England aware they will have to be at their best as they face best

Alastair Cook’s men, who completed England’s sixth successive ODI series victory on home soil when the third and final match against the West Indies was washed out at Headingley last Friday, were unsurprisingly retained in their entirety yesterday.

The selectors have stuck with the original list of 14 players, who beat the West Indies 2-0, for a five-match series set to get under way at Lord’s on Friday.

There was minor controversy when England chose to rest frontline bowlers Stuart Broad, Tim Bresnan and Graeme Swann for Leeds – with the three-match series against the West Indies already in the bag – as part of the ongoing rotation policy to try to prevent player burn-out in a packed international schedule.

But the prospect of such circumstances being repeated against Australia, joint-hosts of the next World Cup in 2015, are remote.

England know they will do well to keep the winning home record intact at all against opponents in flux but nonetheless well-staffed in pace-bowling resources in particular, let alone surge into an unassailable lead in the first three matches.

Cook’s team, who also have a perfect record in their six ODIs this year following an unexpected whitewash of Pakistan in the United Arab Emirates in February, have nonetheless gone to extremes in the 50-over format in recent times, including a 5-0 humbling in India last autumn.

Captain Cook, who along with Ravi Bopara has been released to play in Essex’s floodlit match against Australia at Chelmsford tonight, admitted last week that England’s Ashes rivals, the last team to beat them on these shores, back in September 2009, represent a significant measure of their 50-over progress.

He described it, after England’s Twenty20 win over the West Indies in Nottingham on Sunday, as “a big series for us as a one-day team”.

National selector Geoff Miller echoed those thoughts after yesterday’s squad announcement.

“The series win against the West Indies was pleasing, and we are making steady progress in one-day cricket with a sixth straight series victory on home soil,” he said.

“Australia are a strong one-day side, and I’ve no doubt this will be a challenging NatWest series for us. Playing against the No 1 ranked one-day side in the world is an excellent test for us.”

Middlesex pair Steven Finn and Eoin Morgan have also been released for games tonight as has Somerset’s Craig Kieswetter.