November 11 Monday 2002
Australia crush England in Ashes opener

BRISBANE: Australia crushed England by 384 runs to win the opening Ashes Test inside four days on Sunday after one of the worst English batting collapses in almost 100 years. 

Set 464 to win after Australia declared their second innings at 296 for five, England crumbled to 79 all out in little more than two hours. 

It was England's lowest total in Australia since they were dismissed for 61 at Melbourne in 1903-04 and one of their heaviest defeats in the long history of the Ashes, cricket's oldest and fiercest rivalry. 

"It's a pretty devastating loss," Australia's triumphant captain Steve Waugh observed. 

"There's no doubt England will find it hard to come back from this." 

Mark Butcher scored a defiant 40, more than half his team's score, but just two other players made it to double figures as the innings came to an abrupt end in less than 29 overs. 

"We've had worse Tests than this," England skipper Nasser Hussain said. 

"Unfortunately we have a habit, and it's not funny, of losing first Test matches."(But) if you know anything about English cricket we have lost before and we have lost first Test before and we have turned things around so that's one bit of history that we can call upon." 

Australian fast bowler Glenn McGrath captured four second-innings wickets to finish with eight for the match while leg-spinner Shane Warne claimed three new scalps in an England innings that lasted just 127 minutes.

But even their performances were overshadowed by the heroics of opening batsman Matthew Hayden, who scored twin centuries to become just the seventh player to score hundreds in each innings of an Ashes Test. 

Hayden, now ranked as the world's top batsman after golden run over the past two years, followed up his first innings 197 with 103, giving him a match total of 300 runs. 

The left-handed opener began the fourth day on 40 with Australia 111-2 and looking for quick runs to set up an early declaration. 

Hayden answered the call with a typically explosive display, reaching his first 50 off 104 balls then his second in 45 deliveries. He became just the fourth Australian to score two hundreds in an Ashes Test, joining Warren Bardsley, Arthur Morris and Waugh. 

His innings came to a surprising end immediately after he reached three figures when he hit a return catch to left-arm spinner Ashley Giles on 103 but it did not halt the Australian run spree. 

Damien Martyn made 64 after starting the day with Hayden while Adam Gilchrist made an unbeaten 60 off 59 balls including two giant sixes off Giles that ended up in the Gabba stands. 

Waugh mercifully called an end to proceedings about an hour after lunch with Australia 463 runs ahead on 296-5, giving his bowlers more than four sessions to press for victory. 

Waugh held out some hope of finishing off England before the end of the day but had not counted on knocking them over in two hours. 

"It was an excellent win, to bowl a side out that cheaply is always pretty special, although we've done it a few times now so maybe that's taken a bit of the gloss off it," Waugh said. 

England's hopes of holding out for a draw got off to the worst possible start when their star openers Michael Vaughan and Marcus Trescothick were dismissed in the first two overs. 

They got rapidly worse when Hussain, John Crawley and Alec Stewart went within eight balls of each other just after the tea break and, with a man down after Simon Jones injured himself fielding on Thursday, the end came all too quickly.