Kiwis in final despite defeat
An aggressive Colin Munro belted New Zealand into the Twenty20 tri-series final against Australia despite England claiming their final round-robin match by two runs in Hamilton on Sunday.
Munro plundered the England attack at the top of the New Zealand innings, equalling the sixth-fastest half-century of all time in cricket's shortest form as he raced past 50 in just 18 deliveries.
England, on the back of an unbeaten 80 by returning captain Eoin Morgan, posted 194 for seven after being sent into bat.
New Zealand, with Martin Guptill adding 62 and Hong Kong-born Mark Chapman unbeaten on 37, made 192 for four in reply.
The narrow two-run winning margin was a bittersweet result for Morgan.
It provided a confidence-boosting first win in the series but England needed to win by 20 runs to overtake New Zealand on overall run-rate to face unbeaten Australia in Wednesday's final.
New Zealand passed that target at the start of the 18th over but the groundwork had been laid by opener Munro's whirlwind 57 in a big-hitting innings that included seven sixes and three fours.
"Not that good," Morgan said when asked how he felt.
"Given the start they got off to, with Colin Munro and Martin Guptill in that sort of form, there's a bit of dew around, the ball skidding on, it was quite difficult for our attack," he added.
"We played our best game today. Good enough to win the game but not good enough to go through to the final. We just haven't been good enough throughout this T20 campaign."
SCORES IN BRIEF
ENGLAND: 194 for 7 in 20 overs (Roy 21, Malan 53, Morgan 80 not out; Boult 3-50, Southee 2-22)
NEW ZEALAND: 192 for 4 in 20 overs (Guptill 62, Munro 57, Chapman 37 not out; Rashid 1-22, Dawson 1-27)
Result: England won by two runs.
Player-of-the-match: Eoin Morgan.
