MacGill made menace!

SYDNEY, Jan 5 (AP): Stuart MacGill was employed by England as a net bowler four years ago and Tuesday he finally made them pay for his art.

The 27-year-old overcame a controversial past littered with bans for bad-boy behaviour to become the highest wicket taker of Australia's sixth successive Ashes series.

England's hopes of reaching a record fourth-innings score of 287 to level the series turned to dust on the SCG pitch as MacGill claimed seven wickets in the second innings and 12-107 for the match. He ended the series with 27, having played just four of the five Tests.

With England's nemesis Shane Warne missing all but the final game, England might have expected some relief from wrist spin, which they are neither used to nor particularly skilled at playing.

Warne criticised the team during the fifth Test when he said it obvious his psychological edge remained over the tourists, who paid former Australian leg-spinner Peter Philpott to prepare them for the tour.

MacGill was another who had tried to help them out four years ago.

"The whole time they were in Western Australia, two or three weeks, I was employed as net bowler and used to hang out in the rooms with them," said MacGill. "I worked with each of them individually - fortunately they didn't remember any of it."

There was a large smack of good fortune in the way MacGill got the part-time job, and the lucky touch has remained with him through a short eight-Test career.

"I'd bowled to the English touring team the tour before in the '90-91 series, and then I bumped into Alec Stewart in a bar on the next series and he mentioned they were looking for bowlers," MacGill said.

MacGill, looking for more cricket work, took his skills to England for controversial stints in local leagues.

He was handed a life ban from Lancashire's Northern League in 1994, "for uncouth and ungentlemanly behaviour," after sledging opponents and swearing at umpires during his time with the St. Annes club.

The ban was partially lifted, allowing him to play elsewhere and he went to Tiverton in the Devon League in 1997. He was banned for three games at the end of the season after more on-field problems.

His hopes of playing county cricket for Somerset were damaged by his reputation, but he is keen to play more cricket in England.

He also seems to have curbed his temper on the field, although there are times when he is seething.

"When I'm bowling I just try and do my job and I feel taking wickets is my job, so I just get down to work," MacGill said of his approach.

But there is still something mischievous in England's latest destroyer, just like there is in Warne.

"I've played against England, which is something you joke about in the backyard, I've won the Ashes, which is overwhelming, and going on from there to not only take five wickets against England but to do it twice...," said MacGill. "I'd be uncontrollable if I got seven wickets in a Sydney grade game. God only knows what's going to happen this evening."