Spinners give South Island 15-run win

South Island 139 for 8 (Broom 34, Hira 3-30) beat North Island 124 for 8 (Franklin 45, Henry 2-25, McMillan 2-29) by 15 runs
Scorecard

Two wickets apiece from Matt Henry and James McMillan, and economical bowling from the South Island spinners gave them a 15-run win against North Island in the Georgie Pie Super Smash match in Hamilton.

Some renowned names from New Zealand - international and domestic - were divided into two teams which kick-started the domestic T20 competition. North Island were chasing 140 but fell short as they lost wickets are regular intervals.

Put in to bat, South Island got a strong opening stand of 41 within five overs. The next two batsmen, Dean Brownlie (15) and Peter Fulton (10) got starts but failed to capitalise on them. Opener Neil Broom top-scored with a 29-ball 34 before he was bowled by Daniel Vettori in the 10th over. Two overs later, James Franklin was part of a relay catch at the long-off boundary when he caught the ball and threw it back just in time while falling over, and the catch was completed by Colin de Grandhomme easily to dismiss Nathan McCullum. They scored only 57 runs in the last nine overs as Ronnie Hira took 3 for 30 and Vettori finished with 2 for 14. Adam Milne also picked up two wickets. Milne had slipped in his delivery stride during the fifth over, and even though the fall looked dangerous, he completed his four overs.

The North Island openers - Martin Guptill and Anton Devcich - fell for 1 and 0, respectively. James Franklin built two steady partnerships from there - of 29 with Colin Munro (24) and 39 with de Grandhomme (23). They needed 52 from 39 but Franklin did not get much support from the lower order. When he fell for 45 after four fours and a six, the equation of 32 off 15 proved to be too steep. Spinners McCullum and Nick Beard gave 22 runs for two wickets together in five overs.