England v Australia: fifth ODI - live!

Ben Stokes and Eoin Morgan watch on at Headingley in the fourth ODI. Photograph: BPI/REX Shutterstock/BPI/REX Shutterstock

Nick Miller (first innings) and Vithushan Ehantharajah 

Preamble

So. The decider. The big one. Winner takes all. The series on a knife edge. Tension mounts. Stirring moments, as Richie might say. Good lord I miss Richie. We all miss, Richie, don’t we? In a divisive world, where basically nobody can agree about anything, it’s nice that we can have these things that we can all join hands and concur. Richie was our cricketing sensei, and it’s awful that he’s gone.

Anyway, if you’ll excuse that moment of sentimental reverie, to the cricket. It’s pleasing that a one day series that, a little like the Tests, hasn’t actually produced too many close encounters, will turn out to be quite tight in the end. ‎Australia have won a couple quite convincingly, England have won a couple quite convincingly. And now we have a final encounter to tell us who’s the best.
It’s actually relatively remarkable that the Australians who have been here all summer - Smith, Starc, Marsh - can be bothered with all of this. They were beaten in the Ashes so you’d forgive them for wanting to hop on the nearest Quantas as soon as Mark Wood castled Nathan Lyon at Trent Bridge. But here they are, competing and dancing for our entertainment.

Nick will be here shortly. Meanwhile, read Vic Marks on the deciding ODI of the series:

Back in May the chances of England going through the summer without being beaten in any of their series were about the same as the leader of the opposition sporting a beard. Yet as the two teams return to Manchester on Sunday for the final international match of the season an England victory against Australia will mean that no series has been lost against two of the better sides on the international circuit.
Paul Farbrace, forever happy to chat, bubbling with enthusiasm and a vital midwife in England’s resurgence, admitted as much after the three-wicket victory at Headingley on Friday. “If at the start of the summer somebody said we would draw the New Zealand Tests, beat them in the one-dayers, win the Ashes and go into the last one-day game at Old Trafford locked at 2-2 we would have snapped their hands off and probably walked away saying: ‘Whatever they are drinking, I’ll have a pint of that.’”