Rain shortened Day 1 and Day 2. On Day 3 only 40 minutes of cricket was played and at 17:15 play was officially called off. The final day ended at 17:00 due to bad light.
The game started late because of rain and was reduced to 24 overs by the Duckworth-Lewis method. Then at 7:30 pm it was called off completely due to rain with only one more over needed to constitute a game. Under the Duckworth-Lewis method, New Zealand required just 7 runs to win if the game had gone one more over.
The fourth ODI was marred with controversy. Paul Collingwood appealed a controversial run out of Grant Elliott after Elliott had collided with Ryan Sidebottom and injured himself. While this action initially drew criticism from the New Zealand dressing room, Daniel Vettori admitted during the post-game press conference that the Black Caps' reaction was "a little bit over the top"[1] Collingwood also admitted that he probably made the wrong decision in not withdrawing the appeal. Later, the ICC banned Collingwood for four ODI matches due to England's slow over rate, with England having bowled only 47 overs in the required time. The ICC also fined the rest of the English team 15% of their match fee.[2]Kevin Pietersen was called upon to take over as captain for the final game.[3]
New Zealand's 290 run win over Ireland is a new world record for the biggest margin of victory by runs. The previous world record was India's 257 run drubbing of Bermuda in the 2007 Cricket World Cup.