group match win over England, New Zealand have almost secured their spot in the last four of the World Cup. 

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