West Indies’ Keacy Carty avoids comical dismissal as Black Caps lose opening ODI
Sunday, 12 July 2026
At Guyana National Stadium, Providence, Guyana: New Zealand 267 in 49.5 overs (Daryl Mitchell 65 off 73 balls, Will Young 49 off 63; Alzarri Joseph 4-41 off 8.5 overs, Vitel Lawes 3-54 off 10) lost to West Indies 268-3 in 48.5 overs (Keacy Carty 95 off 112 balls, Shai Hope 87no off 92, Ackeem Auguste 38 off 58) by seven wickets. Click here for full scorecard
For a brief moment West Indies batter Keacy Carty would have felt sick in his stomach.
Carty’s 95 propelled the West Indies to a seven wicket victory over the Black Caps in the first of the five match ODI series in Guyana on Sunday.
The powerful hitting right-hander and skipper Shai Hope shared in a match-changing 131-run third wicket stand to put the hosts in a commanding position in their pursuit of 268. Hope was excellent, finishing unbeaten on 87 to lead the West Indies to their target with seven balls spare.
Carty would have been a nervous man after he clubbed Jacob Duffy for six over deep square leg to move to 70, but then hit the stumps with his bat as he admired the shot.
It was only TV umpire Ahsan Raza who saved Carty, ruling he had completed the stroke before making contact with the wickets. Had Carty departed to a hit wicket it would have been comical stuff, given how impressive he had been batting.
Carty and Hope’s partnership paved the way for the West Indies’ win against a New Zealand side missing plenty of firepower, including Rachin Ravindra, Glenn Phillips, Will O’Rourke, Kyle Jamieson, Matt Henry, Devon Conway, and Zak Foulkes.
Carty fell five runs short of what would have been his fifth ODI ton, held at deep midwicket by Nathan Smith off Michael Bracewell’s offspin with a further 44 needed.
New Zealand thought they’d finally snared the breakthrough when Mitchell Santner seemed to have pulled in a catch at cover with Hope on 53, but replays showed the ball touched the ground.
The Black Caps were left to lament a late order batting collapse, which saw them lose their last six wickets for 33 runs, dismissed on the penultimate ball of their innings for 267. With the ball, they were not quite as accurate as they would have liked on a warm day in Providence, where temperatures were in the mid 20Cs for the run chase.
Northern Districts seamer Matthew Fisher made his ODI debut and went wicketless for 51 runs from 9.5 overs.
New Zealand would have been disappointed to finish with 267 after they were 155-3 at the 30 over mark with Daryl Mitchell and Tom Latham set at the crease.
They lost their last six wickets for 33 runs with paceman Alzarri Joseph getting the big wicket of Mitchell, then mopping up the lower order with three more.
Their total was built around Mitchell’s 65 from 73 balls, following on from his unbeaten 100 in New Zealand’s series clinching third test win over England in Nottingham.
Openers Henry Nicholls and Will Young, who struck 49, laid a strong, early platform, combining for a 80-run first wicket stand.
Outside Mitchell and Young’s knocks, there were plenty of starts with Nicholls (27), Mark Chapman (27), Latham (25), and Bracewell (29) all falling after getting in on a wicket which stayed low and provided turn for the spinners.
Nineteen-year-old left-arm wrist spinner Vitel Lawes had an ODI debut to remember, picking up 3-54, including the top order scalps of Nicholls and Chapman.
The sides meet in the second match on Tuesday (6.30am start NZT) in Providence again.