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Knight's knock in vain

By Ted Corbett

SYDNEY Dec. 13. England had its best hour of the Australian tour this afternoon, ran up a total of 251 in the first one-day international of the VB series and was then battered to defeat by batsmen so intent on attack that there were five overs in hand when Australia rushed to victory by seven wickets, even though this was the second highest winning total on a ground notorious for its low second innings scores.

It was yet another devastating performance by this formidable Australian side which were presented with the world one-day trophy by Malcolm Gray, president of ICC, before the match.

Yet when the match began it seemed that England might make a fight of this game despite three Test defeats and a series of injury catastrophes that might have made the Duke of Wellington call off the Battle of Waterloo.

True it rode its luck, but Marcus Trescothick and Nick Knight, who went on to finish with an undefeated 111, also played a series of imperious shots on a pitch that was on the slow side for the average stroke maker.

Trescothick, whose feet have hardly moved in the entire eight weeks of the tour, was dropped when his edged shot flew low between Shane Warne and Ricky Ponting in the slips off the first ball.

But as they found the boundary repeatedly, particularly against the fast medium of Shane Watson, their confidence increased and the opening stand finally ended at 101 in the 17th over.

Trescothick was caught by Warne — right in the midriff this time — to give Brett Lee the first of his four wickets and in the following over Ronnie Irani, promoted to No.3 to give the batting the strength through joy it has never discovered on this trip, was lbw to Warne's flipper.

Although Knight and Hussain put on 101 for the third wicket, it was in this period that England lost control and a potential score of 300-plus went astray. Hussain believes he is the right man at No.3 — remember him pointing to his back when he made a century in the NatWest final against

India at Lord's — and the figures seem to back his judgement. But he is too much of a Test batsman to be an effective high middle order batsman in a one-dayer and today he scored just 52 in 81 balls which put a huge burden on both Knight and the men who followed.

Warne and the part-time spin of Darren Lehmann stopped Hussain in his tracks and Lehmann had three for 32, a reward for steady bowling rather than great turn. When Hussain was out at 205, suggesting a total of 280, four wickets fell for 18.

Lee took the wickets of Craig White and the off spinner Gareth Batty, yet another replacement in this injury-hit party, in successive balls, and England's total was at least 25 short of a difficult target. What is a difficult target for these Aussie supermen? By the 14th over Adam Gilchrist and Matthew Hayden had put on 101 and Gilchrist had departed after 53 off 50 balls with seven thunderous boundaries.

Gilchrist was out to Irani, who is being touted as Hussain's successor back in England and led the crowd in a Merv Hughes style exhibition of physical jerks.

Meanwhile, Hayden marched on majestically until he was brilliantly caught overhead by Trescothick at mid off two short of his century.

The crowd was annoyed because their applause for his century had been halted by the umpire's signal of leg-bye off the previous ball and at this moment Hayden is a hero in this country with every cricket fan backing his every run. England was upset by one or two decisions that went against it but the television replays showed that the umpires were right and that England had no reason to complain about its bad fortune, though Friday the 13th is thought to be an unlucky day. England and Sri Lanka, now practising in Brisbane where Muttiah Muralitharan is said to have discovered a new mystery ball, will have to raise their game considerably to beat this inspired Australia.

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