Cricket: Black Caps squaring off against the Good Ol' Boys

Unless intergalactic cricket becomes a reality in our lifetime (think Earth Emerging Players versus Venus A) it's hard to think of a more unlikely contest than at The Oval tonight, when New Zealand square off against the United States.

Some obscure match-ups have been seen in previous world cups, but the Champions Trophy marketing people must have been wondering whether someone was pulling their leg when they received wind of their first promotional challenge.

The Black Caps versus the Good Ol' Boys - not even John Lennon could have imagined that.

The country that brought the world the high-five will make cricket history tonight when they walk on to England's oldest test ground to play their first official one-day international.

How did they get there? By 0.028 of a point, as it turned out.

The US side pipped 1999 World Cup team Scotland by the slenderest of net run-rate margins to win the Six Nations Challenge at Dubai.

Left in their wake were the Netherlands, considered a potential test-playing nation in the not-too-distant future, Canada, who beat Bangladesh at last year's World Cup, and the United Arab Emirates, already a well-known cricket entity because of their international venue at Sharjah.

The final team to qualify for the Champions Trophy, the US earned their spurs back in September, when they overhauled Scotland's 206 to win their last Six Nations match by five wickets, with under two overs remaining.

They now take their place alongside the 10 test-playing nations and Kenya for the start of this month's tournament and, just to make their campaign interesting, will face the might of world champions Australia in their second pool game.

Boosted by a smattering of West Indian and sub-continental ex-pats and infused with a naturally aggressive flair, the US side is not expected to last any longer than their second game, but still have the potential to be more than a tournament curiosity piece.

Their best batsman, left-handed opener Clayton Lambert, played five tests and 11 ODIs for the West Indies, and can count among his career highlights a test century against England at Antigua in 1998, and a quickfire 119 in the one-day series that followed.

Now 42, Lambert is one of a number of ageing players in the US side. The team will be led by Richard Staple, a former Jamaican batsman who now plays in the New York metropolitan league.

Dominated by players from the Florida and New York regions, the US side will be coached by former West Indian test players Faoud Bacchus and Kenny Benjamin.

Bacchus (50) once scored 250 in a test but ended up with a career average of 26, while former paceman Benjamin - an accredited Level II coach - will assist with the bowling attack, considered the weakest part of the Americans' game.

One of their more experienced bowlers will be the Lahore-born leg-spinner Nasir Javed, who toured Zimbabwe with Pakistan A, as well as playing against the visiting West Indian side.