Steven Finn has become the first England bowler to claim a hat-trick at a World Cup but the tournament got off to a bad start for Eoin Morgan’s men after Australia crushed them by 111 runs in Melbourne.

The Watford-born Middlesex paceman claimed the rare feat from the final three balls of the innings as Australia reached a mammoth total of 342 for nine.

The 25-year-old former Parmiter’s School pupil saw Brad Haddin caught at third-man by Stuart Broad and then Joe Root held a good diving catch on the rope after Glenn Maxwell lofted down the ground.

Mitchell Johnson then smacked the hat-trick ball to James Anderson, who took the first-ever England one-day international hat-trick against Pakistan at the Oval in 2003.

Finn finished the innings with figures of five for 71 as England conceded their highest ever score at a World Cup. And their day was to get quickly worse as Mitchell Marsh (five for 33) tore through the top and middle order to leave them on 73 for five and then 92 for six.

James Taylor (98 not out) and Chris Woakes (33) did offer some resistance, putting on 92 for the next wicket, but England’s fate was confirmed when Anderson was controversially run out with the score on 231, leaving Taylor stranded two runs short of a well-deserved century.