IRELAND: '˜Small wins' the aim for captain Laura Delany against New Zealand

New Zealand posted a world record total in the first match and become the first side to score more than 400 in consecutive ODIs to move clear by 2-0 with a 306-run success before Wednesday’s final meeting at Clontarf.

“Playing against the fourth best side in the world was always going to be a tricky time for us,” said Delany. “But coming back from Friday’s result, we came out today and took 10 wickets, which was a huge bonus.

“We’ve got a young bowling attack – four out of our five main bowlers are 17 or younger - so we concentrated today on the small wins.

“Getting the ball in a certain area, bowling our stock balls well. To be honest we still bowled far too many bad balls and against a side like this they just put it away.

“Over coming days we’ll look at a few things – particularly looking at how we can create more wicket-taking opportunities.

“Against a quality side, this is all a learning curve.”

Lara Maritz claimed career-best figures of 4-58.

“I’m really happy for Lara (Maritz) taking four wickets today,” said Delany. “We started with a plan, it didn’t work at the beginning, so we changed things up and she executed the new plan brilliantly.

“It was a tough day on Friday for her, but she came back well and I’m delighted.

“She’s only 17 years of age and to bowl like that against a quality opposition like New Zealand, hats off to her today.”