Windies asked to bat first as third test gets underway

HAMILTON, New Zealand, CMC-New Zealand won the toss and have asked West Indies to bat on the first day of the third and final test at Seddon Park Hamilton here yesterday.

New Zeland have named an unchanged team while West Indies have included two specialist spinners,  Sunil Narine and Veerasammy Permaul, the former replacing Shane Shillingford while the latter came in for Shannon Gabriel.

There was a third change for West Indies, a forced one, with Darren Bravo ruled out after taking a hit the day before in the nets.

Bravo’s absence also forced a rearranging of the batting order with Kraigg Brathwaite drafted in to open, with Kirk Edwards dropping to No 3.

New Zealand 1 Hamish Rutherford, 2 Peter Fulton, 3 Kane Williamson, 4 Ross Taylor, 5 Brendon McCullum (capt), 6 Corey Anderson, 7 BJ Watling (wk), 8 Ish Sodhi, 9 Tim Southee, 10 Neil Wagner, 11 Trent Boult

West Indies 1 Kieran Powell, 2 Kraigg Brathwaite, 3 Kirk Edwards, 4 Marlon Samuels, 5 Shivnarine Chanderpaul, 6 Narsingh Deonarine, 7 Denesh Ramdin (wk), 8 Darren Sammy (capt), 9 Veerasammy Permaul, 10 Sunil Narine, 11 Tino Best.