"Rain, rain, go away. Come again another day."
That famous nursery rhyme line will be uttered by thousands of cricket fans today ahead of the third and final Twenty20 match between the Black Caps and Windies at Mount Maunganui's Bay Oval tonight.
The second match on Monday was washed out after nine overs of the Black Caps innings.
There was time for another scintillating innings from Auckland opener Colin Munro, who smashed 66 off 23 balls mostly in partnership with captain and hometown hero Kane Williamson (17no).
The Black Caps raced to 102/4 off just nine overs before the rain came.
Munro hit three sixes into the 9000-plus crowd, none of which were caught to win a lucky fan $50,000 in a sponsored promotion.
Williamson enjoyed some time in the middle after an enforced three-match break. He will be joined by Tauranga's Trent Boult for tonight's
Among the newer Black Caps on display was Anaru Kitchen, living the dream with an international call-up for this series aged 33.
"To debut at 33…to play for the Black Caps has always been my dream and my family's dream. Just to be here is so exciting. I would love for it to continue," he said.
"My role is to come into the middle order and generate a strike rate and basically try and finish."
Kitchen enjoyed his brief stay batting under the new LED lights at Bay Oval on Monday night.
"I think it was great. I had no problem with them at all. I thought they were brilliant," he said.
West Indies batting coach Toby Radford said there is confidence in the side they can draw the series tonight
"It would be nice to leave these shores with something positive to take away so it is a must win and the opportunity to level would be great for us," he said.
"Most of this T20 side have come in the last couple of weeks and would be totally unaffected with everything that has gone before. They have come in fresh and obviously it is a new series and they want to do well."
Radford admits it was difficult for his bowlers in the wet conditions on Monday night.
"Colin Munro was in great form but we couldn't bowl the slower ball because you couldn't grip the ball and the pitch was just skidding on. It was very difficult to create any variation with the deliveries. He was just standing there putting it to all parts of the ground so it was quite tough."
Radford sees champion opening batsman Chris Gayle as a key to winning the deciding match.
"I would love Chris to really fire. We all know he is the best T20 batter when he is playing well. If he can come out and play one of his big innings then he is a match winner. We also need to play the spinners better than we did in Nelson."