Cricket: Luck helps top order to ODI triumph

New Zealand batsman Martin Guptill. Photo / Brett Phibbs

If you're Brendon McCullum or Martin Guptill, you would be entitled to feel pretty good about your game right now.

The top order pair sailed along as New Zealand made it four from four on their tour of Zimbabwe, with a four-wicket win in the second ODI at Harare yesterday.

Guptill's second ODI century, 105 off 121 balls, anchored the win and took his tally over the two Twenty20s and both ODIs to 286 at an average of 95.

McCullum made 87, albeit helped by four dropped catches - one before he'd scored - and has now racked up 271 runs at a juicy average of 135.

But while they've been filling their plate, other batsmen have had few opportunities. The final ODI is in Bulawayo tomorrow night, followed by the solitary test at that same ground, with a two-day hitout in between.

So should New Zealand consider jiggling the batting order to give the likes of captain Ross Taylor, Kane Williamson and Jesse Ryder - assuming he's over the stomach bug which has ruled him out of the last two games - more time at the crease?

It's unlikely coach John Wright and Taylor will make substantial changes, but a tinker here or there could be in order.

Understandably, Guptill is pleased with things as they are.

"I'm feeling good with the bat at the moment," he said yesterday. "Batting with Brendon [McCullum] and Rob [Nicol] up the order has helped me, they let me play my game.

"Brendon and I bat well together, we complement each other quite well and he kept me going right through."

The pair put on 157 for the second wicket as New Zealand chased down Zimbabwe's 259 for eight with 10 balls to spare. McCullum had lives on 0, 23, 31 and 57 before falling to a sharp catch at backward point.

But the middle order stumbled to the line, although B.J. Watling was unluckily run out at the non-striker's end, a Williamson on drive ricocheting to bowler Keegan Meth, who lobbed the ball back onto the stumps.

Earlier, Brendon Taylor became the first Zimbabwe batsman to score back-to-back ODI centuries, with a run-a-ball 107 not out.

He got good support from Malcolm Waller - later the culprit on the two easiest chances offered by McCullum in the deep - in an 86-run stand for the fifth wicket.

Lively left-armer Andy McKay took his best ODI figures in his 16th international, four for 53, while veteran medium pacer Jacob Oram took three for 48 and Graeme Aldridge got the other in his debut ODI.

"I think it was pretty comfortable at the end," Ross Taylor said. "We took our catches, which Zimbabwe didn't."