From The Observer, 23/11/2003 The Observer Richard Beard Sunday November 23, 2003 It mattered so much, and it turned out so well. I don't know which was harder to believe, that England won or that it could matter so much in the first place. Whatever the differences between Australia and England as nations, this week has proved that we have one fundamental weakness in common: we get far too uptight about sporting fixtures. But at last, after so long, in this area of human behaviour known as sport, we have managed to behave more successfully than the Australians. If it sometimes seemed, in the excitement of yesterday's final, that the identity of each individual spectator and ultimately of the nation