England vs Australia- 3rd ODI- First innings report
England seems to be on the verge of securing 3rd consecutive win against the old enemy Australia in the 3rd One Day International of the 5 match series. After winning the first 2 matches England did well to restrict Australia to 212 all out in the first innings.
On an old Trafford pitch which was expected to offer some assistance to the pacers, home side won the toss and elected to bowl first. Australia began solidly, openers Watson and Paine made sure they did not lose early wickets, and contended with the short pitch bowling well in the early overs.
The 2nd hard hitting batsmen restricted themselves to a degree and mixed caution with aggression scoring at just over 5 runs per over. Paine was in good form driving anything slightly wide dispatching 9 boundaries in his 44 runs from 48 balls, he was trapped leg before by the left arm spinner Yardy in the 14th over with Australia at 75. Captain Ricky Ponting’s poor form continued as he was stumped while trying to play a drive against Swann, Kieswetter did well to collect the ball on the leg side and whip off the bails.
The T20 captain Michael Clarke tried to rebuild the innings and put together a 37 run stand with Watson for the 4th wicket, before Watson was caught by Strauss on the bowling of Swann for 61 well made runs from 76 balls, he smashed 5 fours and 2 sixes.
The big hitting all rounder Cameron White failed to make much of an impression as he was caught by Strauss for Swann’s 3rd wicket, White only managed 12 runs from 23 balls with 2 fours.
Just 4 overs and 15 runs later Clarke was also sent packing after scoring 33 from 54 balls without a single boundary, he was caught by substitute fielder Bell for astonishingly Swann’s 4th wicket.
Australia at 169 for 5 were in trouble, their most dependent batsman Michael Hussey was dismissed soon after for just 21 runs by Paul Collingwood on a perfectly disguised slower one knocking back his off stump.
All rounder James has also been in a disappointing form and did not change much with the score at 202 hopes was cleaned up by Anderson for just 7 runs.
After the domination by Swann of the top order, it was the pace duo of Broad and Anderson who tore into the lower order. Ryan Harris at number 9 was caught by Strauss off the bowling of Broad for just 1 runs. Anderson finished off the innings by disturbing the furniture behind Bollinger for just 3 runs.
Australia was all out for just 212 runs after being 75 for 1, credit to Swann who broke the back of the top order getting 4 wickets, while Anderson got into his own as soon as the ball started reverse swinging.
The score seems to be an easy one for England to chase, and given the form they have been in it would be hard to bet on a classic Australian come back.
Even though the pitch if offering true bounce, England should be able to see out the new ball considering they have only a fraction over 4 runs per over to chase.
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