England crushed Australia by an innings and 71 runs after a spectacular collapse of wickets early on the final day in the second Ashes Test at the Adelaide Oval on Tuesday.

The tourists ran through the Australians after snaring the important wicket of Mike Hussey and spinner Graeme Swann finished with five wickets for 91.

It was England’s first Test victory in Adelaide since 1995 and their 100th overall against Australia.

Australia now have the difficult task of having to win two of the remaining three Tests to overhaul England and win back the Ashes they lost last year.

England are now well on track to winning an Ashes series in Australia for the first time since 1986-1987.

England thoroughly deserved their comprehensive victory after skittling Australia for 245 on Friday’s first day and replying with a massive 620 for five declared, to hold a 375-run innings lead.

The tourists broke through with the big wicket of Hussey, and claimed three wickets in four balls with James Anderson removing Brad Haddin and Ryan Harris with successive balls and Marcus North following two balls later to Swann.

Hussey, who has been Australia’s best-performing batsman in the series with 195 in first Brisbane Test and 93 in the first innings in Adelaide, was out for 52 in the third over of the second new ball by Steven Finn.

Hussey attempted a pull shot but top-edged to mid-on where James Anderson pocketed the catch to the delight of the Barmy Army fans on the scoreboard hill behind him.

Wicketkeeper Haddin, who scored 136 in the first Brisbane Test, fell on first drinks caught behind off Anderson for 12 and the ball after the break Harris was out lbw for a first-ball duck.

North was out lbw to Swann after an England referral and it was only a matter of time before England mopped up the last wickets of Xavier Doherty and Peter Siddle to claim victory.

England’s win came with news that paceman Stuart Broad had been ruled out for the rest of the Ashes series with torn abdominal muscles.

Broad is expected to leave for home this week to begin his recovery process ahead of next February’s ICC World Cup in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

Australia are also likely to be without opener Simon Katich for the rest of the series with an Achilles tendinopathy problem.

England amassed their fifth highest innings in Ashes Tests with their 620 for five and their second best in Australia, only surpassed by a 636 scored in Sydney in 1928.

A devastating spell of fast bowling from Brett Lee at Lord’s on Saturday helped Australia to a seven wicket win and an unassailable 4-0 lead in the seven-match one-day series against England.

Lee claimed five for 49 from nine overs to restrict England to just 220 all out from 46.3 overs after they had won the toss in good batting conditions on a sunny morning. It was the ninth time Lee had taken five wickets in a one-day international.

Captain Andrew Strauss continued his good form over the English summer with a top score of 63 in 75 deliveries but he was the only England player to craft any substantial innings.

Australia reached 221-3 in reply with 6.2 overs remaining.

“Our batting hasn’t fired for four games,” Strauss told a news conference. “A few of the guys are low on confidence and one-day cricket is not a game where you can scratch around for too long. You have to play in a positive fashion.

“We have had some partnerships but no telling partnerships and no telling scores. The batting group has got to be better, it is as simple as that.”

Michael Clarke, who stood in as captain in the first three matches when Ricky Ponting took a break in Australia, finished the match with an unbeaten 62, while opener Tim Paine made 51 and Ponting stroked 48.

While Australia will be seeking a 7-0 whitewash after losing the Ashes series 2-1, England need to regain credibility and confidence before the ICC Champions Trophy begins in South Africa later this month.

Lee, who missed the entire Ashes series through injury, made the initial breakthrough when he had Joe Denly caught at first slip for 11. He later bowled Matt Prior (29), Luke Wright (12), Adil Rashid (4) and Stuart Broad (2) with dipping, swinging yorkers in excess of 145 kms an hour.

England lost their last five wickets for just 20 runs in 22 balls. Off-spinner Nathan Hauritz claimed two for 23 from 10 accurate overs that strangled the England run rate.

Strauss was out top-edging a slog-sweep off Hauritz, while Owais Shah was caught for 39 from a Shane Watson full toss that he felt should have been called a no-ball.

“That meant a lot, to take a five-for and to get it at the home of cricket at Lord’s is a very special moment,” Lee said.

“You always treasure the fact you get to play at Lord’s. It is something that is very special in my career.”

“Now being 4-0 up and after winning the series this next game is very important. The chance to win the next three is something that we will be eyeing up but we don’t want to look too far ahead and become complacent.

“It would be easy to think with the series won that we have done the hard work, but the hard work starts now.”

The 2nd ODI in the Natwest Series between England and Australia takes place at Lords on Sunday. The Australians are 1-0 up in the 7 match series after a thrilling win in the opener.

Before we get into the preview, let’s begin with a quick recap of what happened in the 1st ODI at the Oval on Friday.

