I have never actually seen a tempest in real life—and I hope
that I don’t ever get to see one either—but the way Colin Munro inflicted pain
on the two-time T20I World champions was something akin to a tempest.
And Windies were the unfortunate ones to be on the receiving
side of it. Actually, they now have a taste of their own medicine as Chris Gayle
and Kieron Pollard are some of the players who have done similar things to
other bowlers.
Winning the toss and opting to bat first, New Zealand posted
a mammoth score of 243 in their allotted 20 overs. Colin Munro’s 53-ball 104—making
him the only player to score 3 centuries in T20Is—and Martin Guptill's 38-ball 63 helped the
Kiwis to this gargantuan score. The shots that the right-hand left-hand duo displayed
was a resemblance of the all-consuming entity that appears at the end of time.
Every shot was consuming the Windies bowlers in
their fury, who had no idea what to do in order to stop the torment they had
been facing.
Carlos Brathwaite, the captain, Jerome Taylor and Rayad
Emrit were the ones among the wickets, but all of them gave away at least
10-runs-per-over.
They had hoped that their batsmen would avenge them, but
even they fell like a pack of cards.
The mighty Chris Gayle—perhaps the greatest T20 batsman of
all time—fell for a duck and so did his opening partner, Chadwick Walton. Andre
Fletcher showed some resistance with a 32-ball 46, but he also bit the dust
after that.
In the end, the West Indians could only muster 124 from 16.3
overs. Tim Southee took 3 wickets after giving away 21 runs while Trent Boult
supported him very well with 2 wickets from 21 runs. Ish Sodhi also took 2
wickets after giving away just 25 runs in his 4 overs and Anaru Kitchen took 1
wicket meanwhile.
For a two-time world champions losing by a margin of 119 runs
is nothing but embarrassment as the Caribbeans bow of the tour without a single
win.
A devastating tour indeed.
New Zealand: 243/5 from 20 overs
Colin Munro 104 (53) | Carlos Brathwaite 4-0-50-2
Martin Guptill 63 (38)
West Indies: 124/10 from 16.3 overs
Andre Fletcher 46 (32) | Tim Southee 2.3-0-21-3
Rovman Powell 16 (8)
New Zealand won by 119 runs.
Picture credit: Getty Images
