Anderson gets rid of Clarke at Edgbaston. What we’d have given for a Reiffel . Anderson gets rid of Clarke at Edgbaston. What we’d have given for a Reiffel . Image: Getty Images

Is that the captain’s failing?

No, I don’t think so … When you’ve got an inexperienced team your form fluctuates. The good sides even out their form so the distance between their worst and their best is never that much. In this Ashes series, the gap between Australia’s best and worst was huge. I don’t think that had anything to do with Ponting’s captaincy.

Ponting seemed to behave with considerable grace and dignity as a losing captain … 

I didn’t notice him being any different. He’s a pretty hard-nosed character and he comes across that way sometimes. People get the wrong idea. Look, he’s quite clearly the leader of that team. I don’t see anyone else doing a better job than him.

Should Cricket Australia be concerned over this loss? After all, they were beaten by an English team minus their best batsman (Kevin Pietersen) and with Andrew Flintoff operating on one leg.

Well, Australia should’ve beaten them, there’s no doubt about that. Is there concern? I’m sure CA will look at it pretty closely because you don’t like losing, especially when you’ve got the better team, and statistically you perform as the better team. But I don’t think it’ll be a major concern. They’re rebuilding a team and Australia’s still producing some good players; our first class cricket is still very strong. The good players will come through – it just takes time.

Once again, England’s superior mastery of the swinging ball was a factor in this series. Why do they swing the ball better?

They just get more practice at it. You don’t get a lot of statistics show that each of our guys did pretty well at what they were doing.

Australia now sits at number four on the ICC Test rankings. Do you think this new level of competitiveness will reinvigorate Test cricket?

Well, we’ll have to wait and see. The Twenty20 game seems to have taken over and you have to think the Test game might get pushed to the side a little … Look, Test cricket’s always going to be strong in England and Australia and probably South Africa.

It’s the other countries around the world where you wonder if it’s taken that seriously. That’s where the ICC’s work is going to be cut out – making sure there’s still interest for Test cricket in those other countries.