Cricket: Black Caps lose Twenty20 final against Pakistan in Napier

Pakistan scored a pride-restoring victory after a domineering pursuit that nearly fell off the rails upon death.

Iftikhar Ahmed finished with a giant six on the square leg, a rich area of ​​productivity along the innings, after Mohammad Rizwan had skied testing the same two balls earlier.

Rizwan, in the unknown starting position, led the way with 89, mocking his previous T20I to the best of 33 not out, as Pakistan reached their goal with two balls to spare and four wickets in hand.

It was fully deserved, even if successive ball wickets to Tim Southee in the penultimate over made him look closer than he was.

It was a disappointing end to the series for the New Zealand bowlers, who were crippled by the loss of their only front-line player Ish Sodhi (hamstring), their best outfielder Martin Guptill and the conditions that greatly favored the game. batting.

Even with those warnings, his inability to prevent Pakistan from hitting the leg-side boundary was debilitating. Every time it seemed they were applying pressure, they went too straight and were punished.

Senior bowler Trent Boult had an unusually difficult night, conceding 43 of his four overs.

Previously, Devon Conway gave the New Zealanders another tantalizing glimpse of his immense talent, scoring 63 of 45 balls to set up what looked like a competitive 173-7 on a slightly two-paced course.

However, the dew fell heavy as night fell and Pakistan’s two best players on the tour so far, Rizwan and Mohammad Hafeez, combined for a 72-run partnership on the second field that tipped the balance.

First inserted in this series, fit Tim Seifert started out as he did in games one and two.

Unfortunately, so did Guptill as he continued his summer of disconnection with a small 19 out of 16. Not that he looks bad out of shape, he just keeps hanging out. That can happen in T20 cricket, but the top three places in the order are the only places you can consistently build an inning and Guptill hasn’t gone above 35 in his last 10.

At 45-1 and a quarter of the innings, New Zealand was fine again, but the introduction of Faheem Ashraf changed everything.

Bowling slower than before, his mix of cutters and skidders was tailor-made for the conditions. He induced a Kane Williamson cut and threw a peach from a cutter at Seifert, 35 of 20, which disturbed his castle.

After two overs, Faheem was 2-6 and 58-3 the entire inning was redone.

For the first time in this series, the lineup was under pressure. Conway and Glenn Phillips, relatively rookies in international play, only intermittently found the center of the bat, were slightly out of sync with their careers and seemed undecided about who was playing the aggressor and who was hitting.

When the good light stopped play – a totally unsatisfying situation that says more about how suitable McLean Park is for international cricket than it does about the malevolence of the sun – New Zealand was 85-3 after 11.4 overs and delicately serene.

The rupture favored New Zealand. The batters had time to reintroduce themselves. Conway came back hitting singles; Phillips four.

When Phillips hit the 15th over, Conway took over, hitting two covering shots to the fence that wouldn’t have seemed out of place on day three of a test at Lord’s.

Conway continued to draw attention with the range of his stroke play.

The longer an opportunity is denied in all its forms, the more wicked it will appear.