England collapse like a house of cards on uneven ground in a gale

It's almost enough to make you agree with Duncan Fletcher. England's tail is as robust as filo pastry at the minute. At least they've made progress in that the tail starts at seven now, rather than six. This is because Andrew Flintoff actually did a bit of batting. In fact he did so rather well.

What hope has he got though, when the batsmen following him score 2, 0, 2, 0 and 0. In our review of 2006, we highlighted Paul Collingwood's last wicket stand with Monty Panesar against India as a high point. A bit of robust defence from the lower order demoralises the opposition. Conversely, regular wickets gee them up. England's current lower order smacks of the Alan Mullally years.

England 291 all out
Australia 188-4

Shane Warne bats England to death

In marked contrast to England's duck-and-two-scoring lower-order, Australia's tail wagged. Only that phrase is redundant - Australia don't have a tail; they have lower-order batsmen.

Stuart Clark, batting at 10, hit 35 and Shane Warne hit 71 in what may prove to be his swansong innings. Whereas England scrabbled desperately from 245-5 to 291 all out, Australia flew joyfully from 190-5 to 393 all out.

There have been many differences between these two sides during this series, but this a marked one. It's emblematic of many of England's failings. While their lower-order batting hasn't been the worst in history, it's never achieved anything unexpected. If you've any ambition to be the best, you can't be a slave to expectation.