KEY POINTS:
New Zealand levelled their two-match Twenty20 cricket series with Sri Lanka by winning the second match at Eden Park in Auckland today by five wickets.
Needing 116 to win, New Zealand reached the required total with nine balls remaining.
Nathan Astle topscored with an unbeaten 40.
Sri Lanka
won the first match in Wellington on Friday by 18 runs on the Duckworth-Lewis system after the match was abandoned due to rain.
It looked as if the fans were going to be short changed yet again but Lasith Malinga's flailing blade and the customary batting collapse ensured New Zealand were kept waiting until the Black Caps squared their Twenty20 cricket series.
New Zealand finally overhauled a modest target of 116 with nine balls remaining and five wickets in hand at Eden Park after veteran Nathan Astle steadied the innings with a composed unbeaten 40 -- the biggest contribution of a low-scoring contest on a lively drop-in wicket.
After reducing a Sri Lankans, who were resting star turns Muttiah Muralitharan, Chaminda Vaas and Sanath Jayasuriya, to 71 for eight inside 15 overs, it appeared the match was going the way of both tests and the first Twenty20 match in Wellington on Friday by winding up well inside the prescribed time limit.
However, after an energetic and troubling pace quartet spearheaded by James Franklin ripped into a reorganised batting order, Sri Lanka found some solace from an unlikely source. Their own quicks Lasith Malinga and Dilhara Fernando added 44 inside four overs to give the tourists a below-par 115 to defend.
Malinga spanked 27 off 19 including two sixes off Astle, who was press ganged into the attack after Mark Gillespie hobbled off with a knee injury one ball into his fourth and final over.
Fortunately for the Wellingtonian the initial prognosis on his jarred right knee was encouraging though his provincial teammate Iain O'Brien has been called into the one-day squad as stand-by.
Michael Mason has a slight hamstring problem but his injury isn't likely to rule him out of the first one-dayer either.
The five-match one-day series starts in Napier on Thursday.
After waiting so long to bowl at international level -- the first Twenty20 game was abandoned before Gillespie was used by captain Stephen Fleming -- it seemed the cricketing gods were against him.
Gillespie, with his fifth ball, had Sri Lanka's top batsmen Kumar Sangakkara present Fleming with a chance but the captain dropped the ball at slip. Gillespie bounced back to have Malinga Bandara snared by an aerial Ross Taylor in the gully before injury struck.
Gillespie flinched when delivering the first ball of his last over and although he limped back to the top of his mark he pulled up at the crease and left the arena gingerly for treatment.
"I wanted to keep going and I thought I could -- I didn't want to go off but Flem said that's me for the day," said Gillespie, who was confident he would still be available to play at McLean Park.
"I've had enough injuries to know which one's are serious, and this one isn't too bad."
Scoreboard
Sri Lanka
U Tharanga b Franklin 0
C Kapugedera c Franklin b Mason 12
M Jayawardene c Patel b Franklin 9
K Sangakkara c McGlashan b Adams 13
M Atapattu c Fulton b Franklin 5
T Dilshan run out (Fulton/McGlashan) 3
C Silva c McGlashan b Adams 12
M Bandara c Taylor b Gillespie 1
L Malinga b Patel 27
D Fernando c Adams b Astle 21
R Perera not out 0
Extras (1lb, 8w, 3nb) 12
Total (all out, 18.2 overs) 115
Fall: 0 (Tharanga), 24 (Jayawardene), 26 (Kapugedera), 44 (Atapattu), 51 (Sangakkara), 58 (Dilshan), 61 (Bandara), 71 (Silva), 115 (Fernando), 115 (Malinga)
Bowling: J Franklin 4-0-24-3 (1nb), M Mason 3-0-19-1 (3w), M Gillespie 3.1-0-13-1 (5w), A Adams 4-0-20-2 (1nb), N Astle 2.5-0-30-1, J Patel 1.2-0-8-1.
New Zealand
B McCullum run out (Kapugedera/Dilshan) 28
S Fleming c Kapugedera b Fernando 17
R Taylor run out (Bandara/Dilshan) 4
N Astle not out 40
P Fulton b Fernando 14
P McGlashan c Dilshan b Fernando 2
J Franklin not out 3
Extras (4b, 1lb, 3w) 8
Total: (for 5 wkts, 18.3 overs) 116
Fall: 51 (Fleming), 56 (Taylor), 57 (McCullum), 82 (Fulton), 86 (McGlashan)
Bowling: L Malinga 3-0-15-0 (1w), R Perera 4-0-49-0 (2w), D Fernando 4-0-19-3, M Bandara 4-0-20-0, T Dilshan 3.3-0-8-0.
Results: New Zealand win by five wickets, series drawn 1-1.
- NZPA