Image caption, Australia completed a 16-0 clean sweep for the first time in Ashes history
Marc Higginson
BBC Sport senior journalist
Australian cricket never misses a chance to kick England while they’re down.
After a 16-0 Ashes clean sweep was sealed, journalist Gideon Haigh said they were the “worst team to play a Test match at the MCG”.
Harsh? Yes. Fair? Let’s find out.
But first this illustrates how far England have fallen behind Australia in the points-based era of the Women’s Ashes…
England’s ducks in a row
England’s failure to chase down 181 in 50 overs in the second one-day international has been singled out in the grisly post-mortem.
Both teams admitted it sent confidence soaring and plummeting respectively. It certainly summed up England’s deficiencies with the bat.
They passed 200 just twice in the series and only one player – Heather Knight – averaged more than 30 across all matches. Compare that to Australia, who had five batters average 30 or more, with two – Beth Mooney and Ash Gardner – averaging 60-plus.
England’s openers averaged 10 compared to Australia’s 33, with England’s top two scoring a combined 80 runs.
Oh, and England batters registered 10 ducks (dismissed without scoring) to Australia’s two.
If we’re scrambling around for positives, Sophia Dunkley returned to form and bought into the style of play England want – scoring 121 runs at close to a run a ball. She hit five of England’s 12 sixes but did fall victim to perhaps the ball of the series from Alana King…
Media caption, Dunkley bamboozled by King magnificence
King dethrones England’s queen
England being bamboozled by Australian leg-spinners? Yep, we’ve seen that movie one too many times.
England tend to struggle against spin, hence the desire before the winter tours to spend time in the United Arab Emirates where they practised on turning wickets.
It didn’t work.
King
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