West Indies 269 for 8 (Hetmyer 69*, Rutherford 61, Lennox 3-35, Duffy 3-67) beat New Zealand 268 for 9 (Latham 69, Kelly 64, Young 56, Joseph 2-38, Lawes 2-63) by two wickets
Sherfane Rutherford and Shimron Hetmyer found themselves facing a problem. The one West Indies often face. Dot balls. And they solved it in a way that is typical of them too. With boundaries. This was merely a consolation win with West Indies’ chances of winning this series long past and a World Cup Qualifier in their near future but it still tasted sweet.
New Zealand had put up 268 for 9, the highest first-innings total of the five-match series and they were making it seem a whole lot bigger. Mitchell Santner came on in the tenth over. Pace disappeared by the 16th. Spinners bowling in tandem gave away just 37 in 13 overs. Keacy Carty produced the slowest innings of 20 or more by a West Indian since Marlon Samuels’ 25 off 65 against Pakistan in July 2013. And then he fell for 20 off 54.
Jayden Lennox found himself in the company of cricketing royalty. He went past Shane Warne and Anil Kumble and Sunil Narine and Shahid Afridi on the list of spinners with the most wickets in a bilateral ODI series. His 14 was still way off the top
but it was doing pretty well. A long hop of his was enough to dismiss Shai Hope, who walked away throwing a bit of a look at partner at the other end. Carty’s innings at that point was 42 balls long and featured 29 dot balls. In trying to dispel the pressure he had built, Hope, the West Indies captain, had thrown away his wicket with 151 runs still to get. The helplessness in his eyes as he walked off was poignant.
As Hope walked back, a vibrant crowd in Bridgetown, who had watched one of their own being celebrated at the innings break as CWI honoured Kemar Roach for taking 300 wickets in Test cricket, feared the worst. They had seen New Zealand’s spinners tie batters to the crease. They had felt the pressure build without any release. They had stomached the turgid scoring. Even Hope, wedded to a plan of judging the turn off the pitch, was allowing the opposition to dictate terms. That changed once he and Carty departed.
Rutherford brought up his second fifty-plus score in his last 15 innings – after scoring seven of them in his first 11 – by trusting his skillset instead of reacting to the opposition’s. He stepped down the track against spin. And suddenly the boundaries became accessible. He swept them. This could have resulted in his wicket on 7 off 17 but Will Young dropped a crucial catch at deep square leg. He also remembered to use soft hands and roll his wrists so that the good balls would sneak into gaps. New Zealand didn’t leave many, their infielders placed well inside the 30-yard circle to cut off the singles, which is why the third-wicket partnership between Hope and Carty had produced just 59 runs in 99 balls, but the fifth-wicket parntership between Rutherford and Hetmyer compensated with 95 off 90. On their watch, the last five overs of spin in tandem yielded 37 runs.
West Indies were no longer helpless. They were thriving. So much so that they inspired awe in the eyes of their enemies. Santner got whacked by Rutherford first ball of his second spell and all he could do was watch the ball sail into the crowd, his mouth the shape of an ‘O’.
New Zealand being New Zealand made it thrilling with Jacob Duffy picking up two wickets in two balls in the 45th over and opening up the tail. Hetmyer at that point was down on the pitch receiving fluids from the physio. He isn’t a regular member of this team sometimes because of availability, sometimes because of fitness, and sometimes because of displine. But here he was locked in. An equation of 21 runs in 32 balls with just two wickets in hand had everyone on the edge of their seat. Then Hetmyer struck the man who seemed to be winning it for New Zealand out of the ground. Twice. Duffy’s attempted yorker couldn’t stop him (because it turned into a low full toss). Change of pace didn’t fool him (he hit the ball so hard it got trapped in the roof). Hetmyer finished unbeaten on 69 off 64 balls. It was only the third time he had been unbeaten in a chase – in the other two he was a peripheral figure with scores of 7 and 11. This one bore his mark.
New Zealand’s batters had an entirely different challenge to deal with. Will Young, who was perhaps their most fluent at the crease, was dogged by extra bounce. He perservered to score 56 off 63. Nick Kelly, who made 64 off 80, kept trying to force the pace but the occasions he succeeded were almost a surprise. Once when he upper-cut Alzarri Joseph, he was actually walking off the pitch thinking he would get caught on the boundary. The ball sailed over it. Tom Latham was his usual efficient self, scoring his runs through checked drives, one of which almost seemed to cleanse his palate after he indulged in a wild pick-up pull for six off Jayden Seales.
For most of the first innings, seam was causing problems to the extent that even though New Zealand had three half-centurions, none of them made it to 70. Joseph was particularly good, keeping his speeds up in the low 140s [kph] even at the death. His second spell (3-1-6-1) jammed up the New Zealand batting just as they were heading into the last 10 overs. They could hit only six boundaries in those overs. The 19-year-old wristspinner Vitel Lawes finished his first series as a professional cricketer as the joint-third-highest wicket-taker and played just as important a role, dismissing Young when he was looking solid and Mark Chapman who had top-scored with 80 in the previous ODI for just 11.
West Indies need wins to avoid the roulette that is a ten-team qualifying tournament that will swallow six of them up, denying them a place in the 2027 World Cup. They really went through the wringer getting this win, and maybe that puts them in good stead going forward. They’ll remember how they were almost beaten but just didn’t let it happen.
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