Australia coach Matthew Mott says it was "groundhog day" after another disappointing total in Wellington
Stars own worst enemy with bat: Mott
The Commonwealth Bank Southern Stars were "their own worst enemy" with the bat in their Twenty20 series loss to New Zealand, coach Matthew Mott believes.
Mott described the Southern Stars' performance with the bat on Tuesday as "Groundhog Day", after they lost 3-3 in a top-order collapse before a fighting fifty from Ellyse Perry pushed them to 6-116, a target chased down by the White Ferns in the final over with five wickets to spare.
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It consigned Australia to their sixth defeat from their last eight T20Is and their third consecutive T20 series loss, a worrying trend for Mott and his team ahead of next month's World T20 in India, where the Southern Stars are aiming to win an unprecedented fourth straight title.
"I'm really disappointed. It just seems a little like Groundhog Day with the batting," Mott said after the game.
"We were our own worst enemy with the bat today and cost ourselves big time. We need to turn it around pretty quickly."
After a world record winning run of 16 T20Is in a row between March 2014 and August 2015, the Southern Stars have since lost series to England, India and now New Zealand in the last seven months.
In all eight of those matches, Australia have lost the toss and been sent in to bat.
Against England during last year's Ashes, they posted scores of 8-122, 7-107 and 111 in three matches – managing to defend the second to regain the Women's Ashes on the points-based system that had been introduced.
On home turf against India last month they fared better with the bat, scoring 5-140, 8-125 (18 overs) and 5-136, but only managed a successful defence in the third match in Sydney, with the series already lost.
In two matches against New Zealand they have scored 7-113 and 6-116, and Mott said he was disappointed with the output from his star-studded batting line-up.
"We just haven’t clicked as a unit for a long time in T20s and it's something we need to rectify pretty quickly, because it's not acceptable.
"The position we got into at 3-13 in the first Power Play, you're not going to win too many games from that position.
"We had a little fightback and Perry batted really well (scoring fifty) to give us a total we almost defended, but it was still well short of what we needed.
"You're not going to win too many games with 116 on the board."
Australia have tried a series of different batting line-ups this summer, with Tuesday's combination of Elyse Villani and captain Meg Lanning at the top of the order their fourth opening pair in five matches.
Mott has previously called for his batters to be fearless, setting 140 as a benchmark total for T20 matches. Now, the Australia coach says he will turn to his players to provide some answers.
"I think I will open it up to the group a little bit,” he said. “We've been saying the same things for a little while now but it hasn't translated onto the field yet.
"So I'll ask the playing group where we are headed and what we need to do to rectify things.
"It's time for them to take a bit of ownership, particularly with the bat, and get out there and play our brand of cricket.
"We've been doing that well in one-day cricket and it shouldn’t be that hard to translate it to the T20 format but it's something we've struggled with for a little while."
The final T20, to be played in New Plymouth on Friday, March 4 (2pm AEDT), will be streamed live on cricket.com.au and via the Cricket Australia LIVE App.