Mark Craig has put himself in contention for the opening Test against the West Indies as his four wickets helped the Black Caps comfortably beat a Jamaican XI by 123 runs today.
The Otago Volts off-spinner snatched three wickets in one over and was on a hat-trick at one point as Jamaica collapsed in their second innings to be all out for 90 chasing 214 runs for victory on the final day of the three day warm-up match in Trelawny.
The 27-year-old finished with figures of four wickets for eight runs from his four overs, with a change to going round the wicket seeming to do the trick on the turning pitch.
Black Caps Mike Hesson said while Craig had impressed on a turning surface, Boult and Southee had set the tone with the new ball.
The pace duo had the locals reeling at 3-3 straight after lunch with an lbw wicket each after Boult had the opener caught at extra cover.
Then enter Craig who along with fellow spinner Kane Williamson ripped through the rest of the Jamaican batsmen before Neil Wagner wrapped up the innings and the victory grabbing the last wicket not long after tea.
Earlier in the day, Ross Taylor continued his rich vein of form at home this summer with a half century despite the challenging conditions. He finished on 55 not out, including seven fours, to take his side to 132-9 declared at lunch.
Hesson said Taylor showed his skill and experience in adapting to the conditions and capitalising on a slightly better pitch today. He said generally the surfaces were not of good enough quality for our batsmen to gain real benefit from.
Today's match was played on a new strip after the pitch used for the first two days was declared dangerous by the umpires. But the new strip was too wet to start on time at 10am today and play was finally underway 40 minutes later with plenty of tennis ball bounce in the wicket.
After the Black Caps secured the victory they kept bowling until the 5pm scheduled finish as further bowling practice.
Tomorrow the Black Caps head to Kingston for the first Test starting on Monday (NZT).
Black Caps: 132-9 decl(Ross Taylor 55*)203-9 decl(Kane Williamson 47, BJ Watling 30, Jimmy Neesham 28*)
Jamaican XI: 90(Mark Craig 4-
and122-9 decl(Ish Sodhi 5-35, Trent Boult 2-
Result:Black Caps win by 123 runs