Gardner, Healy and Perry star as Australia shatter ODI record

Australia secured a world-record 22nd ODI win in a row with a powerful batting display in Mount Maunganui as half-centuries from Alyssa Healy, Ellyse Perry and Ash Gardner carried them to victory with more than 11 overs to spare.

The match was finished, and record secured, when Gardner pulled her third six which also brought up 41-ball half-century. Perry had anchored the innings after the early losses of Rachael Haynes and Meg Lanning briefly suggested New Zealand might find a way back into the game.

After a watchful start Healy, one of four players to appear in all 22 victories, took the chase by the scruff of the neck with her first major innings of the tour. However, at 136 for 4 the game wasn't entirely secure, but any notion of it being a problem was quickly dispelled as Gardner found her range, much as she had in the first T20I, and dominated an unbroken stand of 79 with Perry.

Earlier, New Zealand had given themselves a platform at 159 for 2 in the 38th over but the borderline stumping of Amelia Kerr set in motion a collapse of 8 for 53. Lauren Down, recalled to the team for the series, made a career-best 90 but the tempo at the top of the order left too much pressure on others to accelerate. Megan Schutt and Nicola Carey shared seven wickets between them.

Schutt had struck with her first delivery of the day when a wicked inswinger snaked between Hayley Jensen's bat and pad to take leg stump. It was slow going in the opening exchanges with Down taking 19 balls to get off the mark but a second-wicket stand of 69 with Amy Satterthwaite gave a foundation.

After Satterthwaite lofted to mid-on - Lanning kept fielders inside the ring as long as possible to build pressure - Down and Amelia Kerr added 90 in an 18-over stand that occasionally threatened to break free against a disciplined Australia attack.

Tayla Vlaeminck, whose first four overs cost just four, had 21 taken off a two-over comeback spell while legspinner Georgia Wareham went for a run-a-ball. Down, who had scored 75 runs in her previous 10 ODI innings, reached a maiden fifty off 90 balls.

However, the innings lost its way when Amelia Kerr was given out stumped off Schutt - it was a very tight decision by the third umpire and from the replays broadcast hard to say it was clearly out. With the innings having been built at a largely sedate pace, the remaining batters had little time to play themselves in and the pressure told. Katey Martin was run out from cover and Down's innings ended with a leading edge back to Carey whose wicket-to-wicket medium pace was tough to score off.

Maddy Green and Brooke Halliday both managed sixes to suggest they could provide the late power but fell shortly after each of their boundaries.

The first over of the chase from Jess Kerr cost 11 but she and Rosemary Mair tightened their lines and were rewarded when Haynes chased a drive in the seventh over. New Zealand were then buoyant when Lanning, who has a phenomenal record chasing and an even more so at this ground, edged Hannah Rowe to the keeper to leave Australia 37 for 2.

Healy had reached 25 off 38 balls when she upped the tempo with a six over midwicket after Perry had eased into her innings with consecutive boundaries off the returning Lea Tahuhu. Healy was dropped on 46 - by Tahuhu long-on - with the resulting six bringing up her fifty from 57 deliveries and another life came her way on 61 when Jensen missed a low return catch.

Next over, though, she got a leading edge back to Amelia Kerr and when Satterthwaite lured Beth Mooney into driving to cover there was just a glimmer for New Zealand if they could strike again.

But Australia's batting order oozes confidence and Gardner stamped her authority on the chase with two early boundaries against Amelia Kerr who she had also targeted in the first T20I. As her innings progressed she added off-side sixes against Mair and Tahuhu while Perry ticked over to a 73-ball fifty to show her batting is in fine fettle.

The job, though, for this tour is not yet finished with the Rose Bowl series - which Australia have held since 2000 - still up for grabs. It would be a brave person to suggest that task won't be completed in the second game by a side that has taken the one-day game to a new level.