Vince rues dismissal as England crumble
James Vince ruefully reflected on his dismissal as the turning point in England’s 72-run defeat yesterday against Australia, who moved into an unassailable 2-0 lead in the ODI series.
Chasing 281, England lost Jason Roy and Dawid Malan in the first over to a fired-up Mitchell Starc while they fell to 34 for three before Vince and Sam Billings steadied the ship with a 122-run stand.
However, on a wearing surface which made life difficult for batters, Vince was given lbw after being struck on the back leg by Australia’s captain for the day Josh Hazlewood to depart for 60 off 72 balls.
Billings was bowled by Adam Zampa for 71 and England were unable to rebuild as they were all out for 208 in 38.5 overs, meaning Tuesday’s match at Melbourne will be a dead rubber.
“Losing those wickets early, we had to rebuild a bit, we got it going and then once I got out there was another flurry which killed the game off,” Vince said.
“I would have liked a bigger contribution to get us towards the target, same with Bilbo. If we could have kept that partnership going for longer, we would have given ourselves more of a chance of winning.
“The wicket was reasonably tricky. In patches it seemed to be quite hard and it wasn’t every ball but there was a bit of variable bounce and the ball sticking in the pitch.
“Luckily when I was going OK, Bilbo was perhaps struggling a bit more and then he started going better when I struggled a bit more.
“If we could have extended that partnership by another 50 runs or so and left the lads at the bottom a bit less to do, we might have got over the line, but it wasn’t to be.”