Ahmedabad: The New Zealand team has won the first match of the Cricket World Cup by defeating England by 9 wickets.
The ICC 50 Over Cricket World Cup started in India on Thursday. On the opening day, the first match between England and New Zealand took place at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad. New Zealand won the toss and elected to field first. Senior player Ben Stokes has been left out of the England squad due to injury. Tim Southee is not included in the New Zealand team.
Bairstow opened the batting first with a six off the second ball of the first over for England. England scored 12 runs in the first over alone. Although Bairstow played aggressively from the start, Malan at the other end could not cope with the New Zealand bowling and was dismissed for 14 runs. Soon Bairstow 25 runs, Harry Brook 25 runs, Moeen Ali 11 runs England’s top order game.
After this he formed a great partnership with Joe Root – Buttler. England recovered somewhat from this. Buttler walked for 43 and Joe Root lost for 77. In the end, England scored 282 runs for the loss of 9 wickets at the end of 50 overs. Henry and Phillips took 2 wickets each for New Zealand team.
After this, Will Young gave a shock to New Zealand who came out for a wicket. But, after this, the game of the New Zealand team heated up. Along with Devon Conway, Indian-origin player Rachin Ravindra ravaged England’s bowling. The England bowlers were unable to separate this partnership till the end when they were 10 runs away. Hitting six boundaries in all fours, both of them were amazing to cross the century in succession.
With a partnership of 273 runs, this partnership reached the target of 283 runs in just 36.2 overs and achieved a huge victory. Conway scored 152 runs and Rachin Ravindra scored 123 runs.
