Sarwan kept his composure to see West Indies to victory

Ramnaresh Sarwan made an unbeaten 67 to steer West Indies to an exciting five-wicket win against New Zealand in their day-night game in Christchurch.

Sarwan hit the winning run off the penultimate ball to finish on 67 in a match reduced to 28 overs per side.

New Zealand totalled 152-8 in their innings which was interrupted for four hours by rain and hail.

But Sarwan and Denesh Ramdin shared a stand of 48 in 5.2 overs to see West Indies to their revised target of 158.

"It's never over till it's over in these short forms of the game and they did really well to take us home," captain Chris Gayle commented.

The match eventually ended at 1030pm and the win gave the tourists a 1-0 lead in the one-day series with three to play, the opening game in Queenstown having been abandoned because of bad weather.

After Gayle was bowled by opposite number Daniel Vettori's quicker ball for 36, it looked for a time as if West Indies would fall short in their run chase.

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They needed to score 78 off the final 10 overs and only managed 14 in the final two-over powerplay.

But Sarwan hit a straight six off seamer Kyle Mills and off-spinner Jeetan Patel, who was struggling to grip the ball because of dew on the outfield, conceded 14 from the penultimate over as Ramdin struck two successive fours.

Ramdin (28) took two of the first ball of the final over, bowled by Tim Southee, but two dot balls increased the tension before Sarwan wrapped the game up for West Indies.

Fast bowler Fidel Edwards earlier took 3-26 in the New Zealand innings, which was interrupted by the weather in the seventh over, with Jesse Ryder, who hit three sixes in his 32, and Grant Elliott (30 not out) the home side's main contributors.

"In the end we just didn't score enough runs," said Vettori.

"We bowled and fielded exceptionally, but we didn't have quite enough runs to defend."

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