Australia 353/6 (50.0 ov)
Pakistan 267 (43.5 ov)
Australia won by 86 runs
A David Warner hundred. A catalogue of Pakistan fielding errors. A big win for Australia. It was as if the fourth one-day international in Sydney was a recap of the Test campaign earlier this summer. Certainly the result was the same - a series victory for Australia. Unlike in the Tests, Pakistan at least tasted success in this series, having won in Melbourne, but the best they can now hope for is to win the dead rubber in Adelaide and finish 2-3.
This was a match that got away from Pakistan early. Warner raced to a half-century from 35 deliveries, and together with Steven Smith lifted the score to 1 for 212 in the 36th over. Glenn Maxwell and Travis Head then built on that platform as Australia plundered 118 from the final 10 overs. Smith, Maxwell and Head all benefited from Pakistan's awful catching, and the target of 354 would have required the highest successful ODI chase ever on Australian soil.
It was too much for Pakistan. Far too much. Only if Sharjeel Khan had sustained his early striking would Pakistan have had a hope, but his dismissal summed up the difference between the two sides. On 74 from 46 deliveries, Sharjeel slog-swept Adam Zampa to deep midwicket, looking for his fourth six of the innings. But Warner, running around the boundary, showed perfect judgment to take the catch and effectively dash Pakistan's chances.
Compare that to a chance that Sharjeel himself had in the deep earlier in the day, when Head skied one off Junaid Khan. Sharjeel grassed what should have been a straightforward opportunity, and Head went on to raise a half-century off 35 deliveries. It was Sharjeel's second drop of the innings, after he had also put down Smith at backward point. In all, Pakistan missed four very gettable catches as well as two much harder ones.
There were also fumbles and overthrows enough to make the fielding coach Steve Rixon wonder why he bothered. Pakistan's fielding was more chaotic than the Shahrah-e-Faisal at peak hour, and was one of the key factors in the result. Australia missed a couple of chances too, but took the important ones. Warner snared an even better catch at deep midwicket after the Sharjeel one; running in quickly he snapped it up low to the ground to get rid of Shoaib Malik for 47.
But even if Pakistan's fielding had been perfect, they would still have faced trouble from Warner. He was dropped, but not until he was well past 100. It was his eighth ODI century in 12 months and featured 11 fours and two sixes. He slowed down after his quick start and brought up his hundred from his 98th delivery, but with such a platform he might still have been dreaming of a double-century when he edged behind off Hasan Ali for 130.
Warner had been the architect of two key partnerships for Australia: a 92-run opening stand with Usman Khawaja, who edged behind off Hasan for 30, and then a 120-run second-wicket combination with Smith. When Hasan broke the stand, he did it comprehensively, getting both Warner and Smith in the same over - Smith was lbw for 49 - but Head and Maxwell proved more than capable of continuing the destruction.
Maxwell was dropped on 8 by Hasan, who had also grassed Warner on 113, and the Maxwell-Head partnership was worth exactly 100 in just over 10 overs. Both men struck the ball cleanly and went at a brisk rate - Head's fifty came from 35 balls and Maxwell's from 34 - before Head was caught in the deep by Malik off the bowling of Mohammad Amir for 51 off 36. Hasan completed a five-wicket haul by getting Matthew Wade and Maxwell (78 off 44) in the final over, but it meant little.
Australia had piled on 6 for 353, and Pakistan needed everything to go right to win. It was already clear that this was not an "everything goes right" kind of day for Pakistan. Azhar Ali, back from injury to captain the side again, edged Josh Hazlewood to slip in the second over, and Babar Azam was well caught at long-on by Hazlewood off Head's offspin for 31 off 39 balls. Then Sharjeel, who had made a 36-ball fifty, fell, and Australia were firmly in control.
The required run-rate began to balloon. Mohammad Hafeez was taken in the deep off Zampa for a run-a-ball 40, Malik holed out off Head, Umar Akmal skied a catch off Mitchell Starc for 11, and Mohammad Rizwan was trapped lbw by Zampa for 10. Then came the formalities of wrapping up the tail: Amir was caught behind off Pat Cummins for 5, Imad Wasim tickled a catch behind off Hazlewood for 25, and next ball Hazlewood bowled Junaid for a golden duck.
