I am talking cricket again, I didn’t give England a chance in hell of winning the 4th one day international against Australia with both Kevin Pietersen and Michael Vaughan both out for the game couple with Flintoff as captain. And I was even more convinced that England were going to get pummelled after their innings only managing 155 runs being bowled out in the 42nd over. But I have to give England a lot of credit, they came out and battled pegging Australia back to 48 – 4, but it was that man Mike Hussey that steadied the ship and brought Australia home to win by 4 wickets in 38.4 overs. But you have to say that England were a little unlucky that Hussey wasn’t given out when he edged the ball to Paul Nixon off James Anderson’s bowling when he was on 19. You have to feel that England could have gone on to pull off the impossible if that decision went their way, but it didn’t; that’s the way it goes sometimes. But England can take some positives from this defeat, first one being Mal Loye who knocked up 36 runs off 36 balls which certainly flustered Australia, I think that Loye has made his case for inclusion in the rest of the tour and the world cup! James Anderson and Jon Lewis certainly have made their claim to a world cup spot with 2 – 29 & 4 – 36 respectively, and Anderson could have had the wicket of Hussey if things went our way!
Update [20/01/2007 – 04:52]: England’s team problems have been compounded further today with the announcement that Michael Vaughan will miss the next two one day games. Vaughan is expected to return for the game against New Zealand on the 30th January! It seems that his hamstring injury is worse than expected, or are the England camp sandbagging and the problem is more serious, maybe even a re-occurrence of his previous knee problem that kept him out for more than a year; let’s hope that’s not the case!
Nothing really to do with sport, but this comment from Argyle manager Ian Holloway in reference to Plymouth’s recent FA Cup adventures amused me – “I said a couple of weeks ago I was like a cheap teabag because I didn’t stay in the Cup very long but at the moment I’m percolating in the hot water so I’m going to be a much better cup of tea.” – You have to say that Holloway is a complete nutcase, but you can’t help but like the guy and he has done reasonably well considering he was thrown into the hotseat weeks before the start of the season. Argyle have just signed League One striker Rory Fallon from Swansea for £300,000; I don’t know how good this player is; but I guess I will find out on Monday against Coventry City at Home Park, let’s hope he can combine with Barry Hayles to make a formidable attack; now all we need to do is patch up the leaking defence!
