New South Wales v England

E-mail this Article

Print this Article

Subscribe to RSS Feed

Jaques celebrates reaching three figures again.

England made an encouraging finish to the first day of their tour match with New South Wales after Phil Jaques tormented them with the bat for the second time in three days.

The left-handed opener hit 112 off 110 balls for a Prime Minister's XI on Friday as England opened their Ashes tour with a humbling 166-run defeat in Canberra.

And the 27-year-old further enhanced his case for selection in Australia's Ashes side by following that up with 107 this time around, putting on a second-wicket stand of 155 with captain Simon Katich (68).

That left the Blues on 193 for two, but England fought back to reduce them to 325 for five at stumps with spinner Ashley Giles claiming best figures of two for 46.

Although Andrew Flintoff (0/52) failed to take a wicket, the England captain continued his recovery from injury with a solid 15 overs, while James Anderson (1/45) and Monty Panesar (1/54) improved as the day wore on.

Matthew Hoggard (0/51) and Steve Harmison (1/76) returned to the England side after being left out of Friday's one-day defeat and opened the bowling with varied success.

While Hoggard conceded just 12 runs from his opening five overs, Harmison gave up 31, although the Durham paceman managed to claim the first wicket in the 10th over.

Ed Cowan (26) tried to leave but edged onto his stumps, just one over after narrowly avoiding a similar dismissal off Hoggard.

Flintoff replaced Harmison, opening with an impressive five-over spell that included two maidens and just 12 runs, although the skipper should also have had a wicket.

From Flintoff's first ball around the wicket to Katich, Marcus Trescothick dropped a straightforward catch at first slip with Katich on 14.

Hoggard returned for Flintoff but was greeted with successive fours from Jaques which brought up his half-century and New South Wales' 100.

While the first boundary was rather fortuitous, almost caught by the bowler, the second came from a glorious drive through the covers.

Katich continued the trend, lofting Anderson for six down legside the following over, and after lunch Katich picked up from where he left off, hitting successive balls back past bowler Harmison for four.

Giles was then given a bowl, and in his first over, Jaques glanced one down legside for three runs to bring up his century.

However, Jaques' fantastic innings came to an end shortly after when he lofted Giles to Harmison at long-off.

Michael Clarke claimed his first boundary by lashing a wide delivery from Flintoff through the covers, but Anderson returned strongly from an expensive opening spell.

Giles backed him up at the other end and the pressure told with the third wicket just before tea as Katich lofted the ball towards the deep mid-wicket boundary, where Kevin Pietersen took a superb catch on the run.

Shortly after the interval, Trescothick made amends for his earlier error by catching Aaron O'Brien (6) at first slip in a wicket maiden from Anderson.

After conceding 39 runs in his first seven overs, Anderson gave up just six from his next eight, as well as claiming the wicket of O'Brien.

Clarke and Daniel Smith put on 65 for the fifth wicket before Panesar was rewarded for some disciplined bowling with the wicket of Clarke (50), Trescothick taking a second catch at first slip.

Smith and Moises Henriques then saw out the session and will resume on 36 and 25, respectively.