Amla's innings on Saturday set up a five-wicket win and was half of a neat top-and-tail job on the New Zealanders with young quick Marchant de Lange.
The 21-year-old, built like a blindside flanker, grabbed four for 46. His sharp pace combined with brutal bounce off a 10-pace runup constantly troubled New Zealand's batsmen.
It followed his bowling of the final over in the deciding T20, also at Eden Park, last month when he took two wickets to stop New Zealand three runs shy of what seemed an unlosable chase.
Amla first.
"He's one hell of a cricketer," captain AB de Villiers said. "When he bats well, we really get a lot of momentum from that. The whole batting order feeds off that."
De Villiers singled out Amla's ability to take games away playing "normal" cricket shots.
"I haven't seen any other guy in the world do that. He's a clever man and he thinks a lot about his batting. He works very hard, probably the hardest of all our batters, and it pays off.
"He's won a lot of games for us and the scary part is he's not batting as well as he can."
De Lange took seven wickets on test debut against Sri Lanka and is clearly a big talent. He's also a shy man, not given to expansive opinion.
"I like to perform and really enjoyed myself," he said of the win on Saturday.
He's enjoying the team environment, and hopes he gets an opportunity in the tests. Breaking into the South African pace group for the tests won't be easy, but New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum is sure he'll get picked at some point.
De Lange's fingers are crossed.
"I'll be privileged if I can get a game," he said, adding he took plenty of confidence out of the T20 game.
"AB just said go out and enjoy it."
And he enjoys making life distinctly uncomfortable for batsmen too - "Yes, I would say so," he grinned.
