I really don’t want to get involved in some kind of slanging match because that would be what they want. But they started it. Well, Shane Warne did.

Before the first Ashes Test, Warne was doing his best to niggle. “Let’s hope the English aren’t relying on Ravi Bopara . . . he cares more about his looks.” This from a man whose impending baldness bothered him enough that he accepted a contract to advertise a hair replacement product.

Warne has been looking closely at our players, not at their spin bowling, their run-rates or their batting averages. No, he’s been looking at them closely in the eye, directly in the face in Bopara’s case, to try to get under their skin. But he’ll have been disappointed, because our boys are considerably more handsome than theirs.

This immediately cuts out a whole chapter of the sledging manual. Accusing someone of being too good-looking doesn’t have the same impact as telling them at the crease that they are so ugly you had to sleep with their wife, does it?

Warne has all but admitted it, by resorting to the handsome gibes, so you’ll just have to trust me and accept that the Australians sent here to try to retain the Ashes just aren’t as beautiful as our boys. Think about Bopara, James Anderson, Andrew Flintoff, Stuart Broad and Alastair Cook and then take a look at the Aussies; not exactly ugly, just a bit plain. Warne could never be described as handsome, not in the way the smouldering Broad can. But in his cheesy Bondi Beach-man way he had “standoutability” — the blond highlights, the “too young for him” earrings and the piercing aqua eyes helped to get him noticed. There’s none of that with this crop.

It would be unfair to pick on Ricky Ponting because there has never been an Australia cricket captain whose face we have not wanted to slap from time to time, no matter how attractive they were. But Ponting does personify the look of this team. He is quite pleasant and smiley in the flesh but on the field of play, wearing “that” cap, with those ears and that pinched-mouth pose, he is how I imagine Jimmy Krankie would have turned out with the aid of human growth hormones.

But does being the less attractive side have any deeper psychological impact?

Warren Gatland, the Wales rugby union head coach, obviously felt that being brown and smooth would enhance his team’s performance on the pitch. He’s long been a supporter of false tans and waxing to attain that “just out of Cape Town look”, as opposed to that “just out of Bangor look”. If grooming in a sport in which being ugly used to be seen as an attribute seems wrong then it’s important to understand that it is more about the accentuation of physicality; the oily limbs and the waxed legs look stronger, faster and more dangerous when they are running towards you than white, pimply, hairy ones.

Gatland, along with Shaun Edwards, brought rugby league-style tight shirts to London Wasps. As well as showing off a player’s physique, the tight shirt is more difficult to get hold of when the player is being tackled; vanity does not always equal vacuous.

So far there are no tight shirts in football; it can’t be long, but footballers are not immune from accusations of excessive grooming. Some appear to spend hours on appearance even before a match; putting all those plasters over a piercing has got to take time.

It’s different in Test cricket. Cricketers cover up a lot of their appearance, with the caps, the sunglasses and the long trousers, even in 40-degree heat; a glimpse of a forearm is about as much flesh as you’ll get. So a strong jaw-line and a good head of hair counts for a lot when you are trying to intimidate the opposition with appearance.

Before we get carried away with the genetic blessings of this England cricket team compared with their Aussie foes, we need to ask how far looks can carry a sportsman. David Ginola is a great example of one whose fame and legend is perhaps accentuated by his handsome face.

In the Newcastle side in the mid-Nineties, not traditionally the stomping ground of renaissance man, there was a respect for Ginola from the male population that was based almost entirely on his aesthetic prowess. He bewitched men and women alike in the style normally reserved for supermodels of unquestionable beauty. It took us ages to figure out that he didn’t have a great workrate. By which point he was offloaded to Spurs, a team who openly admit to enjoying “attractive football”. Newcastle have steered well clear of anything close since.

Off the pitch, being the less attractive side will not cause the Aussies any problems because there’s no doubt that sportsmen have a massive advantage compared with the rest of the male population when it comes to perceived attractiveness. An average-looking footballer, rugby player or cricketer will always have a partner 20-30 per cent more attractive than if he’d worked in another profession. There is some scientific proof of this; again you’ll just have to believe me. (Some studies have put the percentage as high as 75*.) You will already be aware of this if you have stood in a bar near Ginola, and especially if you have stood in a bar near Peter Crouch.

So, Aussie sledgers, you can call our boys slow, call them time-wasters, call them Poms, but don’t call them ugly because when it comes to the team calendar we all know which one your wives would rather hang up in the kitchen.

* Observational studies conducted by Dr G Logan circa 1998.