Ricky Ponting and Brad Hodge turned bogey men for New Zealand as they engineered a brilliant run-chase win for Australia in the tri-series match at the MCG.

Ponting scored back-to-back centuries for the first time with a superb 104 from 113 balls and Hodge made a career-best 99 not out in front of his home crowd to help the world champions produce the third-highest successful run-chase on Australian soil.

Australia (5-291) won by five wickets with 10 balls in reserve when Hodge drove Mark Gillespie through backward point for two, although he finished one run short of what would have been a dream maiden century.

Hodge's knock will also seal his World Cup selection given he had yet to fire for Australia in his seven previous one-dayers.

New Zealand's 7-290 looked well out of reach after 30 overs of Australia's innings with eight runs an over needed and no Andrew Symonds to come because of surgery on his ruptured bicep, which appears to have dashed his World Cup dreams.

But Ponting and Hodge never panicked during a 154-run stand, and the captain signalled the late charge when he thumped Daniel Vettori over his head for six to leave Australia with 80 runs required from the final 60 balls.

The equation was 25 needed from 23 balls when Ponting was caught in the deep, and 13 from 15 balls when Mike Hussey was run out backing up too far for a second run.

But Hodge coolly cover drove the next ball for four and maintained his career-best form this year with a wonderful 86-ball knock.

New Zealand were again left empty-handed against their arch foe despite posting a huge score thanks to Lou Vincent's swashbuckling 90, Peter Fulton's 60 and late hitting down the order.

But the Black Caps' inability to finish games off despite removing Australian openers Adam Gilchrist (29) and Matthew Hayden (28) relatively cheaply again rose its ugly head.

The Kiwis have now lost 19 of 21 matches against their Antipodean rival.

The result means the winner of Tuesday's match between New Zealand and England in Brisbane will play Australia in the finals series.

Australia's chase was the third-highest successful pursuit in Australia, behind only the 9-303 Sri Lanka scored in 1998-99 to beat England and the 6-297 that New Zealand made in 1982-83 to beat England.

Australia's stirring win eased some headaches from earlier in the day, when news broke Symonds' World Cup dreams appear over and given the expensive returns from some of the fast bowlers.

Brett Lee, Stuart Clark and Mitchell Johnson all had tough days, but Shaun Tait enhanced his chances of touring the Caribbean with a return of 1-26 from 10 overs, and broke the 160kmh mark along the way.

Hodge was delighted, despite missing out on a maiden century in front of his home crowd.

"It's just wonderful to be in these colours again, and to have an influence and to win a game at the MCG, it's just a dream come true," he said.

"I thought it (the last shot) was through there for a minute, but that's cricket isn't it.

"It's better off making 99 not out than a duck like I did the other week, so I'll take any sort of runs I can get.

"I just enjoyed every moment of it."

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