Unlikely England hero Chris Woakes delighted with contribution

Pa
Wednesday 12 January 2011 13:28 GMT
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(GETTY IMAGES)

Chris Woakes admitted he was not expecting to be thrown into the role of England's hero following their dramatic Twenty20 win over Australia in Adelaide.

The Warwickshire bowler, on his international debut, was promoted up the order from number 11 to number nine and hit an unbeaten 19 to see England through to a one-wicket win.

"I'm delighted to make my debut for England and it's good to keep the momentum going that the boys have started over the last two months," he told Sky Sports 1.

"At first I was number 11 on the sheet and didn't expect to come in but I got my promotion. I don't think the result was ever in doubt to be honest."

Having been set 158 to win, England suffered a late collapse after a fluent 43 from Eoin Morgan had put them on course, and captain Paul Collingwood admitted he would liked to have won in easier circumstances.

He said: "We dragged it back and I thought that it was a gettable total. I thought we should have done it a little bit easier, but that's the way Twenty 20 goes."

On Woakes, he added: "Andy Flower said he looked fantastic in the nets, we bat all the way down and that's the beauty of having bowlers that can bat.

"He was sensational tonight and showed a cool head on a young pair of shoulders. It was a fantastic debut, he bowled with skill and got us off to a good start."

The world champions have now won a record eight T20 games in a row, and Collingwood added: "We've won eight on the trot now. We still need to go back saying 'we need to take more responsibility', but I thought our intent was superb.

"To go from Test cricket to Twenty20 is a huge jump. I'm sure the guys will learn a lot from tonight and hopefully we can get one of the batters to go through next time."

New Australia Twenty20 captain Cameron White said: "Obviously we got the wrong result, but we were really close, not far away.

"We weren't quite at our best, there are a few things to work on and hopefully in Melbourne we can get them right."

White added: "We still got ourselves in a winning position at times and then just bowled a bad ball, or England played a really good shot. It was close, but not good enough."

Shane Watson was Australia's key man with bat and ball, hitting 59 before taking four for 15, and said on Sky Sports 1: "It's nice to be able to contribute the way I did but really it doesn't matter how you perform individually, the most important thing is the team and unfortunately we weren't able to get over the line."

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