Callum Ferguson was man of the match, his 71 helped the Aussies to a total of 260 after they were asked to bat first. England were always in the chase but lost momentum as regular wickets fell. In the end, a spirited effort from the impressive Adil Rashid saw them get close, but not close enough. Australia won by 4 runs.

Lords, London

First of all, here’s a link to the weather forecast and bear in mind this is a day game.

England have won 3 of their last 4 ODI’s at Lords. In 2008, the Proteas were beaten by 7 wickets here whilst New Zealand beat the hosts by 51 runs. In 2007 England beat West Indies by 7 wickets and India by 79 runs.

When the sides met here in 2005, a century from Ponting helped Australia canter to a 7 wicket win.

The Toss

In 6 of the last 7 ODI’s the captain wining the toss has chosen to field but his team has only gone on to win the match 3 times.

The Teams

After a close game, both sides may well go in unchanged. Ponting will not return whilst the 4th ODI so Michael Clarke will continue as captain.

The Verdict

By the look of the stats, the toss may not have too much bearing on the result. I think it’s possible that Australia may have more to come as some of their players have played very little cricket but as England got so close to them at Lords, it hardly justifies taking such a short price.

The 3rd ODI takes place at Southampton on Wednesday 9th September and remember we will be previewing all the matches on CricketPulse.

Mitchell Johnson took three wickets as Australia edged England by four runs in the first of seven 1st One-Day Internationals at the Oval on Friday.

England, needing 13 off the last over from Nathan Bracken to reach their victory target of 261, saw Adil Rashid miss the first ball after Australia had flirted with a six-run penalty by almost failing to bowl their overs in time.

Rashid pulled the next for four before taking a single.

But Ryan Sidebottom missed the next ball and took two off the next.

That meant the left-hander had to hit six off the last ball but instead he could only manage a single as England finished on 256 for eight under the Oval floodlights.

Rashid, whose 10 overs of leg-spin cost just 37 runs, was 31 not out off 23 balls with four fours,

Left-arm quick Johnson, who finished with figures of three wickets for 24 runs, took three for five in 13 balls as England suffered a middle-order slump

Owais Shah was keeping England on course with 40 off 48-balls until he was unluckily out hit wicket, his back foot dislodging a bail as he faced Johnson, to leave England 161 for four in the 38th over.

Luke Wright tried to rescue the situation with 38 off 27 balls, including a six and four fours, before he was run out by wicketkeeper Tim Paine off a Brett Lee no-ball.

Together with Rashid he put on 46 off 34 balls but his exit left England 224 for seven in the 47th over.

England, after Paul Collingwood had been brilliantly caught by a leaping Shane Watson at mid-wicket off Johnson, needed 93 off the last 10 overs and next ball Wright lofted Watson straight for the match’s only six.

Earlier, man-of-the-match Callum Ferguson’s career-best 71 was the centrepiece of Australia’s 260 for five.

Ferguson surpassed his previous best of 63 against South Africa at Cape Town in April, during a composed 75-ball innings featuring five fours, while Cameron White made 53 before he was run out.

It was two of England’s slower bowlers who checked Australia’s progress after the world champions started briskly against the quicks.

Rashid and medium-pacer Collingwood, who took two for 47, applied a break after England’s Ashes-winning captain Andrew Strauss won the toss.

England, in reply, suffered a setback when fast bowler Lee dismissed Strauss for 12 with the aid of a sharp slip catch by White.

However, Ravi Bopara – who’d averaged just 15 in the Ashes before being dropped for England’s series clinching 197-run win here at the Oval last month – steadied the innings.

Together with Matt Prior (28) he put on 61 before the wicketkeeper reverse-swept off-spinner Nathan Hauritz to Johnson at short third man.

Hauritz then dismissed Bopara one short of a fifty when he had him stumped by Paine.

After Paine was run out for nought by Collingwood, Watson (46) and White compiled a 56-ball fifty stand.

Collingwood separated the duo when Watson’s leading edge gave him a gentle return catch.

Clarke, captain in the absence of the resting Ricky Ponting, and Ferguson shared a stand of 79 off 109 balls.

But Clarke exited for 45 when he sliced a drive off Collingwood to Shah at cover, in an unusually subdued 72 balls with just three boundaries to leave Australia 190 for four.

Australia though still managed to score 82 runs in the last 10 overs.

The second match of this series takes place at Lord’s on Sunday.

