This was not the sort of preparation Australia would have wished for in their penultimate match before the limited-overs NatWest series. They were beaten comfortably, by six wickets, by second division county Middlesex.

Chasing a modest 233, the Middlesex batsmen seemed to be in no trouble at any stage against the six bowlers that the tourists used. Australia's sole early success came in the sixth over when Andy Strauss (15) skied his drive to extra cover off Nathan Bracken. Thereafter, the match was almost entirely in Middlesex's control.

With the entertaining strokeplay in their century, second wicket, stand, Ben Hutton and Owais Shah, both in excellent form this season, took the game away from Australia. Hutton took 76 balls for his half-century and Shah needed six less, hitting four boundaries.

When Shah decided to give the charge to Shane Warne and missed the ball to be stumped by a yard, Middlesex needed 87 from twenty overs. Hutton, on 73, was unlucky to have a straight drive from Robin Weston, deflected on to his stumps as he backed up for a run and Middlesex were 170 for three.

The only other wicket to fall was that off Simon Cook for a quick 20. He had made his intentions clear when he swept his first ball for the only six of the innings.

Finally, with Weston on 36 from 46 balls, Michael Roseberry hit the winning runs with a boundary to square leg to see Middlesex home with seventeen balls to spare.

Australia's batsmen, having been asked to bat earlier on a slowish wicket at Lord's, failed to make much of an impression until the late stand between Ian Harvey and Jason Gillespie.

Their first two wickets went down on 17 and 36, both taken by James Hewitt. Matthew Hayden was the first to go for three, mistiming his pull, followed by Mark Waugh for 14. With Steve Waugh out for four and Damien Martyn for 19, the Australians had slumped to 78 for four.

Harvey and Gillespie's ninth-wicket partnership of 75 boosted the Australian total to 232 with Harvey in brilliant hard-hitting form. He came to the crease after half the side had been dismissed for 106 in only twenty overs and then two runs later he saw the dismissal of another One-Day specialist, Andy Symonds, leg before to Cook who eventually finished with three wickets, as did off-spinner Paul Weekes.

Although there wasn't another substantial partnership in the innings, there was one brilliant display of aggressive strokes. Ricky Ponting, such a delight to watch when he is in full flow, needed only 47 balls to hit 57 and all but nine of those runs come from boundaries.

Ponting's 50 came with one of the best shots of his innings, a beautifully timed drive for four to long off. The stroke also brought the hundred up, in the eighteenth over.

Harvey's 84 runs, exactly half of which came from boundaries, included the only six of the innings when Hutton was hit to mid-wicket. He faced as few as 65 balls during his entertaining knock and showed how particularly strong he is on the leg side.

Gillespie, having given excellent support to Harvey, remained not out with 19 as the Australians were dismissed for 232 in 44.2 overs.

Afterwards Ben Hutton credited his winter playing grade cricket in Australia as the reason for his breakthrough this year, and acknowledged his family pedigree: "It's really good to carry on the tradition of scoring runs against the Aussies.

"Before I went I hadn't backed myself enough and while I was out there I developed a new Australian attitude and began to believe in myself. I started to value each innings as you only got the chance to bat once every two weeks."

Ian Harvey admitted the tourists were disappointed, but stressed that this was a warm-up game and that the team would improve.

"The whole side will have learned from today," he said. "We wanted some guys to have time out batting and bowling in the middle. But we are disappointed we have lost, we came here to win.

"We are the world champions and if you are to be the best in the world you need to win 99% of your games."

© CricInfo