West Indies vs New Zealand, 3rd ODI at Basseterre, , Jul 11 2012 - Ball by Ball Commentary

That cool interview, kept short by the dreamy-sounding Nicol, ends the proceedings for the day. Do be sure to join us on Saturday. Thanks for being here tonight

Rob Nicol is the Man of he Match. A little surprised with that call. Anyway, says Nicol: "I was pleased. I wanted to carry on with a start, which I did today. It was disappointing to not go and score a three figures."

"It's nice to win the match and keep the series alive," says Kane Williamson. "It was below par, but we thought it was enough for us to show some Kiwi fight. We fielded well, executed better with the ball. We are yet to put a strong batting performance. We have been patchy, the momentum keep shifting. It will be nice to put on a proper batting performance. Bowling is doing fine."

Time for the presentation. "It's disappointing," says Darren Sammy. "but the way the Kiwis fielded was brilliant. Looking back, we probably should have batted first, but we backed ourselves to chase 250. We just kept losing wickets. They fielded well, we had a few run-outs. We also had team plannings, and the team always comes first (in reply to why he didn't bowl his 10 overs)". This not a panic situation. We have been playing well. Today was an off day. It's important we have more good days than off days."

John Wright and New Zealand are pretty chuffed with this effort. They are struggling to put an XI on the field, they further lost their keeper today, and put up a sub-par total on a belter surrounded by short boundaries. Yet they have broken their duck on this tour against a massive run of play. Flashy allrounders - Smith, Pollard and Bravo - offered their wickets on a platter all right, but boy did the New Zealanders field spectacularly today, never mind the two drops by Guptill. His run-out of Samuels is one for the ages. Williamson's run-out of Narine, and McCullum's catch of Smith are not far behind. It's almost their comfort zone when it comes down to defending these inadequate totals through tigerish fielding and with the last ounces of their pride on the line. And they have pulled this one off. "How amusing. I was expecting to wake to the news of a match winning ton from Chris Gayle, and instead find that the Kiwis have won by almost the exact number of runs Gayle was short of said ton." BJ - not Watling - finds this trivia

"Looking at what could certainly be Russell's Man of the Match performance, it rather angers me that he would have to be the one making way for when Roach returns. After all, Bravo and Pollard aren't going to be dropped anytime soon, and Sammy has to play, regardless of performance." Randy, this performance might dare them, though. For me, Pollard has to be the man to go

"I can see your logical view about change of angle for the free hit. Logic should prevail. The rule should not allow change of angle for the free hit...I'm at a loss to understand why this is allowed..?!" Ben, I am not sure if the umpires were caught napping, but that is highly unlikely. The rule, as I understand from what hapened today, doesn't allow field changes, but has no problem with the change of the angle

One slip in. Boult sees only three men in, and pulls out of tat delivery. Sharp thinking

Goes round the stumps

Ben: "Russell should be batting higher up the order. He is a better batsman than Pollard, Bravo, and Sammy. He also deserves a spot in the Test squad."

Comes back over the stumps

Free hit coming up. He is going round the wicket. I must confess I am surprised to see you can change your angle for the free hit

Boult comes back

A slip and a short cover-point in