WELLINGTON, New Zealand, Feb. 17 (UPI) -- Skipper Ricky Ponting powered Australia to a 44-run win over New Zealand Thursday in the first international Twenty20 match.
Ponting's 55-ball 98 included five sixes and eight fours and helped his team to 214 for five. In reply, New Zealand was all out for 170. Some 29,000 people watched the game in Wellington, New Zealand, the BBC reported.
Aussie fast bowler Michael Kasprowicz took four wickets and conceded 29 runs in his four hours. New Zealand's Scott Styris scored a futile 66 from 38 balls.
Australian pace man Glenn McGrath jokingly threatened to bowl an underarm delivery on the last ball of the game, a reference to the incident involving Australian Trevor Chappell in a game against New Zealand in the 1980/81 World Series Cup.
Ponting said the new format, first introduced in English county cricket, could have a future.
"There's still a lot of issues to be worked through with how we're going to fit it into the international program, but tonight was certainly a good start," he said.
Twenty20 is a faster version of the one-day game. Each inning lasts no more than 75 minutes and there are greater field restrictions in the first six overs. No balls are penalized with a free hit.
