“Australia’s cricket is low on confidence, that’s the main reason why we’re currently struggling,” former captain Adam Gilchrist told The Telegraph on Friday evening.

Speaking at the MCG, Gilchrist agreed that the defensive batting in the ODI series had been very un-Australia like.

“With no Steve Smith and David Warner, it’s a struggle. We don’t have the quality of batsmen, with the required confidence, to attack and it just hasn’t helped that (white-ball captain) Aaron Finch is woefully out of form...

“There are a couple of players who can do the job, but they are actually playing for places. They’re playing for their spots. So, it’s not a nice picture at all,” Gilchrist, an awesome game-changer, conceded.

Gilchrist is hopeful that things would be settled by the time the World Cup begins, at the end of May, but what if Smith hasn’t recovered 100 per cent from surgery as a result of an injury in the BPL?

“In that case, it will be a bigger struggle. I hope that isn’t so, for we have an exceptional record in the World Cup, having won it five times,” Gilchrist replied.

Initially, there was talk that Warner too needed surgery, but he played for his franchise, the Sylhet Sixers, during the day.

Fingers would, clearly, have to be kept crossed for a long time. Across Australia, that is.