[www.inewsguyana.com] – West Indies followed up Shivnarine Chanderpaul’s 29th Test hundred and valuable runs from their tail-enders with purposeful bowling to leave the third Test against New Zealand in an interesting state on Friday.
Off-spinner Sunil Narine grabbed 2-43 from 22 overs, as the New Zealanders reached 156 for three, replying to the Windies’ first innings total of 367 at the close on the second day at Seddon Park.
For the first time in the series, it was not all one-way traffic, as Narine and Permaul wheeled away for 45 overs, tying the Black Caps batsmen down, although Kane Williamson made 58 and Ross Taylor continued in his rich vein of form with a pulsating, unbeaten 56 in a crucial third-wicket stand of 95.
This had unfolded after Chanderpaul remained unbeaten on 122, drawing level with Australian legend Don Bradman’s 29 Test hundred, eclipsing another Aussie, fellow left-hander Allan Border’s aggregate of 11,174 runs and for the 45th time in 260 innings succeeded in making sure the opposition failed to dismiss him.
Chanderpaul now has 11,199 runs at an average of 52.08 from 260 innings in his 153 Tests for West Indies, still 754 adrift of fellow West Indies left-hand batting legend Brian Lara on the list of all-time scorers.
The pressure from the new-ball spell of Best and Sammy, the only two frontline seamers in the West Indies attack, then took its toll on the New Zealand openers.
Sammy soon clutched a low catch to dismiss left-hander Hamish Rutherford for 10 in the sixth over and Peter Fulton was caught at leg-spin, flicking at Narine’s third delivery, leaving New Zealand 43 for two.
With Permaul, if not Best keeping things on a tight rein from the other end, Narine started to deal his bag of tricks and both Taylor and New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum were fortunate to survive, as balls whizzed past their edge and stumps regularly in the closing overs.
The Windies trail 0-1 in the three-Test series, following a defeat by an innings and 73 runs in the second Test which ended last Friday at the Basin Reserve in the New Zealand capital of Wellington.
Rain forced a draw in the first Test which ended two Saturdays ago at University Oval in the South Island city of Dunedin.
