Posted Thursday 08 July 2010

In the tightest result since the inauguration of the Mathematics Ashes, the United Kingdom team has retained the honours by a 72 to 68 margin over Australia, in the annual mathematics stoush between the two countries. So the urn and bragging rights will be at arm's length from the enthusiastic Australian team until the next event in 2011.

Both teams arrived in the futuristic Kazakhstan capital of Astana early for the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) to acclimatise, train together and compete for the Ashes urn containing the burnt scripts of the British team which lost the inaugural event in 2008.

The Australian team was confident of regaining the Ashes as their 2010 team includes a Gold, Silver and Bronze Medallist from the 2009 IMO and a further Bronze Medallist missing selection in a tight situation.

Both teams were tied on Problem 1, Australia outscored UK on the geometry Problem which followed, but UK recovered with a stronger performance on what was considered the most dificult Problem 3.

Australian scores were: