Ahmedabad, March 4: New Zealand beat Zimbabwe by 10 wickets at the Sardar Patel Stadium, Motera, to register their second win in three matches at the ICC World Cup 2011.

Chasing 163 to win, openers Martin Guptill (86*) and Brendon McCullum (76*) remained unbeaten to take NZ to easy victory. The Zimbabwe bowlers, facing the task of defending a below par score, were unable to make any dents in the Black Caps’ batting line-up.

Earlier, after electing to bat first on a good batting track, Zimbabwe lost too many wickets early on, failing to take advantage of the conditions.

The Kiwi bowlers kept a tight hold on the Zimbabwe batsmen with Tim Southee picking three wickets and skipper Daniel Vettori and Kyle Mills taking two wickets each.

After Opener Charles Coventry (2 runs) was run out in the second over with just two runs on the board, Tatenda Taibu (8 runs) was sent back by Tim Southee. Barring Brendon Taylor (44 runs) the rest of the top and middle order failed to come good. The tail tried to salvage some pride for Zimbabwe with Prosper Utseya scoring 36 runs and Graeme Creamer making 22 runs. Nevertheless, the Zimbabwe innings was wrapped up in 46.2 overs with just 162 runs on the board.

New Zealand will now play Group A table-toppers Pakistan in Sri Lanka in their next World Cup encounter.

Man-of-the-Match: Martin Guptill for his brilliant unbeaten knock of 86 off 108 balls

Brief scores:New Zealand 166/0 in 33.3 overs (Martin Guptill 86*, Brendon McCullum 76*) beat Zimbabwe 162 all out in 46.2 overs (Brendon Taylor 44, Tim Southee 3/29, Daniel Vettori 2/25) by 10 wickets.