DLS drama: Australia win T20, and the Ashes, as rain halts match with five balls to go

Are you allowed to feel a tiny bit sorry for England? With just five balls to go, Heather Knight is on strike needing 18 runs,and the captain is absolutely desperate to fight back with her team.

Unfortunately, the rain is hammering down in Canberra and it will not stop. The umpires signal the end of the game. Australia celebrate, but it’s extremely muted, you know that they really wanted to finish that game out on the field. Instead, Australia win by six runs on the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern.

Tonight the weather played a larger role than either team would have wanted, but it means that Australia win the Ashes outright in Canberra and are on course to whitewash England in this series.

After the off-field distractions, England should take a lot of credit for how they responded tonight in Canberra, with Sophia Dunkley backing up her performance in Sydney with 32 and Dani Wyatt-Hodge playing beautifully with a well-taken half century.

Knight’s cool and collected 42 promised the real possibility that she could catch Australia in the last five balls, after slogging Annabel Sutherland’s first ball of the final over for four.

We will never know. What we do know is that the third Twenty20 in Adelaide in two days is perfectly set up. Knight and her team have not been short of motivation in the lead-up to this game, and tonight in Canberra they showed they are capable of fighting back, they will want even more of this attitude in South Australia.

Ahead of a historic Test in Melbourne, the Ashes series may be gone, but pride is still very much at stake.