New Zealand captain Mitchell Santner decided to bat on winning the toss on a new drop-in pitch at Sky Stadium.

Allen missed at times early in his innings but settled into his work and hit three sixes and two fours in an innings of only 17 balls.

He hit the first six of the match from the second over, bowled by Josh Hazlewood, then hit two sixes and 20 runs from the third over, bowled by Glenn Maxwell. Allen hit another off Pat Cummins in his first over which yielded 15 runs as New Zealand reached 50 from only 3.5 overs.

He was out inside inside the power play when New Zealand was on 62. After six overs it was 68-1.

The New Zealand run rate dropped a little after the power play as the Australian bowlers made good use off slower deliveries. But Conway and Ravindra stepped things up again and Conway reached his half century, his 10th in T20s and third against Australia, from 34 balls.

Ravindra followed him to a 50 from 29 balls amid a barrage of sixes. Ravindra was out to the last ball of the 16th over and Conway to the first ball of the next over.

Santner appeared to have produced a key play near the end when he bowled the 17th over, conceding only three runs and taking the wicket of Josh Inglis (20).

But David came to the crease, hit the ball out of the middle from the start and clinched the game for Australia.

“I thought we didn’t bowl too bad but the power they possess all the way down is the reason why they’re pretty good,” Santner said. “The only way to stop them is to take wickets and we didn’t really do that today.”