Vaughan still semi confident

A seven-wicket reverse at the Sir Vivian Richards stadium left England needing to win their three remaining games against Bangladesh, South Africa and West Indies to have any chance of qualifying for the semi-finals.

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It was England second successive defeat against Test-standard opposition and unlike Wednesday's two-run loss to Sri Lanka, which was sealed off the last ball, Australia cruised to victory with 16 deliveries remaining.

But despite the comprehensive margin of the defeat, Vaughan is adamant England are improving and expects them to reel off the consecutive victories required to be in the shake-up for the last four.

"I think we're very close to being a really good one-day team," stressed Vaughan. "We've lost two games against two good teams and we've put them under a lot of pressure.

"We're just not winning critical periods and doing enough during the whole game to win the match.

"That's disappointing and we'll need to play well against Bangladesh, South Africa and the West Indies and win those games, but we're certainly a team that can do that."

The turning point of the match was again another England batting collapse after Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell had forged a 140-run partnership to guide them to 163 for two with 20 overs remaining.

Instead of powering on to a major total, England lost three wickets in the next six overs and despite Kevin Pietersen's first one-day international century in 32 matches, were dismissed for a mid-range 247 with man of the match Shaun Tait claiming three for 41.

Australia never really looked back from a 57-run opening stand between Adam Gilchrist and Matthew Hayden, although it was a 112-run stand between captain Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke that effectively settled the issue.

"It's very frustrating," admitted Vaughan. "We went to bed at night after the Sri Lanka game thinking we should have won and I know we were in a great position to put Australia under a huge amount of pressure if we'd have got to 280 or 290.

"It was an unbelievable position to be in against Australia, we just didn't hammer home the advantage and we'll certainly come out fighting against Bangladesh.

"We know we have to win the next three games now, so it's sometimes a good thing to know exactly what you have to do to reach the next stage."

Ponting, who hit a superbly-paced 86 from 106 balls to set up Australia's victory, was delighted his side had come through the encounter and stretched their unbeaten run in World Cups to 24 matches.

"That was our biggest test," conceded Ponting, whose side have now regained the number one spot in the world rankings following the victory and South Africa's shock defeat by Bangladesh on Saturday.

"They looked like they were going to post a few more than they did, no doubt about that. It was important for us to hang in there, take the couple of wickets in a row and try to tighten things up around the field.

"That's the stage where the game really changed for us. If we had been chasing 270 or 280, which was probably pretty gettable from there, it would have been a really hard run chase."