In the first flushes of Bazball, it would have seemed unthinkable that a team led by Stokes could be as badly beaten as they have been here, but that is the reality with the Ashes lost in eleven days, a record Stokes now holds jointly with Nasser Hussain. The difference is that the 2002-03 Australians were a truly great team, whereas England’s lack of readiness, a failure for which the management are accountable, has made this Australian team appear so.

Immediately after the match, Brendon McCullum called Australia “strong, formidable and precise” and admitted that he had “not got everything right” as coach and that the preparation was flawed. In both regards, he is right: Australia were precise, especially with the ball and in the field where they held high standards for much longer periods, while England’s lack of cricket, a failure of planning and rigour, left them playing catch-up.

To paraphrase the legendary investor, Sir John Templeton, the four most dangerous words in English cricket could be: “This time it’s different.” England hoped that a different way of preparing and playing would lead to a different outcome from the last three Ashes tours, but they have imploded as badly as those before them, and as dramatically as any of the frothy market bubbles Templeton was warning about.

With two matches to go, this has been just as disappointing as any of those tours, maybe more so simply because expectations were realistically high and Australia were a team with flaws to exploit. Len Hutton, an Ashes-winning captain, on top down under in 1954-55, once said that a team had to play 25 per cent better than its best to win in Australia, but England have been 25 per cent worse than their capabilities. They simply haven’t done themselves justice.

This will be the cue for some to bleat about the failings of domestic cricket, but that should be avoided. Stokes had the players to lay down a decent challenge here, but they arrived at the Perth Test ill-prepared for what was to come, which resulted in them being woefully short of match-readiness for the toughest challenge in cricket.

The batsmen were caught short by the extra bounce, having prepared for it initially in one-day cricket in New Zealand and then on a club ground on the outskirts of Perth. As the series has gone on, the bowlers have looked a long way from being ready for a five-match series, despite the relatively low workload. As a comparison, in the first three Tests of the 1994-95 Ashes, Darren Gough bowled 152 overs. Here, Jofra Archer and Brydon Carse, the most used, have bowled 80 each.

At least, on the final day, there was the kind of fight Stokes had called for before the game, a sense of pride restored and, just occasionally, space for the thought that a miracle might happen. A combination of Jamie Smith, finding his true form at last, and Jacks, battling as well as he had in the second innings at the Gabba, and a 40-minute dollop of rain, meant Australia were forced to wait for almost two hours and the second new ball for their only wicket of the morning.

They also had to do without Nathan Lyon from the 77th over onwards, after he injured his hamstring diving on the boundary edge. He likely to miss the rest of the series. In the absence of Lyon, Mitchell Starc stepped up superbly again, as he did in the first two Tests when Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood were missing. Starc took three of the final four wickets to fall, including his 50th of the calendar year, the most of any bowler. He is enjoying an outstanding series.

Having struggled with the bat until now, Smith offered a reminder of why he is held in such high regard. He made 60 and looked untroubled until heaving Starc to mid-on, having taken four successive boundaries. There was no sense that Australia were panicking, but with Lyon injured and the pitch docile, there was a sense of relief for Cummins when he pouched the catch, as Smith took a calculated — and fair — gamble to press on. Like Zak Crawley the day before, his tempo through the morning suited the circumstances.

Jacks then added a further 52 for the eighth wicket with Carse and brought the target below three-figures, much against expectation, and it took a wondrous slip catch from Labuschagne to snuff out the recovery and put Australia on the cusp of victory. Jacks couldn’t quite believe it when, having pushed forward to Starc, Labuschagne flew to his left across Alex Carey to take another superlative one-handed catch and steal one from under the wicketkeeper’s nose.

It was all too little, too late. This match was not lost on the final day, but in the collapse either side of lunch on the second, when, in perfect batting conditions and on a roasting hot day, England’s top-order failed to fire again. For Melbourne, it is likely that Ollie Pope will pay the penalty for that, losing his place for a second consecutive Ashes tour.

Stokes described himself as “deflated” immediately after the game but promised that his team would “fly into” the final two Tests, for the thousands of England supporters who will make their way to Melbourne and Sydney. Joe Root, enduring his 21st defeat in the Ashes, and Stokes, remain without a win in Australia, remarkably, and this is now England’s 16th defeat in 18 Tests in the country since the end of the 2010-11 series. Australia haven’t won a series in England since 2001, but they have at least been competitive away from home.

Rob Key said “buckle up and get ready for the ride” on appointing McCullum and Stokes and it was, undeniably, a thrilling, intoxicating journey for a while. Let’s be honest, everyone was ready for it after the suffocating Covid years and the moribund end to the Chris Silverwood and Root era when England played timid cricket, all too frightened of their own shadow. Whatever happens next, it is to be hoped that there is no return to that.

But cracks had already started to show before this tour: with this defeat in Adelaide, they have now lost more matches than they have won since the start of 2024. Since that point, against the best teams, they have come up well short: thrashed in India and held to an unsatisfactory draw by them at home and now thrashed here in Australia.

The biggest fascination for me about “Bazball” was always whether what might be called “no consequence”, carefree cricket could hold up under the fiercest pressure. Test cricket is a brutal game, and, especially here in Australia, it exposes every weakness. Could such an approach keep the mental demons at bay? After a run of low scores, for example, with so much at stake, would it be possible to keep playing with such abandon?

The answer, clearly, has been no. The harsh realities of professional sport have resurfaced and swamped them. Australia, doing the basics and fundamentals well for long periods, have been too good. Talking about the dressing toom being no place for weak men and demanding more mongrel and “dog” was a long way from where Stokes started as England captain. He is not the first, and won’t be the last, to lose his bearings here.