Paul Collingwood continued his dismal ICC World Twenty20 campaign as England stuttered to another defeat and the possibility of an early exit from the tournament.
England's challenge has faltered while he has been forced to apologise for visiting a lap dancing bar in the early hours of the morning only a day before today's crunch five-run defeat to New Zealand.
The challenge fell away after an encouraging start with New Zealand recovering from 31 for four to reach 164 for nine and then restrict England to 159 for eight in reply after they had reached 72 for one at the halfway stage.
‘We just seem to be teasing ourselves all the time,’ said Collingwood.
‘We're getting so close to knock the runs off and then we lose an important wicket and that partnership we need at a vital time we've just not been able to get.
‘Whether that's experience or not I don't know, but it's a game that puts you under immense pressure, you have to go in and score from ball one and we just weren't up to it.’
England's hopes of victory were high after winning the toss and deciding to exploit early morning conditions, which they executed superbly to claim four wickets inside the first six overs of fielding restrictions.
But their inability to make further inroads cost them with Scott Styris and Craig McMillan forging a crucial 60-run stand off only 42 balls to lay the platform for a competitive total.
Styris hit Dimitri Mascarenhas for three successive sixes and helped add 44 in only three overs, which allowed New Zealand to add 104 from the second half of their innings.
Perhaps aware the game might be slipping away, Collingwood also lost his composure as captain and firstly allowed himself to be over-ruled by Kevin Pietersen over a field change and then miscalculated the overs which resulted in Andrew Flintoff, England's best bowler, missing out on one of his four overs.
At least Collingwood's day was lightened by England finally finding a successful opening partnership, albeit one which was forced on them with Vikram Solanki taking over as emergency wicketkeeper and opener after Matt Prior was ruled out with a broken right thumb.
Solanki's partnership with Darren Maddy, recalled after missing the South Africa defeat, put England into a strong position and at the halfway stage the game was theirs to lose with nine wickets in hand and 93 runs required for victory.
Just as England began to play with some authority, however, Maddy became the first of three run-out victims after hitting a superb 50 off 31 balls to spark the slow descent to defeat.
Collingwood, who suffered a duck against South Africa, had reached just three this time when he drove Chris Martin to extra cover three overs later to spark a slump of three wickets in nine balls.
Pietersen, returning to the ground where he began his first-class career with Natal, was hoping to mark the occasion with a match-winning innings but instead attempted a reverse sweep off the second ball of Daniel Vettori's last over and was bowled.
Two balls later Flintoff was run out following a mix-up with Owais Shah and the match had swung firmly in New Zealand's favour with England needing 61 off only 6.2 overs.
‘We've seen before that he's played that shot and it's come off,’ claimed Collingwood.
‘He's obviously trying to hit with the wind and I'm sure he was trying to hit it for six.
‘It was a really crucial period losing Freddie to the run-out and myself, three big players with experienced heads who could have perhaps taken us over the line.’
Even with that setback England could have still snatched victory with Shah and Luke Wright, dropped from the top three after three successive failures, adding 42 to leave a simple equation of 20 runs off the final two overs with five wickets in hand.
The 19th over of the innings proved decisive, however, with Shah being run out by Vettori attempting a risky second run, Mascarenhas being caught in the deep next ball and Wright falling three balls later for an encouraging 24 off 17 balls.
Needing 16 off the last over, the task was too great for Chris Schofield and Stuart Broad to leave England - and Collingwood in particular - counting the cost of another defeat.
