The 1987 Cricket World Cup was also called as the Reliance World Cup. The difference between the 1983 tournament and the 1987 tournament was that the number of overs allocated per innings was decreased from 60 to 50. Overall, 8 nations took part in this championship. In the final, Australia defeated England to win this trophy. Group A consisted of the following four teams – India, Australia, New Zealand and Zimbabwe. Each team played 6 group matches before a decision could be made regarding who has progressed to the semi-finals.
Group match against Zimbabwe
On 10th October 1987, Zimbabwe and New Zealand clashed against each other at Lal Bahadur Shastri Stadium in Hyderabad, India. New Zealand batted first and stockpiled 242 runs for 7 wickets in 50 overs. Martin Crowe hit 72 runs in 88 balls. Ali Shah took 2 wickets for 42 runs in 9 overs. In reply, Zimbabwe was all out for 239 in 49.4 overs, in spite of a superb effort by Dave Houghton who smashed 142 runs in 137 deliveries. Willie Watson took 2 wickets for 36 runs in 10 overs. Houghton was honored as the Man of the Match. New Zealand won this match by 3 runs.
Group match against India
New Zealand contested its second group match against India on 14th October 1987. The venue was M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore, India. The first batting team, India accumulated 252 runs for the loss of 7 wickets in 50 overs. The top scorer was Navjot Singh Sidhu who faced 71 balls and accrued 75 runs. Dipak Patel bowled 10 overs, conceded 36 runs and took 3 wickets. New Zealand lost 8 wickets while collecting 236 runs in the allocated 50 overs. Ken Rutherford resisted the Indian attack and scored 75 runs in 95 balls. Maninder Singh claimed 2 wickets in the 10 overs that he bowled while giving away 40 runs. India was victorious in this match by 16 runs.
Group match against Australia
New Zealand faced Australia on 18th October 1987 at Nehru Stadium, Indore. However, play was not possible on 18th October due to rain. The match was played on 19th October which was the reserve day. Additionally, the match was reduced to 30 overs per side due to rain. Australia impressively scored 199 runs for the loss of 4 wickets in 30 overs. The lion’s share was of David Boon who piled up 87 runs in 96 balls. Martin Snedden bowled 6 overs, conceded 36 runs and took 2 wickets. New Zealand also played extremely well and finally fell short of only 3 runs. In 30 overs, 9 wickets fell as New Zealand amassed 196 runs. Martin Crowe top scored with 58 in 48 deliveries. Steve Waugh took 2 wickets for 36 runs in 6 overs. The Man of the Match was David Boon. Australia won this match by 3 runs.
In the first 3 group matches, New Zealand won one match and lost 2 matches. If it desired to reach the semi-finals there was a need of a much enhanced performance in the remaining three group matches.