Issue 153

Collingwood shines for England in ODIs

26th February 2007

England's cricketer's disastrous tour of Australia ended on a high with victory in the Commonwealth Bank One-day series. Despite their abject performances in the 5- 0 test series defeat, England recovered, winning the bestof- three final 2-0.

The return of Michael Vaughan to the setup, and to the captaincy, was a massive boost to the England side with this summer's World Cup in the West Indies now only four weeks away.

After an indifferent start, losing to Australia, before beating New Zealand - their first win of the tour - England were humiliated by Australia in Adelaide, collapsing to 110 all out. They followed this up with another defeat, this time to New Zealand, leaving them all but out of the tournament, and most players eagerly awaiting the plane home.

Vaughan's injury problems continued, however, as a hamstring injury put him out of the rest of the tournament and Andrew Flintoff again filled in as captain. This coincided with a maiden century for Ed Joyce that helped to turn the tour around as England beat Australia comfortably in Sydney. Then, in a thrilling match in Brisbane, Paul Collingwood hit a faultless 106 to put England in the final series.

England begun magnificently in the first final, winning by four wickets thanks to another brilliant century from Collingwood, supported by Ian Bell's 65. Collingwood was again the star in the second final, hitting a match-winning 70 before Liam Plunkett's 3-43 completed the job.

Captain Michael Vaughan is confident he will be fully fit for the World Cup competition despite suffering continuing injuries in this one day series. He said, "The two warm up games against Bermuda and Australia, but the medical team is confident over the way it has gone in the past week or so."

The radical turnaround in form in this series shows how important Vaughan is to England's success, and how his performance could have serious effects on England's World Cup dreams.

England now head into the World Cup brimming with confidence after three successive victories over the world champions, and will fancy themselves with Kevin Pieterson due to return from his rib injury to bolster the rejuvenated batting lineup, a lineup spearheaded by the inform Collingwood. Australia have now been comfortably beaten five times in a row, after humiliation in the Chappell-Hadlee series against New Zealand, and have a lot of work to do if they are to live up to their billing as favourites for the World Cup.

Tom Mooney