West Indies conclude the white ball leg of their tour of New Zealand in Hamilton on Saturday when the two sides meet in the third and final ODI of a series which the host nation have already won with a match to spare.
While the series doesn’t have the context that 20 over cricket has at the minute, West Indies are battling to avoid having to go through qualifying for the next World Cup so they could do with a win here.
New Zealand
You would have to think that New Zealand are pretty happy with how the white ball leg of having West Indies on their shores has gone. They came from 1-0 down to win the T20 series 3-1 and they have won the opening two ODI matches, the second of which was rain affected. Their task now is to maintain their intensity as they look to complete a clean sweep of a series which had the potential to be more competitive than it has been on the scoreboard.
The outcomes of both matches has been tight margins but really New Zealand were good value to win easier than they have done. One thing they haven’t done in this series is maximise their batting efforts and you would think that with no competitive pressure on this match that they will be looking to put that right here. The positive for the Kiwis is that their bowling has been spot on and if that is the case for a third straight time they will be tough to beat.
West Indies
This hasn’t been the white ball tour that West Indies would have wanted. It started well but they haven’t been able to maintain their efforts and have lost the last five completed matches across the two formats. There is a case to be made that they have only just come up short in both of the ODI games having done the same in one of the T20 matches but teams get used to failing to get over the line and the size of the task gets harder and harder.
The big disappointment in this series is that they didn’t win the first game. To not chase down 270 without being bowled out in this day and age is unusual but it was a terribly paced innings and they couldn’t recover the situation in the back end. We can excuse them their loss in the second game given the impact the rain had. West Indies have generally bowled well on this tour but it doesn’t matter if their batters can’t hold their nerve when it really matters.
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Team News
There is no real reason for New Zealand to make any changes for this match but Henry Nicholls hasn’t had a go in the series yet so if they want to play everyone at some point then he could well come in for a run out here.
Khary Pierre and Johann Layne are among the players who haven’t been given a go in the series for West Indies and it is a long way to come just to carry a few drinks so it wouldn’t be a big surprise were they to come into the side.
Betting
New Zealand have got shorter and shorter the longer this series has gone on and I certainly wouldn’t disagree with that but the thing that surprises me is that West Indies have got bigger and bigger to hit the most sixes even though they have hit the most in both ODI matches so far. They have had competitive pressure on them but that isn’t the case with this one so there is licence for one of the big hitters to just have a day out and just and launch everything out of the park with no comeback on it if it goes wrong.
You would imagine that New Zealand might look to give someone like Rachin Ravindra a rest given that he plays in all the formats and that there is a Test series to come so that would detract from the New Zealand six hitting but even in the 10 they hit in Napier last time out, two of them came from Mitchell Santner at seven. It doesn’t matter who West Indies pick there are going to be six hitters throughout their innings and at 13/10 I can’t ignore West Indies to round off the series by hitting the most sixes.
Tips
Back West Indies Most 6s for a 3/10 stake at 2.30 with Betway
