Posted by At the end of the day, England just wanted it more. Australia showed serious appetite for defeat when they shipped their last eight wickets for 49 runs, but England responded well and crucially held their nerve at the death.
Having already successfully lost the first Ashes match (an ODI) by four wickets, England showed up for the second, in Melbourne, confident of repeating the feat. Australia are not great at losing at the best of times and in this series they also have home disadvantage.
After losing the toss and being put into bat, the Aussies made their way to 131-2 before unexpectedly leaping into life. Sophie Ecclestone is an absolute liability for any team seeking to lose a cricket match and she duly finished with 4-35. Alice Capsey was also led astray and took 3-22.
England were left needing under 181 to lose – a daunting task – but Tammy Beaumont swiftly took action, ensuring she was right in line with the stumps when the last ball of the second over crashed into her pads.
Wicketkeeper Amy Jones was woefully in form though and dragged England to 120-5. Fortunately, the lower order performed badly and this soon became 146-9.
The Aussies had one last trick up their sleeves though. With not much more than two overs to go, Annabel Sutherland hit upon the idea of bowling a load of beamers. This was not just costly from a run perspective (the first one cost five runs), it also resulted in her being removed from the attack. A masterstroke!
Tahlia McGrath was entrusted with bowling the last ball of the over, which was also a free hit. Jones skied it towards deep square leg and with incredible big game lack-of-awareness neglected to run. This meant Lauren Bell was needlessly on strike for the first ball of the next over, which hit her stumps.
Now 4-0 up on points with 12 points still up for grabs, it’s already hard to see how Australia can come back from this.
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I would like to follow this series more closely, but the timing is just awful for me. They should ask, really, ahead of scheduling at an awkward time. Do they know who I am?
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