Australia's emphatic nine-wicket win over England in the Champions Trophy semi-final completely overshadowed a milestone by Paul Collingwood, who equalled Alec Stewart’s record of 170 one-day appearances for England. He didn't get the chance to rejoice in the occasions and will have to make do with being an inspiration to younger allrounders like Luke Wright and Tim Bresnan, writes John Westerby in the Times.
Like Collingwood, they have both begun their international careers as bits-and-pieces one-day all-rounders, players for whom neither batting nor bowling on their own would win them a place in the side, but whose overall portfolio of skills makes them so useful in a one-day team. In Collingwood’s case, his brilliant fielding has always added considerably to the package. With time and experience, Collingwood became so much more than a bits-and-pieces player, graduating to become a fully fledged Test batsman. After making his one-day debut in June 2001, his first Test cap did not come until 2½ years later – by which time he had played 25 one-day internationals - but he had learned much from his early schooling in international cricket.
In the Age Brendan McArdle writes that despite the win in the semi-final, Australia are still to recover from the Ashes loss to England. And to make matters worse, one of their key failures of the series won the ICC Cricketer of the Year award.
What made his series all the more disappointing is that he is obviously one of the stars of world cricket. It's easy to like big Mitch, and there is a distinct reluctance in cricket circles to criticise him. But the truth is, he went from being Australia's trump card to its biggest liability in the space of two months. Twenty wickets at 32 apiece looks fine on paper, but it fails to tell the tale of the lack of control he gave his captain. By the time he got to the series-decider at the Oval, Johnson was a broken man. His bouncers in the second innings were pitching just metres in front of his own foot, and his inept shot in getting out to Steve Harmison near game's end encapsulated his hangdog mindset.
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