Australia came back strongly into the ODI series and went on to win the fifth and the final ODI to end it on a high at Lord’s. With this win, the Aussies went down in the series 2-3, but still managed to take home a lot of positives and confidence for their next meeting in the Ashes in November. 
Australia won the toss and decided to bat first to make it five games in a row that they had batted first in the series. The start was rather painstakingly slow, and Shane Watson was also dismissed for 14 that came off 26 balls. Ricky Ponting’s 92 in the previous innings had fans thinking of a return to form but he struggled again, and by the time he was dismissed, Australia was 55/2 in the 17th. 
The pair of Tim Paine and Cameron White did add some valuable runs, but the wickets fell successively to peg the Aussies back to 106/4 in the 30th over. At this stage, it did not look like the Aussies will even get close to 240, let alone go smashing the ball around in the final stages of the game.
It was the combination of Shaun Marsh, coming into the side in place of the injured Michael Clarke, and Michael Hussey that changed the complexion of the game. They were slow off the blocks like the rest of the side, but once the batting powerplay was taken in 40th over, the Aussies were off and racing.
By that time the pair had added 41 runs and had got their eye in, and the powerplay was totally capitalised on. The sequence of runs in those five overs was 15, 10, 15, 10 and 11 to extract full value out of the five overs and ensure that the side was off and running to a score of 277/7 and 130 runs were added in the last 11 overs that killed the English side off.
In reply, it was the turn of Shaun Tait to wreck the English innings. An injured Kevin Pietersen was replaced by Michael Yardy at the number three position, but Tait sent back both, Strauss and Yardy in quick succession. Once Eoin Morgan and Pietersen followed them in quick succession, Paul Collingwood’s 95 was not enough to save the side.
Tait’s fast and swinging bowling saw the end of Collingwood and despite some fighting 20s and 30s in the end, the English side fell away swinging. England was all out for 235 in the 47th over and Tait’s 4/48 in nine overs won him the man of the match award.
Morgan was awarded the man of the series award.