New Zealand beat India by seven wickets in the fifth and final T20I at Seddon Park in Hamilton on Sunday, November 1, chasing down a 192-run target in 18 overs behind Tim Seifert’s 93 and Glenn Phillips’ unbeaten 65. Despite dropping the final two games of the India vs New Zealand tour leg, India took the five-match series trophy 3-2 after winning the opening three contests.
According to The Indian Express scorecard, New Zealand finished on 195 for 3 in 18.0 overs after holding India to 191 for 8 in 20 overs. Seifert hit 11 fours and five sixes in his 50-ball knock, while Phillips struck 65 not out off 38 deliveries to push his five-match series total to 341 runs, setting a new record for the most runs by any batter in a bilateral T20I series.
Dropped catch turns the Hamilton chase
New Zealand’s reply started slowly after Bhuvneshwar Kumar bowled a tight opening over and Arshdeep Singh (1 for 40 in four overs) dismissed Finn Allen for 2 via a top edge caught by Ishan Kishan at 9 for 1 in the second over. The turning point came at 3.2 overs when Seifert, struggling on 13 off 15 balls, sliced a catch to deep point that Naman Dhir dropped, leaving New Zealand at 17 for 1 instead of 17 for 2.
Seifert punished the error immediately, as New Zealand scored 41 runs with five sixes across the final 15 balls of the powerplay, including two straight sixes off Bhuvneshwar that landed in the same spot in the camera gallery. Daryl Mitchell joined Seifert for a 73-run second-wicket stand before Abhishek Sharma took a diving catch forward at long-off to give spinner Varun Chakravarthy (1 for 45 in four overs) Mitchell’s wicket at 82 for 2 in 8.3 overs.
Needing 111 runs off 69 balls, New Zealand took 25 runs across the next two overs bowled by part-timers Nitish Kumar Reddy and Abhishek. Seifert hit consecutive fours off Arshdeep at the end of the 12th over, and Chakravarthy conceded 31 runs across his final two overs. Reddy eventually bowled Seifert via an inside edge at 15.3 overs, leaving the opener seven runs short of a maiden T20I century, before Phillips closed out the chase on the final ball of the 18th over.
Adam Milne and New Zealand quicks restrict India
Earlier, after New Zealand captain Mitchell Santner won the toss and opted to bowl, pace bowler Adam Milne struck twice in the powerplay to put India in early trouble at 19 for 2 in 3.1 overs. Abhishek miscued his first ball from Milne to Mitchell at mid-on to fall for 1 off 2 balls, and Sanju Samson (4) followed with a leading edge after Jacob Duffy generated early seam movement.
Ishan Kishan and India captain Shreyas Iyer rebuilt the innings by adding 93 runs in seven overs to lift India to 112 for 2 in 10.1 overs. Targeting the spinners, the pair took 61 runs from overs seven through 10, a stretch that included a Michael Bracewell over going for 27 runs after Blair Tickner dropped Iyer, as well as a boundary effort by Allen at long-on where half a frame separated Kishan from being caught rather than hitting a six.
As detailed in ESPNcricinfo’s match report, New Zealand’s tall fast bowlers slowed the scoring during the back half by banging the ball into the pitch for extra bounce. Tickner (2 for 38 in four overs) made up for his earlier drop by getting extra bounce to dismiss Kishan for 61 off 32 balls (five fours, five sixes), caught by Nathan Smith on the boundary. Smith (2 for 28 in three overs) then used the short ball to draw a top edge from Iyer, who fell for 50 off 23 balls (three fours, four sixes) caught by Seifert.
In his next over, Smith had Tilak Varma caught off a no-ball, conceded just one run off the resulting free hit, and then dismissed Varma caught and bowled for 6 off 8 balls with another short delivery. Dhir added 33 off 23 balls (four fours, one six) after being dropped by Milne in the 16th over before falling to Tickner. Milne returned at the death to dismiss Reddy (22 off 17) and Bhuvneshwar (6 off 4) in the 20th over, finishing with figures of 4 for 19 in four overs.
IND vs NZ T20I records and ODI schedule
Despite New Zealand’s victory in Hamilton and their 87-run win in the fourth T20I at Eden Park (where the hosts posted 259 for 7), India’s three opening wins secured the series 3-2. During his knock of 33, Dhir hit India’s 400th six across 40 T20I matches in 2026, making India the first team to reach 400 T20I sixes in a calendar year, with 142 of those sixes coming against New Zealand, Livemint reported.
New Zealand’s 18-over pursuit of 192 set a new mark for the fastest successful chase of a 190-plus target against India in T20Is measured by overs, according to Outlook India. DNA India noted that the result also marked the first time in 17 years that India lost consecutive bilateral T20I matches against New Zealand. The two teams now travel to Auckland to open their One-Day International (ODI) series on Wednesday, November 4.