More woe for England as Australia continue winning run

Posted: Tuesday 1st December 2009 | 11:35

AUSTRALIA inflicted more misery on England with a comeback victory at the Champions Trophy in Melbourne.

FOCUS: England defend a penalty corner during their 2-1 defeat to Australia at the ABN AMRO Champions Trophy (Grant Treeby/EHB)

Their winning streak now stretches two decades but they were made to work by Jason Lee's European champions.

England were without James Tindall, who injured his foot during the 3-3 draw with Spain, while James Fair was back in goal after spending the last match on the bench.

Iain Mackay steered England into a 13th minute lead but the defending champions - unbeaten in their last six Champions Trophy matches - stormed back.

Penalty corner specialist Grant Schubert equalised with his fourth goal of the tournament, to move alongside Spain's Xavier Ribas and Germany's Jan-Marco Montag at the top of the scoring charts.

And Des Abbott netted his second goal of the tournament - just ten minutes from time - to secure the points.

“Whilst we’re obviously disappointed to lose the match we weren’t at our best today and yet were still very competitive and pushed Australia hard," said England assistant coach Dave Bunyan.

"We played well in spells and although we know that there are improvements to be made we’re fairly happy with that.”

Elsewhere, Germany edged a tight tussle with Spain, who had led 3-1, to emerge 5-4 winners.

And Holland failed to rally, following their heavy defeat by Australia, as they slipped to a 2-1 loss against Korea, whose captain Seo Jong Ho netted the winning goal.

The Dutch side are next up for Lee's team - and he fears they are still smarting from their European Championship semi-final defeat in Amstelveen earlier this year.

"They had nine penalty corners in the semi-final and didn't score one of them and they think that's why they didn't beat us," said Lee.

"It was quite embarrassing for them to lose at their own ground. They received quite a lot of criticism for it as well so I'm sure they will want to get their own back.

"Their under 21 team won the world cup last year and I know they're taking a few of that team to replace some of the senior players so they'll be hungry."