Australia Women beat New Zealand Women by two wickets in the first T20I of a three-match series at North Sydney Oval on October 18, needing all the way to the final over to get past a target set up by a career-best innings from New Zealand's Georgia Plimmer.
Sent in to bat, New Zealand posted a competitive 162 for 2 in 20 overs, built on an unbeaten 85 off 68 balls from Plimmer — the best score of her T20I career — in a stand with Maddy Green, who finished unbeaten on 56. It gave the tourists a total that looked beyond par on a ground more often associated with Ellyse Perry's batting feats in the longer format.
Australia's chase never quite settled. Ellyse Perry's 52 off 30 balls and Beth Mooney's 38 kept the hosts in touch through the middle overs, but New Zealand's bowling — led by Jess Kerr's 3 for 25 — pulled the required rate back up, and Australia slipped to 145 for 7 with the finish still very much in the balance. Captain Sophie Molineux fell attempting a sweep with only a handful of runs still needed, before Australia scrambled home at 165 for 8 in 18.5 overs, winning with seven balls in hand.
This was a tighter contest than the 1-0 series lead suggests. New Zealand, who have struggled for results against Australia in this format in recent years, will take real encouragement from Plimmer's innings and from pushing the hosts to the last over on their own ground. For Australia, getting over the line while carrying Molineux through the match as she manages a hip issue, and with the XI still finding its combinations this early in the summer, is a result worth more than the margin implies.
Plimmer's 85 not out is the standout individual performance of the series so far and arrives at a good time for a player New Zealand have been building their batting order around. An innings of that length and control against a full-strength Australian attack, at a venue where New Zealand have historically found runs hard to come by, is the kind of marker that should worry the hosts heading into the rest of the series.
The series continues at the same venue, with the second T20I at North Sydney Oval on October 20 and the decider on October 22. Both sides have a short turnaround to make changes, with Australia likely to look at tightening a bowling unit that conceded 162, and New Zealand needing a similar finish with the bat to turn Plimmer's form into a series-levelling win.
Live scores from the remaining T20Is are available on SportGod's live matches page, with data-backed match forecasts on SportGod's predictions page and more women's cricket coverage, including the ongoing India Women-Zimbabwe Women series in Raipur, on the SportGod blog.
Scorecard details in this article are verified against same-day and freshly re-checked reporting as of October 18, 2026.
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