Maia Bouchier struck her first international hundred at Worcester on Sunday, simultaneously bringing up that particular milestone and the winning runs for England as they easily chased down their target of 142 with eight wickets and 153 balls to spare against New Zealand in their second one-day international.
Bouchier has previously been dismissed twice in the 90s, once in an ODI and once in a Twenty20, and here she kept the crowd on the edge of their seats once again, surviving a close lbw call on 92 which was adjudged umpire’s call, and relying on Nat Sciver-Brunt at the other end to selflessly block out 10 dot balls to ensure there were enough runs remaining for her teammate to reach three figures.
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Finally, with four runs needed, Bouchier pierced the leg-side in-field twice for back-to-back twos to seal the milestone, raising her bat to the crowd with an expression which was half relief, half joy.
The moment brought some jeopardy to a match which had earlier seen an embarrassing New Zealand batting collapse which handed the ODI series to England on a plate with one match left to play. The last seven Kiwi wickets fell for the addition of just 27 runs, as Sophie Ecclestone wreaked havoc with a maiden ODI five-wicket haul on home soil.
If the first ODI at Durham had been a walkover, this was a trampling; and with wickets once again tumbling to spin the result should raise serious questions about the ability of this New Zealand team to compete at the highest level in the format with the 50-over World Cup in India next year.
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Their best young hope, the 23-year-old all-rounder Melie Kerr, struggled on to 43 from 86 balls after being saved by a well-judged DRS review early in her innings, while her sister Jess at least showed a bit of resistance from No 9 with back-to-back boundaries against Ecclestone driven down the ground.
But otherwise a slow start from New Zealand – who took 29 overs to put 100 runs on the board – turned into a masterclass in how not to play spin. Maddy Green played all around one from Charlie Dean, who also took a good low return catch to see off Kerr, while Ecclestone rattled three sets of New Zealand stumps, having earlier turned one past the bat of Sophie Devine to have the Kiwi captain stumped.
There was also a brief off-spin cameo from Alice Capsey, who was preferred in the XI over Sarah Glenn in the knowledge that she was likely to be called on with the ball, with Sciver-Brunt still unable to bowl her full allocation.
Capsey had left the field earlier in the innings, having taken a knock to the head in the deep, but when Heather Knight finally introduced her in the 42nd over it took her just five balls to wrap up the innings, rounding off a collapse from 114 for three to 141 all out.
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