Andrew Balbirnie admitted that New Zealand taught them a lesson as they completed a second successive series whitewash against Ireland, winning the final T20 international at Stormont by six wickets.

Even Ireland’s best ever T20 total at Stormont did not trouble this powerful Black Caps side as they chased down their target of 175 with an over to spare.

Player of the match Glenn Phillips was dropped off successive balls on 13 and 15 which may have changed the momentum of the game and the fact he was still there at the finish, 56 not out, underlined the true cost of those misses.

But the depth of batting and big hitting in this New Zealand side is seemingly never-ending. After Daryl Mitchell, the scourge of England in the recent Test series, was out with a strike rate of 150, 28 runs from the finish line, Jimmy Neesham came in and blasted 23 off six balls (two fours and two sixes) to finish the match in a hurry.

Michael Bracewell and Mitchell Santner were not even required.

“We knew we had a pretty decent score, albeit on the best wicket of the week,” said Balbinie in his post-match interview, “but that was a pretty impressive chase and a lesson in how to chase a total.

"We had a good start to our innings and a superb finish but it’s another game we have lost and we have got to look at ourselves and make improvements for the next series. But you have to take your hats off to the Black Caps the way they have carried themselves on and off the field and over the last two weeks it’s been a bit of a lesson to us in how to go about it.”

Ireland had given themselves a mission impossible task in the first two games this week, losing four wickets in the powerplay but this time they finished the opening six overs on 42 for one – the skipper an early casualty yet again – but Paul Stirling reached 40, with three sixes and three fours before he was beaten by extra bounce from Ish Sodhi and edged to the keeper.

Lorcan Tucker had been promoted to number three, where he hit back to back half centuries against the USA back in December and he too looked good for his 28 but again an innings was cut off in its prime, this time a top edge pull to thirdman.

Gareth Delany and birthday boy George Dockrell both came and went and it was looking ominous when only six runs came off the 15th and 16th overs but then came Mark Adair and Curtis Campher.

In a sensational 21 balls of hitting, Ireland’s No 7 and 8 crashed 58 runs with Campher taking 16 from four balls from Blair Tickner, and Adair hitting four sixes and two fours in a whirlwind 37 from 15 balls.

The final total of 174 for six bettered Ireland’s previous best at Stormont by 28 runs and any team that has scored 140 in the first innings of a T20I has always won. New Zealand tore up the script.

Although Craig Young struck with the last ball of the second over, after that the Blacks Caps were always ahead of Ireland's score at the same stage despite Josh Little taking a wicket with his first ball and Dockrell finally getting the scalp he deserved, the ball after the two successive drops.

Phillips played the most remarkable innings of the day, hitting only two boundaries in his half century but by failing to score from just two of his last 35 balls he kept the scoreboard ticking over and his partners did the big lifting.

Ironically, Phillips' only six of the day came the ball after he was clobbered in the helmet, which fell off, by Campher - he still had his wits about him to kick his helmet away from the stumps.

The most spectacular catch of the day was actually taken one-handed in the crowd off Adair, by one-time Scottish international Calvin Burnett, wearing the Ireland jersey of his team-mate in Edinburgh, former Instonians and Ireland international Rory McCann.