'It's gone from bad to worse'

The Australian captain, Steve Waugh, described England's 384-run defeat at the Gabba in Brisbane as "devastating" for the tourists.

Nasser Hussain's men were humiliated in front of the Australians, and Waugh is unsure if the visitors will have the mettle to bounce back to make the series competitive.

"I'm sure England will find it hard to come back from this," he claimed. "It was a pretty devastating loss, but that's why you play Test cricket – to really test yourself and see if you can come back from adversity and they certainly find themselves in a tough position now."

It does not bode well for England that the hosts have no intention of easing up.

"We've got to maintain our standards and keep putting pressure on them," Waugh said. "It was an excellent win for us. To bowl a side out that cheaply is always pretty special but we've done it a few times now so maybe that takes a bit of the gloss off it."

The former England captain Ian Botham criticised England's players as being like "startled rabbits" after they were dismissed for 79.

"After day two I still thought they had a very good chance of saving this game – and we should have done. But the Australians, they don't relent. They're at you all the time and in your face and you can't make mistakes as we did on day one.

"The captain made a mistake with the toss which he has put his hand up for, but have the bowlers put their hand up for the way they bowled on that first day? It was disgraceful. It was substandard and they looked like startled rabbits out there."

Mike Gatting, another former England captain, added: "We made a boo-boo on the first day. Nasser cited his reason as giving his inexperienced side two hours to try to get into the Aussies. My argument is that if you bat and you've got 500 on the board then that will get the bowlers much more relaxed.

"It has just been one of those tours where everything seems to have gone from bad to worse. It all seems to be mounting up."