It’s been a tour from hell for Australia so far. Their ICC World Twenty20 campaign (remember that?) lasted all of three days; they then contrived to lose the Ashes despite appearing to dominate all but a handful of (ultimately critical) sessions, and finally over the Bank Holiday, they were denied a bounce-back victory when rain wrote off the first Twenty20 at Old Trafford, before causing a complete washout in the return fixture two days later. Aside from a one-sided thrashing of Scotland in Edinburgh, it’s been slim pickings of late.

But now here’s a chance to claim some belated honours – seven ODIs in London, Southampton, Nottingham and Chester-le-Street, starting with a day/night fixture at The Oval on Friday. England themselves know what succour the 50-over format can provide to losing Ashes campaigns, having rounded off their whitewash tour in 2006-07 by swiping the CB Series – and Australia will not be starting the series from a position anything like as bleak as England’s back then.

The Aussies looked on with amusement as England’s final preparations descended into a football-related farce after Joe Denly was clogged by his team-mate Owais Shah, and their incentive to exact their Ashes revenge is epitomised by the frustration that has been steaming out of Brett Lee’s ears during his banishment from the Test line-up. Should Australia somehow lose this series 5-2 then they will slip behind England in the one-day rankings, but surely they/ve suffered enough indignities, individually and collectively, for one tour?

Twenty20 cricket was branded as “fun” when it was launched as a professional sport in England six years ago. 

But as the blame game started over who was responsible for the decision to call-off Tuesday’s Twenty20 international between England and Australia without a ball being bowled, one thing was clear: top players are not prepared to take any chances with conditions just to entertain a capacity crowd.

Twenty20 cricket has gone from ‘hit and giggle’ to a lucrative business thanks to the advent of the Indian Premier League and the World Twenty20.

Tuesday’s match was abandoned primarily because a two-metre square area damp patch on the line of the bowlers’ run-ups at the Brian Statham End was ruled unsafe by the umpires.

Former Australia fast bowler Jeff Thomson labelled the players “soft”.

But with Australia’s attack set to have featured Brett Lee, Mitchell Johnson and Dirk Nannes, all of whom can bowl at over 90mph, captain Michael Clarke was in no mood to take risks.

“I’m 75 kilos and for me to put my foot on that was very unstable so I can’t imagine (England’s Ryan) Sidebottom, Lee and Johnson – bigger boys than me – running into bowl on that,” he said.

“There’s no game I play for Australia that I’m willing to just go out and bowl some full-tosses so the crowd get a great spectacle,” Clarke added.

After the match the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) announced they would hold an inquiry, with Lancashire facing questions as to why an international match was abandoned because a small area of the outfield was wet.

Although 600,000 pounds was spent on a new drainage system in the pre-season, it did not cover the run-up area as the square at Old Trafford is to be turned next year, when the new drains in that section of the ground will be installed.

Angry Lancashire chief executive Jim Cumbes insisted inadequate covering and drainage were not behind the abandonment, which came after Sunday’s first Twenty20, also at Old Trafford, was also washed out.

“I’m perfectly aware of the safety of players, I played the game for 20 years myself,” former Lancashire seamer Cumbes said.

“But there are times when you’ve got to think about the people who’ve paid 50 quid (pounds).

“Sometimes I think we’d rather play in front of empty stadiums,” he added after the crowd reacted with impressive restraint to the lack of cricket.

Tuesday’s was the third embarrassing abandonment England have been involved in this year.

Three months ago a One-Day International (ODI) against the West Indies at Headingley was abandoned in bright sunshine without a ball bowled because a new drainage system couldn’t cope with a downpour.

That in turn followed the abandonment of this year’s Antigua Test on England’s Caribbean tour because of an unfit outfield.

On Friday, England and Australia are set to play the first of seven ODIs at the Oval, where in 1977 they took part in an extraordinary limited-overs match.

Back then, play continued despite rain and then hail lashing the ground and Australia captain Greg Chappell saw his side to a two-wicket victory with a superb 125 not out.

Although there was a reserve day, that clashed with a public holiday for the celebration of the Silver Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, monarch of both Britain and Australia.

And that meant there would be no television coverage if the game went into a second day.

“I realised the best chance of winning was to get off and start again the next day,” Chappell said. “But I played on for the sponsors’ sake.”

David Frith, writing in the Cricketer magazine, said: “As for the bemused spectators, they were left to reflect that in the days ahead first-class cricketers, far from splashing about willingly, would not be prepared to emerge if there was the smallest spot of rain in the air.”

More often than not, it seems, they still aren’t.

A marathon 7 mach ODI series between England and Australia begin at the Oval on Friday. We take a look at the squads, the series preview and the schedule .

