Liam Livingstone hard hitting gets England an easy win over New Zealand. They won the match by 79 runs. The match was reduced to 34 overs due to rain.
England made 226/7 in 34 overs and black caps only managed to score 147/10 in 26.5 overs.
Kiwi team already won the 1st ODI by a brilliant performance by Daryl Mitchell and Devon Conway and won the match by 8 wickets. With this win England now equalizes the series by 1-1.
New Zealand after winning the toss opted to bowl first.
The decision seems to be correct as England lost 5 wickets in 55 runs. Root goes for a duck while Stokes only makes 1 run. Then after that Liam Livingstone (95 runs) and Moeen Ali (33 runs) put 48 runs for the 6th wicket. Livingstone hit 9 fours and a six in his innings whereas Moeen hit 3 fours and a six. These two manage to take their team in a little better position.
Later on Liam was supported by Sam Curran (42 runs) with whom they put 112 runs together. It comes in crucial when the team needs it the most. Curran hit 1 four and 2 sixes in his knock. In the end England scored 226 runs in 34 overs by losing 7 wickets.
Trent Boult damaged the Kiwi batsmen early on and took 3 early wickets. Tim Southee grabbed 2 wickets. Matt Henry and Mitchel Santner got 1 wicket each.
Kiwi team didn’t get a solid start and they were losing wickets at regular intervals. No big partnerships were made. The highest partnership was between Daryl Mitchell (57 runs) and Tom Latham (19 runs) which was of 56 runs. Daryl tries to get some runs but with the rising required he gets out.
Will Young (33 runs) also plays well but is unable to convert his innings into a big one. In the end they only managed to put 147 runs in 26.5 overs and all the batsmen were sent to the pavilion.
David Willey and Reece Topley grabbed 3 wickets each. Moeen Ali got 2 wickets while Sam Curran got 1 wicket.
Liam Livingstone, England, Player of the Match
“Just tried to get used to the conditions and play well. We got a lot of depth, something that we pride ourselves on. It has been a frustrating year for me. I pride myself on adaptability. I was looking forward to this series to spend some time in the middle. I just needed one innings. Sometimes you can overthink and just feel like I needed time in the middle. Frystating couple of months, not at my best, but my hard work for the last couple of months has paid off.”
Tom Latham, New Zealand Captain
“They had a couple of key partnerships at the back end with lower order. Unfortunately we could take the wickets to get into the bowlers. Full credit to them. We look for ways to improve. Our new ball bowling was good. Boult doing his things was great. Unfortunately we couldn’t capitalize when they were under pressure. Couple of changes in the side today, hopefully we can do that again in the next couple of games. We weren’t able to take it deep with the bat and didn’t have partnerships.”
Jos Butler, England Captain
“To be able to post a total like that is credit to the way we wanted to play. Liam came with intent and Curran was also good. We wanted to find ways to put pressure back on the opposition and push their lengths because there was enough help for bowlers initially. Encouraging everyone to be ultra positive. Defining roles will come. Everyone is pretty clear with the options they have in the team. Livingstone and Curran batting at 7 and 8, well within their right to bat higher. We talked about improving from the last game.”