Cricket: Ruthless Aussies finish job

By DEREK PRINGLE

LONDON - It ended much as it began, with England once again on the receiving end of a thorough and professional drubbing.

The Oval has been something of a bastion for the home side in recent years but, faced with the prospect of having to defend their stumps for another day, Nasser Hussain's team were bowled out for 184 before tea on the final day of the fifth test against Australia yesterday to lose by an innings and 25 runs.

As the teams gathered for the presentation ceremony, England were laughing and joking like men who had just been liberated from five months in a Bangkok jail.

For most, playing Australia has not been fun, and while captain Steve Waugh has moved mountains to get fit enough to play test cricket, you get the impression that some England players have been just as keen to avoid it.

A man of deeds, Waugh's determination has spread throughout his marvellous team and it shows in their cricket.

Playing great sides forces change on opponents, undermining team spirit in the process.

Something similar used to happen when the West Indies were in their mighty pomp during the 1980s. This Australia side are almost as awesome, having won 20 out of their last 23 tests.

Hussain was full of admiration for them.

"We've not progressed at all from any other series I've played against Australia," he said. "We go 0-3 down before we start playing some cricket. It's like Groundhog Day to be honest. But then Australia are playing cricket at a different standard to everyone else."

After the aberration of Headingley, where England won one day in five and won the match, justice, at least in the size and manner of the result, was once again served yesterday.

In the tabulated terms of the world test championship, this series may have been between first and third, but the gulf between the sides can be measured if not in light years, then at least in terms of Glenn McGrath (32 wickets) and Shane Warne (31 wickets).

The pair have been outstanding, leaving everyone else, including their own colleagues Jason Gillespie and Brett Lee, struggling to match their unremitting quality.

They have been so good for so long that every time they take a wicket these days they seem to overhaul some milestone or other.

Yesterday, two fell, McGrath overhauling Dennis Lillee's 355 test wickets when he removed Usman Afzaal, and Warne, now with 407 wickets, jumping ahead of Curtly Ambrose into fifth place in the all-time list.

It was Warne, with England resuming the last day on 40 for one, who quickly made any prospects of a draw seem remote.

Pitching the ball into the footholes, he had Mark Butcher caught off pad and bat at silly point.

No one exploits footholes better than the blond wrist-spinner and he made the craters at the Oval seem as treacherous as Mt Etna.

Not every ball turns at right angles, as Hussain found out when he underestimated the spin and was leg-before, but some do, something Alec Stewart witnessed at close quarters after trying to pad Warne away.

The real killer ball, though, was delivered by McGrath the over after Butcher was out. On a pitch that pace bowlers have found little more than heartache, the wiry McGrath got one to leap at Marcus Trescothick from short of a length. It was the perfect throat ball and the left-hander could do little, except poke a simple return catch.

Until Darren Gough and James Ormond added 58 for the ninth wicket after lunch to give the vocal crowd something to cheer about, England's hoped-for rearguard had turned into a procession.

Asked if Australia could improve, Waugh said: "There's always potential for that. However, I don't know how much better we can become. Our fielding wasn't up to our normal standard, but I felt we batted as well as we could, and bowling, pretty much the same."

- INDEPENDENT