Relentless Australia ready to prove gulf in class against England

On one side of Sunday’s upcoming World Cup final is the inevitable. In 50-over cricket, the Australians march on like Darth Vader: more machine now than human, twisted and evil. You could argue that’s overstated, but they do have an imposing relentlessness. After having their world record winning streak of 26 matches broken back in September, Australia immediately set about building the next one. It currently sits at 11, including an unblemished eight wins through this cup campaign. Their semi-final against West Indies was a thrashing.

On the other side of the coin is the unlikely. A few months ago the defending champions were expected to challenge for this prize, but England wobbled through the Ashes like a one-wheeled tricycle, lost their first three World Cup games, then stumbled backwards into two of the wins they needed to make the top four. Their semi-final was against South Africa, a team running hot whose only loss in the tournament was a competitive one against Australia. But when the South Africans dropped Danni Wyatt five times, England’s opener had almost no choice but to make a match-winning century.

However debatable their merit, and however poor their recent years against Australia, England are in the final. The beauty for an underdog is that it only takes one anomaly to take the prize. A core of players have experienced the occasion before. Now that Wyatt has replaced the underperforming Lauren Winfield-Smith, there have been runs through the tournament from most of the batters, though England persist with the delusion that wicketkeeper Amy Jones is doing the job at at five, and that seamer Katherine Brunt is a No 7.

With the bowling, Brunt now operates on reputation more than reality, still talked about