England Cruise to Consolation Win Over South Africa

It might not quite be a case of all's well that ends well, but England finished a difficult summer on a positive note with a comfortably six-wicket victory over South Africa at The Oval today. England resumed on naught for naught, chasing 197, but an opening partnership of 123 between Andrew Strauss and Alastair Cook killed whatever hope South Africa had of a 3-0 series victory.

After a slow start, with only 10 runs coming from the first 10 overs of the innings, Cook took control with a series of majestic pull strokes. For the fourth Test in a row he reached a confident half-century; for the fourth Test in a row he failed to turn it into a century. On 67, Cook stretched to drive a slightly wider delivery from Makhaya Ntini but could only snick it through to Graeme Smith at first slip.

Ian Bell, walking across his stumps to Ntini, was bowled round his legs in embarrassing fashion for four, and there was the merest hint of a collapse when, two balls later, Strauss inside-edged Paul Harris to leg slip.

That made it 147 for three, with 50 still needed, but a liberated Paul Collingwood played some positive strokes in his unbeaten 25. And even the tame dismissal of the captain Kevin Pietersen, caught at short leg off Harris, could not dampen a mood of benign contentment.

Andrew Flintoff finished the match in style, clouting Harris for a perfectly straight six, and Pietersen, who was the man of the match and England's man of the series, was all smiles as he shook hands with the South Africans.

He knows that tougher challenges await him, not least in England's next Test series in India, but he could hardly have got off to a more satisfying start.