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Aussie media gloomy over ‘painful’ T20 loss

SYDNEY - Australian media on Tuesday admitted the World Twenty20 final defeat to England “hurts” and hoped it did not foreshadow more pain in this year’s Ashes series against their arch-rivals.

Low-key newspaper coverage also predicted the axe for captain Michael Clarke, whose failure with the bat helped England secure their first ever world cricket title by seven wickets in Barbados.

Sydney’s Daily Telegraph ran a picture of the dejected Clarke standing in front of England’s celebrating players, under the headline, “Poms target Ashes after our painful Twenty20 hiding”.

“It’s not like losing the Ashes — but it still hurts,” the story read. “Against England, it always does.”

Victoria captain Cameron White was tagged as favourite to replace Clarke, who is suddenly in the firing line despite Australia’s positive tournament including a memorable semi-final win over Pakistan with just a ball to spare.

The Telegraph found echoes in England’s Ashes victory last year, and gloomily pondered whether Sunday’s result was a precursor of this year’s Test series.

“As England romped to their seven-wicket win, the sounds of an enraptured Barmy Army echoed around Kensington Oval in such a manner that you thought, for a second, you were back at The Oval when England reclaimed the Ashes last August,” said the article headlined “Dead and buried”.

“While they mightn’t have been kissing a little urn and soaking themselves in champagne, that they were on a victory dais holding a piece of silverware at Australia’s expense provided a disturbing mental image of what could lie ahead.”

The Sydney Morning Herald ran with the headline: “Clarke in firing line after final capitulation”, while The Australian’s back-page story was titled, “T20 defeat puts heat on Clarke’s future”.