Martin Guptill 2,England 0

Guptill later back to back hundreds were a good way to get back in form after a lukewarm run in the Tests. “It’s pretty special,I didn’t expect that at the start of the day. I just wanted to go on as long as I could. The Test wasn’t ideal but I’ve turned it around. I don’t really know what a good score on any wicket is but I just tried to start partnerships and put pressure on the opposition. You never know,you can get a pearler or nick off early so you’ve got to take each ball as it comes,” he said.

After New Zealand skipper Brendon McCullum won the toss and elected to bat under blue skies,Guptill smashed 19 fours and two towering sixes in a 155-ball stay. He combined for partnerships in excess of 100 runs each with Kane Williamson (55),Ross Taylor (60) and McCullum (40 not out) on the way to a another century after guiding his team home at Lord’s on Friday. He became only the third Kiwi batsmen to make successive ODI hundreds,after Mark Greatbatch and Ross Taylor. England’s bowling attack,once again minus the injured Stuart Broad and Steven Finn,lacked depth on a flat pitch.

Only James Anderson threatened consistently as Jade Dernbach conceded 87 from his 10 overs and Chris Woakes struggled through just seven overs. New Zealand kept England captain Alastair Cook under pressure throughout their innings with some clever running between the wickets while Guptill,in particular,was brutal on anything loose to propel his side to the fifth highest score in the game’s history.

A massive 132 of New Zealand’s runs came in the last 10 overs. England got off to an encouraging start in the chase with Cook (34) and Ian Bell (25) producing a flurry of early boundaries to give the home crowd plenty of reasons for optimism. But when the two openers were dismissed and Joe Root (28) also got a start but holed out at long-on to the spin of Nathan McCullum,Trott was left to do the bulk of the scoring.

Not a naturally aggressive shot-maker,Trott keep up a strike rate of close to a 100 for most of his innings but he eventually ran out of batting partners. The pace of Mitchell McClenaghan completed the job as New Zealand celebrated a second significant one-day series win away from home after their success in South Africa at the start of the year. Cook said England lost the game towards the end of the first innings,saying,“We bowled pretty well until the 42nd,43rd over but New Zealand built a huge platform,kept wickets in hand and when you’ve got a guy on 100 not out and Brendon McCullum,it’s very hard to stop them.”

McCullum said it was a great way for the Kiwis to respond after the Test losses and with the Champions Trophy coming up. “It’s been really pleasing after the Test series,we’re an experienced one-day unit and we’re hard to beat. When the Champions Trophy rolls around we’ve got to play as well as we can,” he said.

BRIEF SCORES: New Zealand 340/7 in 50 overs (M Guptill not out 189,K Williamson 55,R Taylor 60; J Anderson 2/65,G Swann 1/61) bt England 273 all out in 44.1 overs (A Cook 3,J Trott not out 109; M McClenaghan 3/35,G Elliot 1/13)