We took wickets at key moments: Santner

KARACHI: New Zealand’s all-rounder Mitchell Santner has said that taking wickets at key times helped the tourists thrash Pakistan in the second ODI here at the National Stadium on Wednesday.

“I think the turn was a bit more. I think we bowled very well as a unit. We took two wickets in the power-play which helped. Breaking that partnership between Rizwan and Babar which we could not really do in the first game helped a lot. We managed to take wickets at key times and kept their run-rate going hard,” Santner told reporters after New Zealand beat Pakistan by 79 runs on Wednesday to level the series 1-1.

“It probably spun, may be a little bit more,” Santner said about the track for the second ODI which helped the spinners, especially in the second innings under floodlights.

“In the last game it did spin latter on in the second innings once the ball got a little bit older. I guess it was a plan to play three spinners and try to bowl second. It looked like we were going to hit 280 or 300 but we managed 260 as they bowled well. We bowled quite well in partnerships and never gave easy boundaries as well against some very good batters,” said Santner, who also played a key role with the bat at a time when New Zealand had faced a huge collapse and even the team did not play full overs.

Not knowing how the wicket for the third ODI will behave, Santner was happy that they have entered into the third and final ODI after levelling the series.

“It was nice to win this game but we know that there would be another wicket, which could be similar, could be different and we are not sure. Pakistan are quality side and its nice to go into the last game, a decider, and will recover tomorrow rest of and will come again in two days time,” said Santner.