Australia had completed an 86-run win and secured the series. Warner was rightly named Man of the Match; his hundred set up Australia's total and his two catches highlighted the chasm in the fielding of the two sides. Australia can now head to Adelaide to celebrate the final match on Australia Day; Pakistan look ready for home already.
England 321/8 beat India 316/9 by 5 runs
Chris Woakes pulled off the Kolkata grandstand finish that had eluded his team-mate, Ben Stokes, in last year's World T20 final, as he held his nerve in the face of a supreme onslaught from India's man of the moment, Kedar Jadhav, and delivered for England their first victory in India in eight matches and more than 10 weeks of touring.
The end, when it came, was anticlimactic to all but the 11 relieved Englishmen in the outfield, and their nerve-shredded dressing room. With 16 runs to defend, Woakes recovered from being slammed for six and four in the first two deliveries of the game's final over to chalk up four consecutive dot-balls, including the vital scalp of Jadhav for 90 from 75 balls, to seal a consolation win in the three-match ODI series.
It was a supremely hard-earned victory at the end of an extraordinary series that has featured a grand total of 2090 runs in six innings - a record for a three-match rubber. And England's effort was all the more impressive given that they lost the toss (and with it the chance to pace their innings against a measurable end-point) as well as one of their frontline seamers, David Willey, who had to withdraw from the attack with a shoulder injury after two overs.
However, thanks to another tapestry of hard-hitting cameos all down the order - from Jason Roy against the new ball to Woakes and Stokes at the death - England ended up with just enough runs on the board. And when 321 for 8 on a sporty seamer's surface equals "just enough", you know the format has entered a new dimension.
The foundations of England's victory were laid by the opening pair of Roy and Sam Billings, who was playing in his first match of the series after Alex Hales' withdrawal with a broken hand. From the outset, India's seamers found bounce and movement from a probing line and length outside off stump to force a naturally aggressive duo to sit tight for their opportunities.
To both men's credit, they did just that. Roy once again took the lead with his third fifty of the series while Billings alongside him played the holding role, contributing 35 to a 98-run stand that was only broken by the advent of the first drinks break.
Bairstow, a late replacement for Joe Root, made 56 from 64 balls to keep England ticking along in the middle over, while Morgan, a centurion at Cuttack, showed once again that he's rediscovered that pocket-battleship power that once set him apart among England one-day batsmen.
The return of Hardik Pandya threatened another decisive momentum swing, as he picked off both set batsmen, plus a slightly subdued Jos Buttler, in a brilliant six-over spell that proved both incisive and restrictive. England, however, no longer know how to stop attacking in the closing overs, and Stokes in particular served notice of his intention to banish the memories of his last visit to Kolkata. He finished unbeaten on 57 from 39 balls, with Woakes chipping in with 34 from 19, as England posted a total that would have counted as formidable in any series.
Nevertheless, having demonstrated the potency with the new-ball in defeat at Pune and Cuttack, the onus was on England's seamers to strike hard and strike fast in the most favourable conditions they had encountered all winter. And they should, by rights, have done so with the very first delivery, when Woakes was shown on replay to have grazed Ajinkya Rahane's glove with an off-stump lifter, but nobody thought to appeal.
Rahane, however, did not detain them for long. He had been brought in as a replacement for the out-of-sorts Shikhar Dhawan, but managed just 1 from six balls before being bowled by a big inswinger from the left-arm seam of David Willey. Willey, however, struggled with his line, conceding five wides in two overs before clutching at his shoulder and leaving the field for treatment, never to return.
His departure could have been a devastating blow for England in less conducive conditions, but fortunately their remaining four seamers closed ranks to good effect, allowing the spinner Moeen Ali to get through an impressive eight-over spell of Jadeja-esque pace and purpose that covered off Willey's remaining workload.
