Fletcher focuses on fightback and a fit Flintoff

It is 48 years since England last won the Ashes in Australia having lost the first Test match of the series. This is not news that will fill England supporters with hope until we look at the match in November 1954 which followed a remarkably similar pattern to the one which ended abruptly in Brisbane on Sunday.

Like Nasser Hussain last Thursday, Len Hutton won the toss and put Australia in to bat. The Aussies scored 601 for 8 declared and England lost by an innings and 154 runs.

However, it is not this series, in which Frank Tyson later demolished the Australian batting, that has given both Hussain and the England coach, Duncan Fletcher, hope. They will draw on occasions when series have been turned around under their leadership to give their squad cause for optimism.

"We did this after we were hammered by Sri Lanka in Galle two years ago." said Fletcher yesterday. "We went out there, apparently unable to play spin, got hammered and then came back to win. It also happened in Pakistan [in 2001] where we started shakily and hopefully we will go about it in the same manner here."

And to do this? "The big thing is talking to the players, to make sure there is no panic situation. We have just got to make sure that we go out there and do as we have in the past – turn things around."

England's chances of achieving this unlikely goal would improve greatly if their leading all-rounder, Andrew Flintoff, was to return to full fitness. And there was good news on this front yesterday when the results of a scan on his injury – a double hernia, which has been slow to recover from surgery at the end of August – showed there to be no further complications.

"We are now very optimistic he will be fit to play in this week's match," said the England physiotherapist, Kirk Russell, after being told that there were no hot spots on the scan and that all the Lancashire vice-captain was feeling is stiffness in the groin.

This will be Flintoff's second game of the tour, after limping through the three-day match against Queensland 10 days ago, and it is hoped that his efforts to prove his fitness are more successful that they were for the first Test.

However, the fact it has taken the 24-year-old so long to overcome this injury has frustrated the England management and has led to questions over the amount of monitoring and communication that has taken place during his rehabilitation. Opinions are divided as to whether there should be someone looking over a player's shoulder throughout his rehabilitation, telling him what to do, or that he should be trusted to do the exercises required himself.

Regular contact obviously needs to be maintained between both the player and the medics, but it would be hoped, with the prestige and honour which goes with playing for your country – as well as the amount of money a top England player can earn in a year (£300,000) – that a player would have enough motivation to do as he was asked.

Fletcher said: "At the end of the day everyone has to get involved with this. Players have got to make sure they carry out the procedures that have been advised for them to get ready."

It is hard to believe that any member of the Australian side would need a physiotherapist or a trainer standing over him in order to ensure he does the exercises required to return to fitness. Such is the competition for the honour of wearing a "baggy green" cap that no player would want to give even the slightest opportunity to someone competing for their place in the side.

One England player who will not be playing against Australia A in Hobart will be Hussain. The England captain, who, incidentally, was the only member of the Test side to attend an optional practice session yesterday, will travel to Tasmania and practice with the squad until Friday. On Saturday, however, he will fly to Perth to be at his wife's side for the birth of their second child.

Eyebrows have been raised in some quarters about the timing of the captain's departure, but it is right for Hussain to be there if he so wishes. Graham Thorpe's domestic problems last summer were a reminder that there are more important things in life than sport and Hussain will rejoin the squad as they arrive in Adelaide to prepare for the second Test.

For Hobart, Australia's selectors have picked a strong side containing six players who have represented county sides in England. The best known is Greg Blewett, who scored 169 not out and 213 not out in the corresponding fixture four years ago. Needless to say, England lost.

AUSTRALIA 'A': J Maher (capt), G Blewett, M Clarke, S Clark, M Elliott, B Haddin, N Hauritz, M Love, A Noffke, M North, B Williams.

* Centuries for Inzamam-ul-Haq and Taufeeq Umar put Pakistan in complete control against Zimbabwe on the third day of the third Test in Harare yesterday. Inzamam's 112 made him only the second Pakistani to reach 6,000 Test runs after Javed Miandad.