New Zealand and Australia continue their T20 series on Wednesday and after the first two matches were played in front of crowds in a sign of normality, the last three matches will be behind closed doors with the country heading into lockdown.
The remainder of the series, which New Zealand have the chance to win with two matches to spare on Wednesday after winning the opening two games, will be played at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington, beginning with this one which Australia have to win to stay in the series.
New Zealand
After a dominant performance in the first match of the series, New Zealand were embarked on a rollercoaster ride in the second game. On a brilliant batting wicket and a small ground they defied losing the toss and being sent into bat to still come out on top. That was down to a clever batting performance and a disciplined bowling effort, which even when it threatened to get away from them they had enough to get themselves over the line.
The big thing for the Kiwis in that second game was that a couple of the batsmen who didn’t get going in the first game scored decent runs in the second one. They now have a top five in decent form and that sort of thing can’t be underestimated. One or two of their bowling attack went round the park but you would expect that given the dimensions of that ground and how good a wicket the teams were batting on.
Australia
There is no doubt that Australia will have seen that previous match as one which got away from them. Although they were never really able to put partnerships together, one did come along at the right time and it looked like it was their match to win with a couple of overs to spare, but a very strong start to the final over from New Zealand got rid of two batsmen who were in and they ended up falling just short in a cracking contest.
Australia need to do two things if they are going to keep the series alive. They have to find a way to control Kane Williamson and get him out because if he is allowed to bat through the innings like he did in Dunedin then things can get out of control. The other thing they have to do is put partnerships together at the top of the order. It is all well and good having tons of batting depth but someone has to take responsibility for getting the innings up to a level it should be.
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Team News
New Zealand might want to get the series won before they think about making changes to their side but Kyle Jamieson went around the park in the last game and could be a little vulnerable as a result of that. Hamish Bennett is waiting to step in.
Australia are said to be eyeing up the idea of tinkering with their side for this match. They might not want to play two spinners here so Ashton Agar could miss out. Jason Behrendorff and Andrew Tye are both waiting for their opportunity.
Betting
New Zealand have been on top in this series but there were signs towards the end of the second game that Australia are finding their feet and if they discover some more runs from their top order they could be a very dangerous outfit in this match. I’m reluctant to bet on the match outcome in these tiny New Zealand grounds at the best of times but particularly now that Australia seem to be finding a groove making it a much more 50:50 contest.
That leads me to the bet which served us so well in the previous match which is the sixes where the line has only gone up by one to 14.5. There are a couple of reasons why this surprises me. The first of them is that the previous match had 31 sixes in it with the likes of Aaron Finch, Glenn Maxwell and Mitchell Marsh, all clean hitters of a cricket ball, offering nothing to the total. The other reason I’m surprised if the Cake Tin is a relatively small ground straight down the ground and with this venue now hosting three matches in the space of a few days this drop in pitch is likely to be playing very well for this game. This isn’t a particularly high line and although I don’t expect us to get up past 30 sixes again I do think we get half that number and get this line covered.
Tips
WON – Back Over 14.5 sixes for a 4/10 stake at 1.91 with BetVictor
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