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Windies crumble late on in thrilling tie

Zimbabwe take three wickets in the final three balls of the match to secure a tie against the West Indies

Zimbabwe have taken three wickets in the final over to secure a thrilling tie against the West Indies in their one-day international in Bulawayo.

Chasing 258 to win, a six from West Indies star Carlos Brathwaite from the final ball of the penultimate over left the visitors needing just four runs to win from the last six balls and with five wickets in hand.

But with the equation reduced to three runs required from five deliveries, the wheels started to fall off, starting with Brathwaite's dismissal, caught at long on trying to finish the match with another six.

A superb piece of work from bowler Donald Tiripano made it two wickets in two balls, the Zimbabwean athletically getting a fingertip to a straight drive from Jason Holder, which deflected onto the stumps to run out non-striker Ashley Nurse.

After Holder managed a leg bye from the fourth ball of the over, Jonathan Carter skied one into the deep, a dropped catch and the resulting single bringing scores level with one ball remaining.

Image Id: FB789F8BBC7F45BEBE6560E325AE337B Image Caption: Zimbabwe players and staff react to the thrilling finish // Getty

Holder only needed a single off the final delivery, but could not make contact and Carter was run out by a direct hit from wicketkeeper Peter Moor to set off wild scenes at the Queens Sports Club.

"We should have won the game, but that’s cricket," Holder said.

"It’s important for the guys to learn from this occasion. As a young team we just need to think a bit more when we get into these tight positions."

Earlier, Shai Hope hit his maiden one-day international century, posting 101 for the Windies in just his second ODI.

The game was set up by two dominant partnerships for the third wicket, with Craig Ervine and Sikandar Raza Butt putting on 144 for Zimbabwe before Hope and Kraigg Brathwaite’s 162-run stand for the West Indies.

With Ervine scoring 92 and Raza hitting 77, Zimbabwe went into the final 12 overs of their innings on 2-188, with their eye on a winning total.

Image Id: 2F01F3F7EDD54A8991BFE501BED2FFC9 Image Caption: Graeme Cremer and Craig Ervine celebrate a wicket // Getty

Instead the innings unravelled with Raza’s dismissal, as the hosts lost eight for 69 in the remaining overs to be bowled out from the final ball of the innings.

Carlos Brathwaite picked up the key wicket of Raza as well as two more late dismissals to finish with figures of 4-48.

The West Indies looked in control throughout their chase, with Kraigg Brathwaite scoring 78 and Hope taking advantage of being dropped on 69 and 84, both times by Raza off the bowling of Graeme Cremer.

The tourists reached the end of the 44th over on 2-217, but when Hope was caught behind off the bowling of Chris Mpofu, Zimbabwe were able to squeeze the new batsmen on a two-paced pitch.

“We made some mistakes and it could have gone our way, but credit to the guys for the way they fought and secured the tie,” said Cremer.

“We were a bit sloppy in the field, we probably gave away 20 runs and dropped a couple of catches, but we’ll take the positives from this game into the final two matches.”

Zimbabwe take on Sri Lanka on Monday in the next game of the series.

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