Collingwood lauds duo

Paul Collingwood walks off in the rain © Getty Images

Buy this photo

Captain Paul Collingwood was thankful to Luke Wright and Dimitri Mascarenhas for boosting England's total in the final one-day international against New Zealand.

New Zealand eventually earned a four-wicket victory under the Duckworth-Lewis method in Christchurch to seal the series 3-1 but Wright and Mascarenhas added 65 in the final five overs of England's score of 242 for seven after seamer Kyle Mills had claimed 4-36.

But a stunning opening stand of 103 off 68 balls between Brendon McCullum and Jesse Ryder - after they had both been dropped - effectively settled the outcome until England tore through the middle order with left-arm seamer Ryan Sidebottom claiming two wickets with successive balls.

Collingwood said: "The boys at the back end really put us into a good position and I think it was a target that was defendable until the two openers came out and performed the way they can and put us under pressure.

"They pretty much took the game away from us. I keep saying that we're very good at fighting back but we need to learn how to get our noses in front a bit more often.

"You've got to have a perfect fielding and bowling performance when you've got a target on the board like that. We had a few chances out there that we didn't take and they've got to be taken at this level, especially when they've got two batsmen like that."

Delighted New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori was elated at the series triumph, particularly after his side were labelled the worst in 40 years after losing both Twenty20 matches against England prior to the start of the series.

"The pressure that was on us leading into the series, there was a lot of talk about the quality of our team and I think we probably refuted a lot of those comments," said Vettori.

"It shows we have some good players and some guys coming through. We've lost a lot of experience in the last few years but every team does that and we've got some good players there and we're hoping these guys can carry on for a long time."