Guptill's stunner, and NZ's winning habit in England

Stats highlights from Martin Guptill's incredible innings, and New Zealand's ODI series win in England

03-Jun-2013

Jade Dernbach's opening spell proved expensive, England v New Zealand, 1st ODI, Lord's, May 31, 2013

New Zealand's ODI series win is their second on tour this year. In January they'd beaten South Africa 2-1 in South Africa. It's also their third triumph out of four in an ODI series or tournament in England: they'd won the four-nation NatWest Challenge in 2004, and beaten England 3-1 in a bilateral series in 2008.

New Zealand have an outstanding ODI record in England over the last nine years: in their last 15 matches there, they've won ten and lost just two. Their win-loss ratio of five is the best by any team in England during this period - the next-best is Sri Lanka's 8-4 win-loss record. It's also New Zealand's best record in any country during this period, and much better than their home record of 43-29.

The common protagonist in both their wins in the current series was Martin Guptill: his scores of 103 and 189, both unbeaten, gives him a series aggregate of 292, the third-highest by a New Zealand batsman in a series in which he's played fewer than five innings. The highest is 333, by Glenn Turner, in four innings in the 1975 World Cup. Guptill will have a chance of going past that mark in the third ODI of the series, on June 5.

Apart from being the fifth-highest ODI score by a batsman and the highest by a New Zealander, Guptill's unbeaten 189 in Southampton is also the joint highest by any batsman in ODIs against England. Viv Richards had scored the same number of runs against them at Old Trafford in 1984. While Richards' knock came off 170 balls, Guptill scored his runs off 155.

That innings propelled New Zealand to a total of 359, their sixth-highest in ODIs but their best against one of the top sides. Their five higher totals have come against Ireland, Zimbabwe (three times) and Canada. This was also the second-highest number of runs conceded in an ODI by England, after India's 387 in Rajkot in 2008.

New Zealand's innings of 359 included three century partnerships, with Guptill being a part of all three - 120 for the second wicket with Kane Williamson, 109 for the third with Ross Taylor, and 118 for the fourth with Brendon McCullum. It's only the second instance of three century stands in one ODI innings - the previous instance was by South Africa, in the 2007 World Cup against Netherlands.

The partnership of 118 between Guptill and McCullum came off 50 deliveries, a run rate of 14.16 runs per over. That makes it the sixth-best recorded run rate in a century stand in ODIs, and the third-best for New Zealand. The top two such instances are both by New Zealand batsmen - 136 off 46 balls between Craig McMillan and Nathan Astle against USA in 2004 (run rate 17.73), and 114 off 41 between James Marshall and Taylor against Ireland (run rate 16.68). However, the run rate of 14.16 is the quickest for a century stand against one of the top sides: the five quicker ones came against USA, Ireland, Zimbabwe, Netherlands and Canada.

In the last ten overs of their innings New Zealand scored 132, their third-highest in ODIs since the beginning of 2002. Their best in this period is 142, against USA in the 2004 Champions trophy, while the next-best is 139 against Pakistan in the 2011 World Cup. It's the most runs that England have conceded in the last ten during this period. The previous highest was 124 in that Rajkot game when India scored 387.

Guptill's unbeaten 189 included 19 fours and two sixes, which means only 88 of his runs came in boundaries, a percentage of 46.56. Among the 21 ODI innings of 175 or more, this is the second-lowest boundary percentage: only Gary Kirsten's unbeaten 188 against UAE in the 1996 World Cup had a lower percentage - he hit 13 fours and four sixes, scoring 40.43% of his runs in boundaries.

The England bowler who suffered the most was Jade Dernbach - his ten overs went for 87, the fourth-highest number of runs conceded by an England bowler in ODIs, and the highest by an England bowler against New Zealand.

Jade Dernbach Brendon McCullum Martin Guptill New Zealand England England vs New Zealand New Zealand tour of England

S Rajesh is stats editor of ESPNcricinfo. Follow him on Twitter