Cricket: Nash the man as batting deal rewarded in thriller

The experience and cricketing nous of Dion Nash has taken Auckland into the three-match Shell Cup final against Canterbury starting at Eden Park next Friday.

In a low-scoring thriller at Eden Park yesterday Nash, batting at six, steered his side through the tight Northern Districts minefield and with two balls to spare scored the equalising run that took Auckland through.

Chris Drum's last-ball slash for a single took the Aces to a victory which for most of the innings had looked light years away.

Nash's innings emphasised the wisdom of the New Zealand coach, David Trist, and the Auckland selectors, coach Tony Sail, Peter Langton and Rex Hooton, in agreeing to play him solely as a batsman.

While it might have been difficult for him not to try an over or two, everyone stuck to the agreement and Nash paid his dues in full.

He said he grew in confidence as he and firstly Brooke Walker and then Drum approached the final over.

Nine runs were needed from it. Nash missed the first ball, struck a sizzling four from the second, a two from the third and with Drum running like a hare, picked up two singles, leaving Drum to hit the winner.

Earlier, Auckland bowled well enough to contain the ND top order and when the fourth wicket fell for 123 with 22 overs remaining, ND had laid the foundation for a reasonable score of around 225.

But when Andre Adams started his stint, the sixth bowler to be used in the attack, the innings was demolished as ND limped to 150.

Adams ended with five wickets for seven runs from six overs, setting a record of 28 for Shell Cup wickets in a season, beating Justin Vaughan's tally of 25 set in 1995/96.

"I simply bowled straight and they made mistakes," Adams said.

"It is hard to believe that I have had a season like this, but we still have three games to go so the job is not over yet."

The 24-year-old Adams hit the stumps once and persuaded umpire Doug Cowie to give him three leg-before decisions, all evidence, he claims, of his accuracy.

His father is from the West Indies island of St Vincent, and his mother (once the runner-up in a national body building championship in New Zealand) from Guyana with a bit of French thrown in.

ND again used Vettori as an opening batsman and the 21-year-old, who celebrated his birthday on Thursday night, produced 29 from 25 balls.

Michael Parlane took 61 balls for his 40 but he and Vettori gave their side a useful start of 41 that was eventually squandered.

Auckland were troubled by the swing and accuracy of Simon Doull, Darryl Tuffey, Scott Styris and Alex Tait, a very formidable attack in the competition.

But after John Aiken had batted solidly for 49 at No 5, it was left to Nash to bring Auckland home and into the final.