South African-born Grant Elliott made an undefeated 75 as New Zealand beat Pakistan by five wickets in their ICC Champions Trophy
semifinal at the Wanderers on Saturday night.
The victory means that New Zealand, who had not been among the tournament favourites, qualify to play Australia in the final at Supersport Park on Monday.
Chasing 234 to win, New Zealand passed that total in the 48th over, thanks largely to a partnership of 104 between Elliott and his captain Daniel Vettori.
Brendon McCullum showed New Zealand’s intentions right from the word go, when he smashed Mohammad Amir for six off the second ball of the innings. However, Amir got his revenge in the fifth over when Shahid Afridi took a high swirling catch to dismiss McCullum for 17.
Martin Guptill and debutant Aaron Redmond took the score to 43 before Guptill was caught at mid-on by Rana Naveed off Umar Gul for 11.
Redmond was caught and bowled by Saeed Ajmal for 31, and the next wicket to fall was that of Ross Taylor, who was bowled by Afridi for 38. He and Elliott had shared a fourth wicket partnership of 55.
Taylor’s departure brought captain Vettori to the crease. When New Zealand was awarded the Spirit of Cricket Award at the ICC Awards on Thursday, Vettori made it clear that he wanted to add the Champions Trophy to that award, and the way he played on Saturday bore testimony to his determination — and also won him the Man of
the Match Award.
Although at times they appeared to be falling behind, Elliott and Vettori never allowed the required run rate to get too far ahead, and when Vettori called for the batting power play in the
43rd over, New Zealand needed 59 runs off seven overs.
That was when they cut loose. Umar Gul conceded 16 runs in the 45th over, with Elliott hitting him for two fours and a six, and after that, New Zealand were virtually home and dry.
With New Zealand needing just four runs for victory, Vettori went down the pitch to Saeed Ajmal, missed the ball and was stumped by Kamran Akmal for 41 off 42-balls.
He and Elliott put on 104 for the fourth wicket — the highest fifth wicket partnership at the Wanderers, beating the 93 scored by Grant Flower and David Houghton of Zimbabwe against South Africa in
1996/97.
Earlier, a career-best four for 44 by Ian Butler and a three wicket haul for captain Daniel Vettori helped New Zealand to restrict Pakistan to 233 for nine. Every time Pakistan started scoring freely, New Zealand responded by taking a wicket, and it
was thanks to a fifth-wicket stand of 80 between
Mohammad Yousuf and Umar Akmal that Pakistan were able to post a reasonable total. Wickets clattered in the middle of their innings, and then there was another collapse towards the end, leaving Pakistan on 198 for nine, with more than five overs left to play. With all the big hitters gone,
tail-enders Mohammad Amir and Saeed Ajmal responded magnificently by adding 35 for the ninth wicket to take Pakistan to a defendable total. – Sapa