Bangladesh crash to 6-wicket loss

Bangladesh lost their way while batting and eventually conceded a 6-wicket defeat to New Zealand in the first one-day international of a three-match series yesterday.
Given a modest target of 202 on the short-boundaries of Eden Park, hosts' opener Jamie How set the platform with a patient 88 before Scott Styris ended the game with a towering six in the 43rd over.
New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori acknowledged his decision to send Bangladesh in to bat first appeared to have backfired when Mohammad Ashraful was in full flight, plundering the boundaries with 70 off 57 balls.
"I think the way Ashraful played took the game away from us for a certain period of time," Vettori said after the match.
"We wanted to win comprehensively, but we had to understand we're going through a bit of a rough patch," a relieved Vettori said.
New Zealand's fortunes turned on one wayward ball from Jacob Oram.
With Bangladesh racing along at five an over, Ashraful belted the Oram delivery straight to Peter Fulton at deep mid-wicket, triggering a sensational collapse.
Bangladesh were then 150 for four after 29 overs, and in the space of the next 20 more balls they added just four more runs and lost three wickets to be 154 for seven.
Mashrafe Bin Mortaza (17) and Abdur Razzaq (not out 22) added some life to the tail before the Bangladesh innings ended at 201 in the 43rd over.
Despite New Zealand's batting shortfalls in recent months they were never in trouble on the ideal batting wicket.
How and Brendon McCullum started with a 90-run opening partnership before a lack of concentration by McCullum (40) saw him lob a full toss straight back to Farhad Reza.
The second game in the series will be played in Napier on Friday with the third and final ODI in Queenstown on New Year's Eve ahead of two Test matches.