A combination of the way the Aussies play by nature, as well as the culture of T20 Cricket has cost the Series. Apart from Rogers and Smith at Lords, Warner got a couple of starts, but not a great deal else from the others, the tail showed more fight than the top order. For as long as i can remember the Australian batters love to come hard at the ball, whether it's in defense or attack, growing up on true, bouncy pitches, suits that style of batting. The evolution of T20 encourages to score at least a run-a-ball, even in Test Matches. Cardiff, Edgbaston and Trent Bridge swung/seamed and as a result, the current squad of Aussie batsmen showed a lack of patience, discipline and shot-selection. This line-up needed a Allan Border or Steve Waugh in the middle-order to show some fight and bat with the tail.

Continued... what i was saying is this. Aussie got bundled out because they want to dominant and aggressive in scoring. When things are not in favor you have to play smart. Even though it looks like technique issue , its not. They should not attack ball that early. That caused the problem. You have to grind and you have let the ball come to you or leave as many possible. Its about survival not ego issue. What i am saying is aussie played brainless cricket because there is void in leadership. When your captain is not scoring , his words become meaningless babble. Aussies must make smith captain and let clarke play as specialist batsman at 6. Ya hide him for now or bring joe burns. Aussies gave up wicket without fighting for it. Clarke throw away his wicket in frustration. I do not think aussies are bad even in this conditions. Its lack of leadership caused this collapse not technical issue even thought it seems like it is.

I completely disagree with your assessment. But your job is to write about symptoms , my theory is based on what caused it. Aussies have batting coaches and great players advising them on how to play swinging ball. Play late, soft and leave. Its not even habit problem of whacking the ball. Its mental issue and lack of leadership. Aussies have this arrogance of trying to be dominant. They did not judge the pitch and buy time. They try to force it by being aggressive. When ball swinging you can't be aggressive. You have to be outsmart the conditons and wait for ball to go soft. This simple basic stuff not executed because clarke did not lead them. if smith would have been captain , he would advise team on the spot buy time and hunkered down. Smith is all about brain. Clarke is all about luck and his luck ran out. Can aussie play well in second inning? Conditions dictate actually. If ball swinging and they might go same way because clarke is still capatin and no one in the team trust him.

I wish you guys had not stopped publishing text version of his interviews.

I wonder how much time is taking up with drinks breaks? Every time a wicket fall the reserve player run out with drinks. Every time there is a review he brought the drinks out. He gave drinks to the fielder fielding on the boundry. Every minor interruption he will bring the drinks out. Why do there is still a need for drinks break?

Mediocre bowling all around barring Steyn and to an extent Anderson (in England). Even a mildly good ball will get most batsmen out these days it looks like. Just see what is happening to Smith and Gary Ballance. The Indians and West Indians bowled incredibly poorly and Gary Ballance became the next David Gower. Add to this there is the habit of messing around with pitches. Over the past 5 years the quality of test match bowling has been quite poor. There is no point is quoting statistics of Mitchell Johnson or any body else; they all have been good in small patches. The same with batsmen;Root, Kohli, Smith etc. All of them will be found out or have been found out very soon. It is also hilarious to say that this series is closely fought!

Mr, Boycott ,a question for you right after Australia's abysmal first innings.. what happened to the players of Steve Waugh's caliber in this side who can bat with a broken arm and can still score two centuries... its not as if the bowlers are bowling so good these batsmen are just fishing their bat outside off stump like anything !!! can't they curb their natural instincts ?? why can't they just sweat it out!!

I agree with him to some extent, but it's also due to batsmen being too inflexible with their mindset and technique: they develop such for one version of cricket, and suddenly find it's not so useful in another. "Playing your natural game" is good if your natural game can be usefully applied everywhere. All these versions of cricket are steadily diverging and thus the techiques and methods are necessarily different. Only truly excellent players can really perform consistently across all forms. Otherwise, get ready for a batting collapse.

Question for Boycott - How can the over rate increase with the imminent arrival of more time consuming "advancements" like DRS?

It's always good to listen to the one person in cricket who speaks knowledgeably & openly. What you say about County Cricket & the related problems applies in exactly the same way to the Sheffield Shield. A lot of Test "batsmen" would have been seen as easy picking in grade cricket in the past because they have really poor technique - poor footwork, head/foot nowhere near the ball, massive gap between bat and pad. It's easy to see why - lots of international cricket, predominance of short-form games, flat pitches, thick bats, short boundaries, short-term thinking & greed on the part of administrators. The current Tests are interesting in that they're unpredictable, but on the whole the cricket is rubbish with the occasional bit of brilliance. Root's 100 in Cardiff was decent but he was within a hair's breadth of being out about 5 times & he's one of the best going around. If this trend keeps up we'll have three types of cricket - half day, 1-day and 2-day. Some balance is needed.