Canterbury, 30th June - Australia securing their place in the NatWest Series final against England a little over a week ago, they won a hard-fought six-wicket victory over Bangladesh at Canterbury today. The Tigers playing in their final match of the tour in England have showed promise throughout and have gained nothing but confidence following their first ever victory against Australia in Cardiff. Match Scorecard

Winning the toss, Ponting had no hesitation in putting the opposition in to bad on a cloud covered day, hoping that the wicket would give his bowlers some assistance. It did and with Brett Lee running in at full speed, Bangladesh didn't know what had hit them in the first 10 overs.

With McGrath rested ahead of Saturday's final, Gillespie was given the new ball and before long had Javed Omar back in the pavilion without scoring, the Tiger falling to a Gilchrist catch behind the wicket. Omar was unable to take advantage of the earlier drop by Hayden in the slips.

Brett Lee bowled Tushar Imran first ball and took his second came a few overs later when he clean bowled Ashraful, the amazing youngster on his first full tour of England. The previous ball Ahsraful had played an amazing pull shot to send the ball crashing over the boundary rope for a maximum. Unfortunately for the Tiger he attempted a reckless shot the very next ball and a yorker put paid to his aspirations, Lee following through grinned at the youngster and celebrated with his team-mates.

Habibul Bashar collected five boundaries in a quickfire 30 before he gloving a rising delivery from Shane Watson (3-43), and he was soon followed back to the dressing room by Aftab Ahmed, who made only seven before Michael Kasprowicz found the edge to take the score to 5 for 75.

Shahriar Nafees played with pride scoring 75 off 116 balls, including six fours but when he fell to Watson the writing was on the wall for the Tigers. However Khaled Mashud and the lower order continued to battle against all odds and finally took the total to a very respectable 250, Mahmud falling for 22 on the final delivery of the innings and Mashmud remaining 71 not out.

Despite loosing Hayden for one when he was caught behind off Mashrafe Mortaza it was left to Adam Gilchrist to hit Bangladesh to all parts of the ground. With the score on 63 Gilchrist fell to a freaky catch, Mashmud's second of the game. Replays suggested that Gilchrist got nowhere near the ball which had hit the footholds and lobbed up to the slips courdon. Gilchrist ever the walker assumed he had hit the ball and left for the pavilion.

Martyn followed shortly after but Ponting and Clarke steadied the ship with an 85 run partnership before Ponting fell for 66.

Michael Clarke (80) and Andrew Symonds (42) followed Ricky Ponting's knock with an unbroken stand of 86 to steer them home on 254-4 with 11 balls to spare.

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