And just as the Australian cricket team lost coach Mickey Arthur early in this tour, so too had the Wallabies in this situation lost coach Daryl Haberecht to a heart attack.

And so it was at this point, on the morning of that third Test, with the coach in hospital, the stand-in Wallabies manager Ross Turnbull took control. First he asked the backs to leave the room, so that just he and the Wallabies forwards remained, staring back at him. They were hard men, such as Greg Cornelsen, Chris Handy, Gary Pearse and the great Garrick Fay.

''Look,'' Turnbull began, nodding dismissively to the door that the backs had just retreated behind, ''these Phantom comic-swappers and Minties-eaters, these blond-headed flyweights are one thing, and we will need them after the hard work's done. But the real stuff's got to be done right here by you blokes.''

Turnbull warmed to the theme that backs were backs, and there was nothing that could really be done about them as a species. They were a flim-flammy lot by their very nature, more prone to worrying about how their hair looked than making tackles, and never to be relied upon to do the grunt work always so crucial to victory. And that meant that the men, the Wallabies forwards, had to make up for them. They had to tackle as never before, push in the scrums as if their hearts would burst and charge at the opposition like bullocks bitten by bumble-bees, all game long! Then, and only then, could the backs have their little fancy runs and get their glory - but without the forwards smashing them first, there was no point.

The result, of course, was one of the most famous Wallabies victories of all, as the forwards ran riot, Cornelsen bagged no fewer than four tries, and they belted the All Blacks 30-16.

Are you with me? Can you see the parallels?

For this is precisely what must inspire Boof Lehmann's speech before the team takes the bus to Old Trafford this morning. (After all, Boof looks like a rugby forwards coach, sounds like a rugby forwards coach, and is perfect for the part.)

First thing is, he has to clear all the hangers-on out of the team room. I grant you, that may take half an hour or so before all the batting coaches, fielding coaches, bowling coaches, psychoanalysts, sports psychologists, statisticians, high performance managers, low performance managers and downright abysmal performance managers - oh, come on, you know they must have at least six of the last lot - are gone, but it has to be done. This will leave just the team.

And now to the task at hand, with a twist. For instead of then clearing out Australian cricket's answer to ''the Phantom comic-swappers and Minties-eaters, blond-headed flyweights'', they are precisely the ones he must now address. First putting the men on one side of the room, the hard-working bowlers who have toiled magnificently in the series so far, taking wickets and catches with just as much fervour and grunt as they have scored runs, he must turn his attention to the Australian batsmen, who have become cricket's answer to backs.

''You lot,'' Lehmann must begin, ''are a disgrace. You are heirs to the greatest Australian sporting tradition of the lot - batsmen in baggy green, grinding out runs against Englishmen in all conditions, grinding their hoity-toity noses into the pitch. You are following names like Victor Trumper, Bill Woodfull, Sir Donald Bradman, Keith Miller, Ian Chappell, Rick McCosker, Allan Border, Mark Taylor and Stephen Waugh, men who would sooner put a red-hot knitting needle in their ear than give away their wicket cheaply against Englishmen, and yet in this series so far, your collective net contribution has been three-fifths of sweet f--- all! Did you hear what Allan Border said about you the other day? Let me read it to you: 'Our major concern right now,' he said, 'is the performance of the top six. I could honestly say the nine, 10 and jack looked more competent than our one, two and three. If that was me in the top three I'd be embarrassed.' And if you're not embarrassed, you bloody well should be!

''The top scorer on tour so far is our No.11, Ashton Agar! Does that freaking tell you something or what? It is time to put down your Phantom comics, your Minties, your mobiles, your mirrors, your blow-dryers, your Marks & Spencer catalogues. It is time to stop admiring your tatts, stop having your pathetic little squabbles with each other, and actually get out there and grind! FIGHT for every run! WORK!''

Something like that, anyway.

Australia expects every man to do his duty, and if you can't beat the English, at the very least bring a piece of them home with you, to show your mother. Go, you bastards!

Twitter - @Peter_Fitz