Let’s begin with the fixtures:

Friday 4th September, Day/Night, Kennington Oval, London

Sunday 6th September, Day, Lords, London

Wednesday 9th September, Day/Night, Rose Bowl, Southampton

Saturday 12th September, Day, Lords, London

Tuesday 15th September, Day/Night, Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Thursday 17th September, Day/Night, Trent Bridge, Nottingham

Sunday 20th September, Day, Riverside Ground, Chester-le-Street

The Squads

England:

Andrew Strauss, James Anderson, Ravi Bopara, Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad, Paul Collingwood, Joe Denly, Eoin Morgan, Matt Prior, Adil Rashid, Owais Shah, Ryan Sidebottom, Graeme Swann, Luke Wright

Australia:

Ricky Ponting (captain), Michael Clarke, Nathan Bracken, Callum Ferguson, Nathan Hauritz, Ben Hilfenhaus, James Hopes, Mike Hussey, Mitchell Johnson, Brett Lee, Tim Paine, Peter Siddle, Adam Voges, Shane Watson, Cameron White.

Note: Ponting has returned to Australia and will miss the start of the series though he will re-join the squad at some stage. Michael Clarke will take over as captain in Ponting’s absence.

Remember to join us for previews of the all the matches on CricketPulse.

Captain Ricky Ponting’s face turned red when team England clinched the Ashes and Australia were left with no place to hide.

Post Ashes, they are still left with one opportunity to pick up their shattered performance and that will be the first Natwest Twenty20 match against the same archrivals England at Old Trafford on August 30, 2009.

However, the embarrassed and much criticized Australian skipper Ricky Ponting will miss the twenty20 matches, as he went on a short trip to his country. Ponting has also shared his thought of sharing the captaincy with his teammate Michael Clarke for the shorter version of the game.

Team England is certainly on the ninth cloud and will hope to prove the world that the Ashes have not come to them by luck and will so play to win the Twenty20 matches as well.

They will definitely take advantage of the deflated Australian side but considering the fact that this is the shorter form of the game it is difficult to predict the winner. The world knows Australia’s potential to make a strong come back.

So, yet another exciting match is on the cards and the Australians might come charging in this. Let us wait and watch.

The England and Wales Cricket Board on Thursday scrapped the 50-over format from its domestic cricket calendar for the 2010 season, claiming that ICC will review the future of ODIs after the 2011 World Cup.

The revised domestic structure, finalised after a 12-month detailed discussion with the first-class counties, now comprise four-day matches, enhanced Twenty20 competitions and 40-over leagues, which would be played only on Sundays.

The first-class counties voted 13-5 to adopt a revised domestic structure.

“The board acknowledged that the members of the International Cricket Council will themselves be reviewing the future of 50-over cricket after the 2011 World Cup and felt that an increased programme of England Lions matches should be developed in parallel to the first-class counties decision to revise the domestic structure,” ECB Chairman Giles Clarke said in a statement.

“Directors of cricket and coaches reported through their county votes, that the leading one-day team in world cricket, South Africa, do not mirror 50 overs at domestic level and that, provided powerplays and fielding restrictions were the same as the international format, the skills required were very similar,” Clarke said.

However, England and England Lions will continue to play 50-over cricket internationally until the ICC review is complete.

The domestic limited-overs competition, to be staged in a 40-over format, will be played mainly on Sunday afternoons throughout the season, consisting of three pools of seven teams with six home and six away matches, progressing to a semi-final and final in September.

The powerplays and fielding restrictions will be the same as per international cricket.

The ECB also decided that the LV County Championship would be a two-division competition of eight home and eight away matches from 2010-2013.

The enhanced Twenty20 competition will be played in pools of nine teams on a geographic basis (North vs South) with the top four teams qualifying for the quarter-finals from each pool from 2010-2013.

Pity poor England – Ashes winners one minute, grist to the mill the next. “Not ideal,” is how Paul Collingwood summarised the team’s requirement this week, as they prepared to cleanse their minds of all lingering traces of glory, and get back to the drawing-board in preparation for two Twenty20s and seven ODIs against the all-too-recently vanquished Australians. First-up, however, there is a stop-over in Belfast that might, in days gone by, have represented a convivial way to unwind in a green and pleasant land renowned for its appreciation of a party.

But not in this unstinting professional era. The Irish are the pace-setters of cricket‘s second tier – streets ahead of their traditional rivals, Scotland (who take on the Aussies in Edinburgh on Friday) and itching to put one over the English, for a variety of reasons that extend beyond mere sporting instincts. For starters, there is the likely presence in England’s line-up of Eoin Morgan – a member of the Irish side that captured the imagination at the 2007 World Cup, but now a targeted man after switching his allegiance to further his career. And then there’s the large Australian influence in the squad, all of whom are gunning for vengeance for their mother country, not least the former captain, Trent Johnston.