Australia have had plenty of time to address but also rationalise the madness of their final hour at Headingley, resulting in conclusions such as the evident fallibility of Ben Stokes against Nathan Lyon, the impending return of Steven Smith and the fact that only one of the final two Tests need end in victory for the touring side to ensure they retain the Ashes in England for the first time since 2001.

Following a day in Derby where senior members of the Australian set-up, from the selection chairman Trevor Hohns and the coach Justin Langer, to the captain Tim Paine and the opening batsman David Warner, all spent time ensconced in discussion behind the wicket at the county ground, the skipper emerged to note that Stokes, while seeming a miracle worker, has been riding a more than generous share of luck since Edgbaston.

"Hold our chances would be a good start," Paine said of how to combat England's talismanic allrounder. "We've looked at, I think Nathan Lyon in the last two Tests alone has got him out five or six times had we held our catches or referred our lbws. Lyono's still a huge weapon against him, and there's some things we've spoken about with our fast bowlers where we think we can do things a little better than him.

"But he's a world class player, he puts bowlers under pressure and makes them do things and captains do things that you wouldn't normally do. That's a huge weapon England have got and one we've got to try and contain in the last two Test matches."

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Those things that captains don't normally do were relevant to Paine, given his struggles to find the right way to either cope with Stokes or keep his bowlers and far flung fielders thinking clearly when they only required one more wicket to retain the Ashes. There have been plenty of discussions since, not least a most animated one between Paine and Ricky Ponting to one side of the post-match presentation at Headingley.

"I think you've just got to address it, we had some honest conversations and we know we made some errors as a team and as individuals, but we can't be holding onto that, we're in the middle of a massive series and it can happen," Paine said. "We've moved on, we're ready for Manchester, the group's in a really good spot, if we were 1-1 I think most people would've taken it.

"Without Steve Smith playing I don't think we were given any chance of winning that Test match, so without Steve Smith playing i think most people wrote us off in that Test, so we're tracking ok.

"We're sticking to our plans and our process, I think it's working quite well and I said in post-match we've been in a position to win every game so if we continue to do those things and tidy up a few things we didn't quite get right at the end there then we think we'll be in the thick of it in Manchester and at the Oval."

Something that pleased Paine from the boundary was the energy of the players taking part in Derby. At the back end of a World Cup and Ashes campaign, Paine knows as well as anyone that stamina, both mental and physical, will be vital to how the final story of this series is told.

"We knew we were going to bounce back well. Things like energy and the way we hold ourselves is something we can control easily," he said. "We've passed that last hour in Leeds. We were tested as a group, we know where we can get better from it.

"We've learnt from it. And now it's about getting up for the next Test match and making sure we're prepared as well as we can be for Manchester. I thought today was a good display by our team. There's a huge opportunity for guys in this game to make sure we've got our selectors making really tough decisions."