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Napier: New Zealand beat the West Indies in a rain-disrupted fifth and final One-Day International by nine runs under the Duckworth-Lewis system on Tuesday to claim the series 2-1.
New Zealand were 211/5 after 35 overs in reply to the West Indies' 293 when rain forced the players from the field in the deciding ODI. Under the Duckworth-Lewis adjustment the par score was 202. Two of the earlier games were abandoned because of rain.
With the rain getting heavier, Taylor took the batting Powerplay and some delightful drives took them past the Duckworth Lewis par score and into control. It was certainly cruel on Gayle and Chanderpaul who were the outstanding performers of the day but as Gayle said afterward that whilst West Indies played good cricket in patches New Zealand played the better cricket overall throughout the series.
Earlier, Chris Gayle smashed his 19th One-Day International century to guide West Indies to 293 for nine from 50 overs in the fifth One-Day International against New Zealand at McLean Park on Tuesday.
Gayle also combined in a 170-run partnership with Shivnarine Chanderpaul, who looked set for his 10th ODI century before he was dismissed for 94 with three overs remaining when he reverse swept a Jesse Ryder delivery to Martin Guptill.
The efforts of the pair, who have virtually carried their team's batting fortunes on their five-week tour of New Zealand, however, were undone with little support from their team-mates.
Kieron Pollard provided a brief eight-ball cameo of 19, which included two sixes and a four, while Ramnaresh Sarwan scored 22. No other player made double figures.
The visitors had looked on course to post a total in excess of 300 on a superb batting wicket, but the tail opted to slog rather than accumulate runs and were unable to get hold of some tight bowling at the death. Mark Gillespie took two wickets in the final over, bowling both Denesh Ramdin (nine) and Fidel Edwards (one), to give him figures of four for 58 off his 10 overs.
Kyle Mills also bowled well in the final few overs, varying his pace and length to finish with 3-57. Gayle, who scored 197 in the second Test on the same postage-stamp sized ground, was just as brutal on Tuesday, bringing up his century off just 110 balls.
Chris Gayle receives the Man of the match award for his fabulous 135. He sounds a very disappointed man and so he should be, he and Chanderpaul played superbly to give their team a excellent platform. However, there were precious few contributions from the rest of the team and some of the batting at the death was mindless slogging where run gathering would have got them the extra 15-20 runs that may have made the difference.
