An Australian cricket supporter group has admitted responsibility for a fire-drill prank which forced the English team out of their hotel on the opening morning of the fourth Ashes Test.

Warren Livingston, head of the Fanatics, told The Sunday Telegraph that one of its 100-member group had set the fire alarm off at the Radisson SAS Hotel in Leeds at 4.30am, with the intention of disrupting the English team's sleep.

Livingstone described the prank as "good old-fashioned Aussie hijinks".