Australia must build on one-day lead

Australia’s cricketers must build on their successful start to the one-day series against England when the second match gets underway, allrounder James Hopes says.

The teams meet again at Lord’s on Sunday night (AEST) and Hopes believes the Australians have been buoyed by their narrow four-run win over the Ashes victors in the first of seven one-dayers at The Oval on Friday.

“It stops the spiral,” Hopes said on Saturday.

“If we’d started off with a loss it could have been: ‘Here we go again.’

“But we’ve kick-started the one-day series again and now tomorrow becomes very important. It’s a short turnaround between games, the first hour-and-a-half will be very important.

“They are going to have a bit more momentum than us at the moment, but hopefully we got a bit of that back last night and we’ll see how they come back tomorrow.”

Hopes hit an unbeaten 18 off 12 balls as Australia reached 5-260 before managing to restrict the home side to 8-256 in reply during the series opener to take a 1-0 lead.

The result came after a frustrating period for Australia following their 2-1 Ashes series defeat a fortnight ago.

Their two Twenty20 matches against England were ruined by rain, meaning their only preparation for the series was a 189-run thrashing of Scotland during a one-day game in which the Australians fielded their Twenty20 line-up.

Hopes said his team-mates were relieved to have played some cricket under non-threatening skies, particularly with the Champions Trophy looming in South Africa later this month.

“We are pleased to come out with a win, it doesn’t matter by how much and four runs is enough and we are full of confidence,” Hopes said.

“The team prides itself on being able to win in tough conditions.

“The tough part here is that half the team has been here for four months, but we are committed to getting over the line in this series and begin full of confidence for South Africa.”