A gentleman named Fred left a comment on The Australian’s cricket weblog that summed it up. “This is almost like the death of John Lennon, it can’t be true,” he said. Many Australians were refusing to believe the rumours, hoping that Shane Warne would be announcing something positive, such as a one-day return or a new cure for hair loss.

Peter Lalor, writing on the same newspaper’s website, shared some of Fred’s hysteria: “Shane Warne has let us down before, but he’s never let us down like this. He’s wrecked Christmas. God I know how it feels to be a Pom.”

Sean Beasley wrote on the Sydney Morning Herald blog: “Don’t do it, Shane — you have a responsibility to the Australian cricketing public to bowl until your arm falls off, your shoulder corrodes or your hair-plugs collapse inwards.”

On the same website, Ronald Badman said: “This is going to bring us back to the rest of the field in a hurry.”

Andrew, from Perth, wrote on the Fox Sports website that “it is a great shame that Shane Warne was not born an Englishman. He would surely have been made a lord by now.”

Rick Eyre predicted that the fifth Test in Sydney would “play second fiddle to Warnie’s swansong in the manner of Steve Waugh in 2004”, adding: “I wonder if Cricket Australia will give him a gold watch, or maybe a gold mobile phone.”

With Glenn McGrath also expected to announce his retirement soon, John Cook, from Brisbane, pointed out that “a side-effect may be that some of Australia’s other veterans prolong their careers. They’ll be acutely aware of the Chappell-Lillee-Marsh effect, when three greats simultaneously left the game, to devastating consequences for Australian cricket”.