Arch-rivals eye victory in the last face-off before Ashes

After three loses in a row, leading to a series defeat, Australia came back roaring at Kennington Oval and would be hoping to keep the momentum while the English would be aiming to regain their focus.

Finally, the World Champions, Australia, orchestrated a dominant victory over arch-rivals on this tour. Skipper Ricky Ponting struck his lost touch with the bat in the last match and his deputy, Michael Clarke, continued his gritty innings and lend a helpful hand in posting a big target for the English side. The bowling department powered by a five-wicket haul from Ryan Harris backed up the good performance from the batters. However, the team is still struggling with the middle-order batting and the batsmen like Cameron White and Michael Hussey will surely like to get some runs under their belt before the series against Pakistan. The bowlers will definitely like to emulate their performance from the last match, if not better it. There is a saying that when going gets tough, the tough gets going, probably this will not go down well with the series result, but surely the win in the last match would have reignited the self-belief in the Australian camp, who looked short of confidence in the first three One-dayers.

Andrew Strauss was disappointed after the last match loss as they threw away the chance of white-washing the Australian side. Although, the English bowling looked completely off-color but have shown tremendous form throughout the series. The batting was exposed when the top order got out cheaply and their new talisman in middle-order, Eoin Morgan, also failed to bail them out of the crisis. But the English have been consistent in the series in all the three facets of the game and can’t be written off with one defeat as they still possess a strong and in-form side in comparison to the visitors.

Despite the loss in the previous tie, England will head into this match as favourites but we can expect the Aussies to carry the winning confidence after the comprehensive win.