England behind in Ashes warmup match vs Victoria

Tags: The Ashes 2010-11, Victoria, England, Warm-Up Matches

Published on: Dec 11, 2010

Ashes warmup match Scores: England's bowling trio looking to replace the injured Stuart Broad failed to take a wicket on Saturday as Victoria took an overall lead of 310 runs into the final day of its three-day tour match against England.

Melbourne: England's bowling trio looking to replace the injured Stuart Broad failed to take a wicket on Saturday as Victoria took an overall lead of 310 runs into the final day of its three-day tour match against England.

Victoria reached 278-6 at stumps following some strong hitting by tailenders Clint McKay and Jayde Herrick against the bowling of Andrew Strauss (1-51 from four overs) and Eoin Morgan (0-37 off three overs).

England is trialling Chris Tremlett, Ajmal Shahzad and Tim Bresnan to replace paceman Broad for the third Ashes test against Australia beginning in Perth on Thursday. England leads the five-test series 1-0.

"The idea behind it was to allow Victoria to get enough runs so we could have a real competitive game tomorrow," England's Ian Bell said.

Tremlett was 0-28 off nine overs, Shahzad 0-28 off seven and Bresnan 0-28 off 10.

On Saturday, they were beaten by a slow-paced pitch as part-time medium-pacer Paul Collingwood claimed 3-19 and spinners Monty Panesar (2-83) and Strauss shared the wickets.

"It's always nice for them to get a couple of wickets. But it has been a hard wicket for the (pace) bowlers to be fair," Bell said. "It's so slow out there and they've toiled away.

"It's a great thing for us going to Perth that all three of them had a really good workout in batting-friendly conditions."

Panesar had opener Aaron Finch caught at cover for 45 and 20-year-old Ryan Carters was bowled by Collingwood for 68 to leave Victoria on 147-2. Collingwood struck again 16 runs later to have Matt Wade (1) caught at cover. Victoria lost three wickets for 13 runs in a middle-order collapse.

England declared Saturday at its lunchtime score of 184-2 on a slow-paced pitch in reply to Victoria's 216-2 declared.

Strauss top-scored with a hard-hitting 66 before becoming left-arm spinner Jon Holland's second victim. Holland took 2-53 from 12 overs.

Bell was unbeaten on 60 with Paul Collingwood on 29.

Bell has made 500 first-class runs at an average of 125.00 in six matches on the Ashes tour, trailing opener Alastair Cook's 696 at 99.42.

In 13 previous Ashes tests, Bell averaged 25.68.

"Definitely I'm a tougher and better cricketer than I was four years ago when we were out here," Bell said.

England's regular test wicketkeeper Matt Prior, who intended to play the game as a fieldsman with backup wicketkeeper Steven Davies taking the gloves, was forced to get behind the stumps when Davies bruised his hand.

Cook left the field with a back problem but returned in the final session.

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