New Zealand White Ferns captain Suzie Bates has guided the tourists to a six-wicket victory over the Commonwealth Bank Southern Stars in the fourth T20 INTL at Sydney Olympic Park.
Chasing 93 for victory off 18 overs after rain delayed the start of the match, Bates hit an unbeaten 40 off 43 balls to lead her side to a morale boosting win with five balls remaining.
Young-gun Katie Perkins hit the winning runs with a boundary off the first ball of the final over as the Kiwis finished 4-95 in reply to the hosts' total of 7-92.
Despite the loss, the Southern Stars lead the best-of-five series 3-1 heading into the final match at the MCG on Friday.
Southern Stars skipper Jodie Fields said her side's slow start with the bat and three dropped catches in the field cost them any chance of victory.
"It was just a disappointing batting performance, you can't be 4-17 and score 92 and expect to win the game so it's a little bit disappointing today," Fields said.
"We felt like we had enough runs, even though we didn't really score enough, but it just wasn't enough today."
"Fielding is one of our strengths and we dropped three really important catches which could have changed the match, but well done to Suzie, she batted really well today."
Bates said of her side's breakthrough victory: "Obviously it was really important for us to get a win in this series and or bowlers started the day off really well for us so it was good to finally follow up with some batting."
"It's nice with all the work we've done between the losses to finally get a performance like that."
The White Ferns made a fast start as Bates and opening partner Sara McGlashan took the attack up to the Southern Stars bowlers.
Both openers found the boundary in the early overs before McGlashan cleared the fence with a straight six off Erin Osborne (0-19) in the fourth over.
Sarah Coyte (1-11) made the opening breakthrough when she clean bowled the dangerous McGlashan for 18 with the first delivery of her first spell.
The dangerous Amy Satterthwaite (six) was next to go, caught behind by Fields off Lisa Sthalekar (2-19).
Sthalekar gave the hosts more hope when she had Maddy Green stumped for six, and when Elizabeth Perry (six) was run out in the penultimate over there were some nervous moments for the Kiwis.
But a Bates boundary over cow corner swung momentum back in favour of the visitors to all but ensure victory.
Earlier, rain delayed the start of the match and there was a deluge of Southern Stars wickets when play got underway.
Meg Lanning (one), Jess Cameron (zero), Coyte (one) and Jess Jonassen (zero) all fell in the first six overs as the hosts slumped to 4-17.
Things went from bad to worse when the in-form Leah Poulton (19) became Kate Broadmore's (3-9) third victim of the innings.
That brought Sthalekar to the crease and the all-rounder joined skipper Jodie Fields in a 43-run partnership before Sthalekar holed out in the deep off Amy Satterthwaite (1-19).
Fields (37 not out off 40) continued the rescue mission, smashing Satterthwaite for six behind square in the final over to help the hosts to a competitive total.
