The Football Ferns are still searching for their first goal of the year, after falling to another disappointing friendly defeat to Argentina at Hamilton.
Just days after their five-goal rout against Portugal, New Zealand were once again unable to find the back of the net in a 2-0 loss against the South Americans.
Despite sitting five places higher than their rivals in world rankings, the home side were outshot 17 to five, after a promising start to the match.
The Ferns thought they had finally found the back of the net in the 56th minute through Olivia Chance, but her equalising goal was ruled out by a tight offside call from the assistant referee.
After a promising opening 15 minutes by New Zealand, Argentina opened the scoring against the run of play in 17th minute.
Football Ferns defender Katie Bowen tried to shield the ball from Mariana Larroquette, but the Argentinian forward pounced on the mistake to poke it past goalkeeper Erin Nayler.
As New Zealand pushed for an equaliser, Aldama Cometti put the result beyond doubt with a goal in the 90th minute.
The defender hammered home a header, after a series of corners, to secure the win, as Chance flashed a potential consolation goal moments later.
Ferns coach Jitka Klimková, who made five changes to the starting XI, is disappointed with the result, but believes they're making progress.
"I am glad that we improved our game and had more positive moments in the game, but that's not good enough to win those games and we should be definitely winning those games," she said. "We will review the game and find what we need to change for game No.3."
Ferns defender Meikayla Moore echoes her coach's sentiments, as her team chase their first win of the year.
"We improved, but again, it's not good enough," she said. "We are here to win matches.
"We're here to play to win matches and we didn't do that today, but we can take the positives and we have one more game to get those three points.
"[After Friday] we did a lot of talking. We almost stripped it beyond tactics and went to what we can control, the basics, and that's what we focused on.
"You guys all see what's out there, but there's so much more stuff that we're doing behind the scenes.
"Again, we didn't get the result that we wanted today, but we can take the positive momentum and the shift from the game previously till today."
The Ferns now travel to Auckland to take on Argentina on Thursday at North Harbour Stadium.
