White Ferns go down to Australia at women’s Twenty20 World Cup

Eden Carson of New Zealand is bowled out by Megan Schutt of Australia during the ICC Women's T20 World Cup. Photo / Getty Images

The White Ferns have been handed another comprehensive defeat by Australia in their second outing at the Twenty20 Cricket World Cup in the United Arab Emirates.

Chasing 149 for victory, New Zealand were bowled out for 88 with four balls remaining for a 60-run defeat - their sixth straight loss to Australia.

After opening the tournament with a 58-run win over India, New Zealand will likely need victories in their remaining games against Sri Lanka and Pakistan to confirm a semifinal spot.

Australia made 148 for eight with their top order doing most of the damage with top three Beth Moody (40 off 32), Alyssa Healy (26 off 20) and Ellyse Perry (30 off 24) ensuring a solid start. But Amelia Kerr (4-26) stemmed the flow of runs with regular wickets, helped by Brooke Halliday (2-16) to keep Australia under 150.

But that would prove to be more than enough.

In the chase, Kerr and Suzie Bates put on 47 for the second wicket which looked to give the White Ferns a chance at 54-1 at the midway mark before they lost nine wickets for 34 runs.

Australia’s Megan Schutt finished with 3-3 from 3.2 overs including 18 dot balls. New Zealand haven’t beaten Australia since March 2021 while this was their fourth straight World Cup defeat to Australia.

“We needed to have a good start and we let the run rate creep up too much. By the ten over mark it was up over 10-an-over,” New Zealand captain Sophie Devine said.

“At the halfway mark we thought the wicket played better than we thought it would. But we got ourselves into a bit of a hole. When we were bowling we strayed a little too far from the stumps and that’s where we had been good against India.

“In the field we were a little sloppy. With the bat we need to play some more courageous shots. We’ve still got two games to go. We don’t want to get too carried away with run rate. Sri Lanka is our next big game.”