But India, true to their current form and reputation, just kept coming. KL Rahul took a block-or-blast approach against the new ball, slotting a monstrous six over the covers in Woakes' first over before falling to a similarly aggressive wallop when Jake Ball entered the attack as Willey's replacement in the sixth.
Virat Kohli, inevitably, proved a different class of opponent, as he calibrated the conditions in his inimitably forensic fashion, and set about pacing the chase with his second half-century of the series. On 35, Ball at deep backward square dropped a clanger as Plunkett banged in a bouncer - a terrible miss from a fielder who clearly had too long to think about the stature of the man who had launched the ball his way - but for once such a let-off wasn't overly costly.
Where Pune and Cuttack had offered nothing but misery once the hardness had gone from the new ball, Kolkata kept on giving if the seamers were willing to bend their backs. And, in the 20th over, Stokes struck the big blow, luring Kohli into the drive with a bit of width outside off, for Buttler to complete a high take to his right as the ball kicked off the outside edge.
Yuvraj Singh kept India's innings ticking along for a while, climbing into a rare Moeen long-hop to batter a huge six over midwicket. But, on 45, he aimed in the same direction off the extra pace of Plunkett, and could only pick out Billings on the edge of the rope, who silenced a raucous crowd with a simply judged take.
MS Dhoni, too, was a victim of that extra spring in the pitch, as he climbed into a drive against Ball to snick another flying edge to Buttler. However, before his departure, he had demonstrated that Plunkett's pace and bounce could work in India's favour too, when he top-edged a pull that sailed over the keeper's head for six. And Jadhav was in the mood to take that tactic and run with it.
With Pandya a slap-happy accomplice, India's sixth-wicket pair camped themselves on the back foot and waited for England to bang the ball half-way down the track. From a dicey scoreline of 173 for 5, they carved 104 runs from the next 85 balls, with a fusillade of boundaries to keep an asking rate of nine an over in constant sight.
Jadhav smashed Woakes for back-to-back fours in his eighth over before bringing up his fifty with a stunning back-foot smash over long-on off Stokes from 46 balls, but Pandya was the revelation on this occasion - connecting with ferocity time and time again, not least with a duck-and-pull six over fine leg off Plunkett that brought up his maiden ODI fifty from 38 balls.
A change of plan was needed as India brought the requirement down below fifty with five overs remaining, and Stokes once again delivered, finding a fuller inswinging length to beat Pandya's ambitious wipe across the line and bowl him for 56 from 43 balls. One over later, Jadeja was gone as well, caught in the deep by Bairstow, but not before he had slaughtered Woakes' fuller length for two of the hardest-hit boundaries of the night.
Jadhav toasted Woakes' final delivery straight down the ground, making it 16 off the over, and leaving India needing a very gettable 27 from the final three overs. Morgan responded by turning back to Stokes - the man whose death skills had deserted him so fatefully on his previous appearance at this venue, in last year's World T20 final.
This time, Stokes responded with skill and nerve, limiting India to four singles - one of them a harshy judged wide - in an over that also included the scalp of Ravi Ashwin, caught off a steepling top-edge as he tried, but failed, to take on the length ball just as Carlos Brathwaite had so triumphantly achieved nine months earlier.
Still Jadhav wasn't done, inside-edging another four past the keeper to keep India within reach, but a diet of low full-tosses from Ball kept his more aggressive intentions at arm's length to leave Chris Woakes defending 16 runs from the final over of the night.
Cue Jadhav's most outrageous stroke of the night - an open-shouldered slam for six over wide long-off, to reduce the requirement to 10 from five, and revive agonising memories of Stokes' own implosion nine months earlier. When Jadhav followed up one ball later with another flat-bat for four over mid-off, Eden Gardens was ready for lift-off.
But Woakes and his captain Morgan weren't done yet, knowing full well that, at eight-down, one good delivery could still derail the chase. Instead, Woakes offered four, finding a consistently awkward length outside off that forced Jadhav to reach for his strokes. He reached, fatefully, with a drive into Billings' midriff at long-off, and with him went the game.
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