Black Caps set competitive total

Put into bat by the tourists, New Zealand slumped to 95 for six and looked set to be dismissed for a lowly total against an England side galvanised by two changes to their line-up.

But a superb 88 from 91 balls from all-rounder Jacob Oram and a quickfire 42 off 35 balls from captain Daniel Vettori propelled New Zealand, who need victory to seal a series win with two matches remaining, to a highly-competitive 234 for nine.

England looked highly charged and aggressive in the field having dropped Ravi Bopara and spinner Graeme Swann and replaced them with all-rounders Luke Wright and Dimitri Mascarenhas and quickly ran through New Zealand's top order.

Lancashire seamer Jimmy Anderson struck with the 10th legitimate ball of the innings to remove dangerous wicketkeeper Brendon McCullum and shared the first four wickets to fall with the impressive Stuart Broad.

With Paul Collingwood also claiming two wickets to remove Peter Fulton and Ross Taylor, England seemed in the dominant position and also had luck on their side with umpire Asad Rauf ruling an Oram drive for four as a dead ball because he was not in position at the bowler's end.

Three balls later Taylor fell to an lbw appeal and New Zealand could have lost their composure at the injustice of the situation, but instead relied on the wise heads of Oram and Vettori to steer them towards a competitive score.

The pair added 74 off 72 balls by intelligently rotating ths strike at first before becoming more aggressive as the innings reached its climax to leave England regretting dropping Vettori before he had scored with Anderson missing a one-handed catch at mid-on off Collingwood.

Vettori went on to hit four fours and a six off Mascarenhas over mid-wicket before being superbly caught by Owais Shah on the mid-wicket boundary attempting to hit Collingwood for successive fours with eight overs remaining.

Oram was in sight of only his second one-day international century and hit Broad for successive sixes in his final over but, attempting to clear the cover boundary off a full toss from Ryan Sidebottom, he mis-timed his shot and was superbly caught by a diving Ian Bell having hit four fours and four sixes in his brilliant innings.