Cricket: NZ seek spin turn around

Getting on top of spinner Sunil Narine will be pivotal to New Zealand's chances in their two-test series against the West Indies, and Kane Williamson is confident the Black Caps can combat the right-armer in the longer form of the game.

Narine, who has produced staggering statistics in his first eight months of international cricket, was a constant menace to New Zealand during the Twenty20 and one-day series. The 24-year-old took seven wickets in the Twenty20 games as the Windies swept New Zealand 2-0 and claimed 13 scalps in five one-dayers as the home side won 4-1. He took a career-best 5-27 in the fifth game yesterday.

The West Indies won the toss and batted at Warner Park. They posted 241-9 from their 50 overs, with No9 Andre Russell top-scoring with a hard-hit 59 not out.

New Zealand looked on track to chase down the target but when Williamson was brilliantly caught by Chris Gayle in the 46th over, their chase ran out of steam and they eventually lost by 20 runs.

Williamson said the lengthy nature of test cricket meant the Kiwis wouldn't be forced to push the tempo against Narine, which had brought their downfall in the limited overs matches.

"It's a very different challenge, I think, playing him in a test," Williamson said. "In saying that, it will be interesting to see how they produce the wickets, but hopefully the tests bring him down to a more level playing field ...

"When we looked to attack, he certainly picked up wickets so I think the slightly more defensive or slower version of test cricket will make him less effective because he's not a huge spinner of the ball both ways - but he does get it to go both ways."

The Trinidad-born tweaker played alongside Brendon McCullum for the Kolkata Knight Riders in this year's IPL and Williamson said they were working hard on trying to read the finger-spinner's deliveries.

The New Zealand side to play the tests should have a different look, with Kruger van Wyk, Chris Martin, Daniel Vettori and Neil Wagner joining the squad as Jacob Oram, Tom Latham, Rob Nicol and Andrew Ellis drop out.

Wicketkeeper-batsman BJ Watling remains under an injury cloud with a quad strain but is expected to be available for the first test.

- APNZ