Australia seal a clean sweep

Australia 6 for 205 (Edwards 45*, Goszko 40) beat New Zealand 8 for 204 (McGlashan 45, Pike 4-23) by four wickets
Scorecard

A 71-run undefeated stand for the seventh wicket between Sarah Edwards and Julie Hayes sealed a four-wicket wicket win for Australia as they wrapped up the series against New Zealand 5-0. New Zealand fought back well in the last match in Brisbane - after posting just 204, they reduced Australia to 134 for 6 before Edwards and Hayes snatched the game away.

The target wasn't a stiff one, but the Australians got into early trouble, losing both their openers with only 18 on the board. Michelle Goszko and Lisa Sthalekar, the captain, put the run-chase back on track with a 53-run stand for the third wicket, but when Sthalekar was dismissed for 17, the innings slumped again as three more wickets went down quickly.

Edwards, playing in only her second one-day international more than a year after making her debut, found an able partner in the experienced Hayes, and the two turned the game around completely, scoring the remaining runs in less than ten overs. Edwards's unbeaten 45 came off just 48 balls, while Hayes scored a run-a-ball 36 to ensure that the win was achieved quite comfortably in the end, with 14 deliveries to spare.

New Zealand needed a significant seventh-wicket stand to boost their innings too, after they slumped to 136 for 6. Kirsten Pike, a right-arm medium-fast bowler, doubled her tally of ODI wickets with an incisive ten-over spell of 4 for 23 as New Zealand lost their way after a 36-run opening stand. Six wickets went down for 100 runs before Nicola Browne (26) and Helen Watson (39) propped them up with a 65-run stand. The partnership lifted New Zealand to 204, and while that seemed a challenging total, Australia had the depth in their batting line-up to ensure a clean sweep.