Geoffrey Boycott: Last laugh on unbelievably bad Aussies

Australia's David Warner makes his way from the pitch after losing his wicket for 64. Photo / AP

I cannot believe that before this series started I picked Australia to win 2-1. If I had seen how badly Australia bat against the moving ball, I would have run to the bookies to put money on England.

They are so bad it is unbelievable. They do not learn and last night were on the verge of another embarrassing defeat.

Australia should have done their homework on the lateral movement you get in England from good seam bowlers such as Stuart Broad and James Anderson.

It's not as if Australia didn't know it will seam and swing in England and the likes of Bob Massie, Terry Alderman Glenn McGrath were lethal on English pitches.

You cannot just turn up in England and expect pitches to be exactly like Australia, hope the sun is going to shine at 90 degrees and you will bat under blue skies. That does not happen.

There are times in England when you have to graft and work hard for your runs. I have no sympathy for them. They came here cock-a-hoop and gloating after beating us 5-0. They derided England and some of their players slagged us off whenever they could.

But the last laugh is on them. They have been so poor in batting that maybe we should play four or five of our second-teamers at the Oval so we can give them some experience and see how they go against this second-class Australian team. Obviously England will not do that, but this lot are so bad I think we would still win if they did.

Just look at how they have performed away from the flat pitch of Lord's.

Australia's most prolific batsman over the past 12 months, Steve Smith, has played like a novice. He is a flat-track bully on easy batting pitches but in six innings on the three test-match pitches where the ball has moved laterally, he has shown bad technique, poor shot selection and an inability to graft or work for runs. In those six innings he has scored 92 runs. Pathetic.

His second-innings dismissal here was unbelievably stupid. He was caught at cover-point trying to smash a good-length ball on the up having just come to the crease following a failure in the first innings and with his team trying to battle for credibility.

As the vice-captain and the next leader of the team what sort of message does that send to your team-mates?

Michael Clarke has moved down to No5 because of a lack of runs and the fact the short ball is playing tricks with his mind. There is no doubt the shot he played to get out in the second innings was because he just had a bouncer the ball before and had played it badly.

You cannot play test cricket thinking all the time about the next short ball that is going to be aimed at your head. I question whether he is ever going to come back from this. He looks shot mentally.

Then we have Shaun Marsh. He made a mistake going hard at the ball in the first innings. That is human. It happens.

But to make the same mistake going hard at the ball in the second innings is brainless. He has played 15 tests, had 28 innings and scored eight ducks. No wonder. Playing like that shows that he is neither smart nor a good learner.

But Australia's terrible cricket should not take away from the performances of Broad and Ben Stokes.

If Broad keeps bowling this well, he will take 500 test wickets - he is only 29. But if England want to be the best test team in the world, they have to think seriously of taking Broad and Anderson out of one-day cricket. They did not play earlier in the summer against New Zealand. They were rested. Look how fresh and good they have been ever since.