Cricket: God save this graceless team

England's fall from grace has been almost as swift as their Phoenix-like rise from the Ashes. Widely expected to gobble up Sri Lanka and Pakistan this summer as a tasty subcontinental entree before venturing south for the Ashes, England instead face humiliation on the home front.

It drew the test series against Sri Lanka one-all after being comprehensively Murali-ed on the final day of the third test and faced a whitewash in the five-match one-day series which was completed overnight.

Worse, it is heading into a series against the talented Pakistanis without captain Michael Vaughan and a host of other incapacitated players.

While this is bad news for England and the game as a whole, it is possibly very good news for New Zealand.

Not only will they potentially meet a down-on-confidence England side during the VB series in Australia next summer - but England are in the Black Caps' pool at the World Cup in the West Indies next March.

Reaching the finals of the VB series is both lucrative and a great warm-up for the pressures of the World Cup. At present, New Zealand and Australia look streets ahead in their one-day development.

Rewind to a year ago and the England team was matching the Australians in the one-day arena and beating them in the Ashes, prompting an open-top bus parade through London to Trafalgar Square, where hundreds of thousands of fans rejoiced.

Should this England team embark on another such journey tomorrow they would turn the corner to be greeted by the odd Spanish tourist and a loft of pigeons.

The English press, flushed after their bylines for once usurped the football correspondents for the right to the back page, have been overwhelmed by gloom.

"A malaise has set in for which the only cure is a return to winning ways, though quite how that might be achieved is not apparent," wrote Derek Pringle in the Telegraph following the fourth defeat in a row.

Mike Walters in the Mirror was even more caustic: "Ten months ago, Lancashire turned away 30,000 for the final day of the Ashes thriller. But last night, the queues snaking round Old Trafford were those trying to flee another bankrupt performance."

How much of their demise can be put down to Vaughan's absence can only be speculated upon.

The 31-year-old right-hander might come across as a dour Yorkshireman, about as inspiring as that county's famous puddings, but his loss to England has been enormous - and not just for the runs he frequently brings to the top of the order.

He has a relaxed style of leadership and his best players, particularly Andrew Flintoff and Steve Harmison, have thrived after the dictatorial days of Nasser Hussain. Nobody, not Flintoff, Andrew Strauss nor Marcus Trescothick, has been able to recreate that environment.

Now it appears Vaughan will need a miracle to be ready in time for the Ashes after yet another knee operation this week, meaning instead of a fill-in skipper, England are forced to look for a genuine leader. Nobody is rushing to put their hand up.

Vaughan is one of several senior players on England's sick list with all-rounder Flintoff (ankle), left-arm spinner Ashley Giles (hip), fast bowlers Simon Jones (knee) and James Anderson (back) also ruled out of the one-day series with Sri Lanka, during which batsman Kevin Pietersen (knee) and Paul Collingwood (thigh) were the latest to sustain injuries.

Although there might be an element of schadenfreude, particularly given that New Zealand suffers similarly on the injury front, England's rapid fall is probably the last thing the game's leaders wanted to see.

Last year's Ashes captivated the cricket world in a way not seen before. Satellite television beamed the matches around the cricket world.

Enthralled audiences watched Australia's hegemony challenged by a team inspired by Flintoff, the most charismatic English cricketer since Ian Botham.

The Australians are circling, with Steve Waugh, Geoff Lawson and Rodney Hogg all recently saying England look dead in the water. "Put your house, and mine, on Australia to win - and win comfortably," Lawson crowed. Problem is, it doesn't look like he'll be made to eat crow.