Back on the sofa

11.25am: Australia were 170-1 and ended on 252 all out. England were 15-3 and won the match with four wickets in hand and three balls to spare.  Who are the chokers now?

What a fantastic match - I'd say that even if England had fallen just short - this is what the whole winter should have been like. Well done England, well done Paul Collingwood, and well done Australia for putting a smile back on my face.

11am: Flintoff gone, caught behind off "He-Man" Watson with 31 needed from 28 balls. A gripping conclusion awaits. Surely now is the time for Nixon to justify his place in the side at the expense of Read, but maybe he won't be needed if Dalrymple, who has reached at least 28 in his past two innings, hangs in there with Collingwood

10.45am: This is quite thrilling. England need 498 to win off seven overs, six wickets in hand, Australia appealing for anything dodgy and Ricky Ponting whinging about England having the ball changed. Anything can happen, and Australia may yet win, but my God it is nice to have them rattled for a change. Even the one-day game we won last week wasn't all that exciting; this is the first decent evenly matched game with Australia since the Adelaide Test.

9.40am: Twenty overs to go and England are actually looking in a reasonable position on 135-3. Australia are being rather sloppy in the field now, giving away a couple of runs on mis-fields. This may inevitably lead to a hat-trick, but Glenn McGrath is having a shocking day on his 37th birthday. Out for a duck when batting, he has dropped a catch, been hit for 33 off six overs, including a long driven six from Collingwood, and had a throw from Brad Hogg, his team-mate, clatter off his bonce. Meanwhile, Stuart Clark, who was dropped for the finals, has taken 4 for 11 including a hat-trick for New South Wales today.

8.20am: 32-3. Drat. Another dodgy leg-before decision by Daryl Harper against Mal Loye after earlier giving Brad Hodge out to a ball that was missing the top of off stump. What is it with Australian umpires called Daryl/Darrell and incompetence? Still, at least we have had the pleasure of seeing Glenn McGrath drop a sitter.

7.30am: For once, it was worth getting up at 3am. England have rallied superbly to restrict Australia to 252 having been 170-1. Great bowling and control from Flintoff and Panesar in particular, but it could have been much better with some sloppy fielding giving Australia three let-offs. Mahmood lowered himself even farther in my esteem with a feeble catching effort, Dalrymple and Panesar muffed an easy run-out of Hayden and Collingwood missed the easier of the three run-out chances he was given.

3.30am: Seventy-nine days ago, I was driving to my friend Mathew Gullick's to watch the first ball of England's international winter Down Under. I remember the optimism, the hope, if not the expectation, that this would be a cracking winter. I feared we would lose the Ashes and struggle in the one-day series, but I didn't imagine how humiliating the next 78 days would be. Perhaps I should have turned round and driven home when, delayed by traffic through the Blackwall Tunnel, I called Gullick to find out how the first over of the Brisbane Test had gone. "Not great," he said. "Harmison bowled the first ball to second slip."

Now I'm over at Gullick's house again for the first time since the Brisbane Test began and it's time to watch a one-day match all the way through (something I haven't managed this tour). Will England find a silver lining to this 79-day cloud? I won't be blogging over by over but I will post some comments later on as the innings progress, and in the meantime do let me know how you think the game is going.

Comments

[Oscar the Grouch]

Great game. Good old hard-graft cricket, mercifully free of malignant personality issues.

England totally deserved the win and Australia showed that it too can make ingrained selection errors - Watson was about as useful as a Labrador puppy. Many Australians have commented ever since the almost religious fervour to have him included started prior to the commencement of the English tour that his level of performance didn't warrant the confidence that our selectors were showing.

Collingwood batted beautifully, a joy to watch. The icing on the cake I think would have to be the gracious acceptance by Freddie as the winning Captain of the victory, which ought, in anybody's book, to balance out much of his apparently meek acceptance of defeat after defeat earlier.

Roll on Sunday..

[Peter McGuinness]

Good on you Patrick!

What a great game by Collingwood tonight.

Chokers?

Don't know about that. But perfectly understandable sentiments given the circumstances of your tour. And of our oft visited discourse regarding the joy/misery cycle of English sporting emotion.

Still, three ODI games is three games after all!! Good stuff, and a great relief to all concerned. No doubt tome upon glorious tome of analysis will ensue.

252 was never enough for the Aussies against any reasonable contender given the conditions.

Poms should direct most of their thanks toward one personage:

Monty!

His memorable spell during Ponting and Hayden's ascendency was truly the match winning effort for England. In the hysteria of TV's coverage - he will likely be forgotten. Monty made the difference.

Good game wasn't it? Pretty close for an ODI too. Most of them are ostensibly finished by 3/4 of the way through. Fingers crossed that the death knell of our otherwise strange international season gives us similar entertainment.

To a game on Tuesday!!! No reason why not by the looks!

[Peter McGuinness]

Harper's cock up with Loye was only 20% better than his effort that executed poor old Hodge.

One all.

Let's hope he continues to keep his incompetence at an even keel...

Maybe it's best that Harper takes a leaf out of Rudi's book and simply puts the finger away for good...