England's long and cheerless cricket tour of Australia ended with one last, resounding defeat Sunday when it was beaten by 84 runs in the third Twenty20 international.
An Ashes tour that began full of promise and optimism 100 days ago, crawled to a downbeat ending as Australia made 195-6, batting first after winning the toss, and dismissed England for 111 in 17.2 overs.
The win extended Australia's superiority over England in all forms the game, allowing it to follow a 5-0 sweep of the Ashes test series and 4-1 win in the one-day internationals with a 3-0 rout in the Twenty20 series. In 13 matches against Australia this summer, England won only once.
The England team that will leave Australia Monday seems a pale shadow of the one that arrived 3-1/2 months earlier, favored to win a fourth-straight Ashes series.
The tour had many casualties. leading batsman Jonathan Trott departed early after suffering from an anxiety-related illness; spinner Graeme Swann announced his retirement after the third test in which Australia completed a series victory and fast bowler Steven Finn returned home during the one-day series.
Test coach Andy Flower has already been forced from his job and Alastair Cook, who led England with increasing despair through the tests and ODIs, is uncertain whether he wants to continue as captain. Others, including batsman Kevin Pietersen, may be discarded as England attempts to rebuild after one of its most disastrous tours.
All the elements of its dismal summer were encapsulated in its defeat on Sunday. England's performance wasn't entirely without spirit but, just as it began to seem competitive, a couple of brilliant individual performances from the Australians took the match beyond its grasp.
Brief Scores
Australia: 195/6 (George Bailey 49*, Stuart Broad 3/30) beat England: 111 (Eoin Morgan 34, James Muirhead 2/13) by 84 runs.