For those who foresaw demise, think again. The emotional farewell to Test cricket at Sydney almost a year ago of Shane Warne (708 wickets), Glenn McGrath (563) and Justin Langer (7,696 runs) was supposed to have heralded a new era, one in which Australia did not simply brush aside the opposition like a pesky fly in the out-back. Instead, the world champions have evolved with frightening efficiency.

If they beat India at the SCG in the second Test starting on Wednesday, Australia will equal their own world record of 16 straight wins, set under the captaincy of Steve Waugh between October 1999 and February 2001. Even with India’s spin bowling strength at a venue that usually helps the slow men, few would bet against Ricky Ponting’s side drawing level. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, it was not meant to be like this. But then perhaps the rest of the world ought to have known better, for no cricket culture has ever operated within such a heady atmosphere of tradition, dedication and sheer relentlessness as Australia and its baggy green. First under Waugh, now under Ponting, they have rendered redundant the notion that success and failure come in cycles. A hat-trick of Test wins since the Ashes – a 2-0 win over England’s conquerors, Sri Lanka, followed by yesterday’s 337-run mauling of India at Melbourne – suggests Australia possess the quality of the Hydra. Regeneration is a fact of life.

Central to the seamless transition in the post-Warne/McGrath/ Langer era (not to mention Damien Martyn, who surprised everyone by retiring after the second Ashes Test at Adelaide), has been an attack still capable of taking 20 wickets. Warne and McGrath did it with their eyes shut, but now Brett Lee, for so long a fast-bowling loose cannon, has added thrift to his natural wicket-taking ability. While claiming 22 scalps in three Tests – including five bags of four – he has conceded just 2.88 runs per over; before that, he had gone at 3.58. Perhaps McGrath bequeathed him his metronome; perhaps responsibility has focused a mind that has occasionally erred towards hot-headedness.

Whatever the reason, Lee’s new-found parsimony has taken the pressure off his rookie new-ball partner, Mitchell Johnson, who eased into Test cricket on the back of 25 one-day internationals and now looks the part at the highest level too. In the first innings against India he began with five successive maidens to Rahul Dravid before having him caught off a no-ball; in the second, he cleaned up the lower-middle order with chilling matter-of-factness. At 26, he is yet to peak: an Ashes tour in 2009 awaits.

But the biggest improvement in the new Australia is the quality of their first-change seam bowling. Their most glaring weakness in England in 2005 is now a strength, thanks to the McGrath-like meanness and pigeon-toed fast-medium pace of Stuart Clark, who would not know how to spray it around if you handed him a leaky hose. Injuries and a hernia operation stunted his progress after he had earned a central contract in 2002, but his late arrival on the international scene – he played his first Test at Cape Town aged 30, and duly recorded the third-best figures by an Australian debutant – has channelled the hunger. Figures in India’s first innings of 15-4-28-4 (his victims look good on the CV: Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh and Mahendra Singh Dhoni) were quintessential Clark. His 59 Test victims in 12 games have cost only 19 runs apiece. Just as relevant is his economy-rate of 2.53, only a fraction more expensive than McGrath (2.49). And, unlike McGrath, Clark – a former real-estate agent studying for a masters in commerce – is virtually unflappable. Warne was always going to be a harder hole to fill because of the uniqueness of his gifts, and Stuart MacGill’s struggles against Sri Lanka (five wickets at 65) revealed a missing piece in the jigsaw. But an injury to his spinning hand opened the door for Brad Hogg, a purveyor of Chinamen who made his one-day international debut in 1996. It was typically Australian that, after some harsh treatment at the hands of Tendulkar, Hogg came back to take four wickets in Sydney, removing the inform Sourav Ganguly twice. Aged 36, he is no long-term replacement for Warne, but his instant success is symptomatic.

At the top of the order, Langer has hardly been missed thanks to the forthright style of fellow left-hander Phil Jaques. Since getting a second crack at Test cricket, Jaques has applied the lessons learned in five non-stop years of county and state cricket to register scores of 100, 150, 68, 66 and 51. There must have been times, notably when playing for Northamptonshire in the second division of the county championship in 2003, when Test recognition seemed an unlikely dream. But the success of Langer and Matthew Hayden, who is batting with as much brutality as ever, kept Jaques waiting and fuelled his desire. Now Australia have yet another real deal on their hands. It is the same everywhere you look. Michael Clarke can no longer be patronised as “Pup”, the baby of the middle order, and looks set to inherit Ponting’s mantle as the classiest of Australia’s batsmen, while Andrew Symonds has shed his reputation as a one-day slugger ever since hitting 156 in the Melbourne Test against England a year ago. In that series, Kevin Pietersen felt able to taunt him for being a specialist fielder, shouting “fetch it” every time he hit the ball in Symonds’s vicinity. Such condescension would feel out of place now, although his fielding remains as earth-jarringly committed as ever. All this, of course, is before we have even mentioned Mike Hussey or Adam Gilchrist (who has a ready-made heir apparent in Brad Haddin), but then, their excellence is taken for granted. The fact is that no other side in the world would have coped with the loss of three all-time giants of the game. Australia’s genius is that they are doing their damnedest to go one better.

For the record, Vangipurappu Laxman top-scored for India with 42 and Ganguly added 40 but the tourists never looked like getting anywhere near the 499 runs needed to win and were bowled out for 161. All Australia’s bowlers contributed to their victory with Johnson taking 3-21 off 15 overs, while Clark took a wicket, bowled nine maidens and conceded just 20 runs off his 15 overs. The bad news for India is that it starts all over again in Sydney on New Year’s Day.

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