England collapse against New Zealand
In the exciting match played between England and New Zealand, the later emerged victorious in their first outing at the prestigious ICC Cricket World Cup 2007 in Beausejour, St Lucia. Earlier New Zealand skipper Stephen Fleming won the toss and elected to field first.
England powerful batting line-up had put up a reasonable score of 133/3 at the end of 35 overs but their middle order collapsed and just few overs later, they were faltering at a score of 138/7 in the 39th over. The team had lost four world-class batsmen -Jamie Dalrymple, Andrew Flintoff, Kevin Pietersen and Paul Collingwood in span of just 5 runs. Just when it seemed that England will be restrained till 150 odd runs ace batsmen Paul Nixon and Liam Plunkett put up an unbroken 71-run partnership which gave England a respectable score of 209/7.
Chasing 210 to win, the Kiwis comfortably achieved the target with nine overs to spare. After some initial hiccups, which made the match interesting, star batsmen Scott Styris and Jacob Oram took their team to an easy win.
The Kiwis initially had the worst possible start as Lou Vincent was caught behind by Paul Nixon. He went off for a duck in the very first over. The very next over saw Ross Taylor back in the pavilion as he was caught at slip by Andrew Flintoff off the bowling of Liam Plunkett.
Anderson then struck again to displace ace skipper Stephen Fleming. Early fall of wickets saw Kiwis stumbling at 72 for four in the 16th over. Just when it seemed that the match had gone in the hands of England, Styris and Oram hammered the English attack and put an unbeaten partnership of 138 runs to lead their team towards a comfortable win.
Scott Styris was adjudged man of the match as he scored 87 and also took two crucial wickets while Oram remained unbeaten on 63.
Brief Score: England 209/9 (KP Pietersen 60, PA Nixon 42) vs. New Zealand 210/4(Scott Styris 87, Oram 63)
Result: New Zealand won the match by 6 wickets
Man of the Match: Scott Styris
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