According to PJ O’Rourke, it’s best to affect a limp handshake. “A firm, hearty handshake gives a good first impression,” he wrote, “and you’ll never be forgiven if you don’t live up to it.” There were a lot of hearty handshakes at the start of this latest one-day series between England and Australia, a gamut of clasps, claps, pats, pumps and bumps. Before the start of play the Australians shook hands with the umpires and then the Australians shook hands with each other, then the umpires shook hands with the English, then the English shook hands with the Australians. It was, O’Rourke might say, a lot to live up to.

The handshakes were Australia’s idea. “It’s something we want to bring in to start a series, not before every game,” Tim Paine explained, shrewd not to overdo it. This Australia one-day team seem unusually injury prone – they have already lost their four best fast bowlers to various strains and sprains – and it seems wise to minimise the potential for repetitive strain injuries. The last thing they need now is a case of politician’s wrist. Alex Salmond shook so many hands during Scotland’s independence referendum that he had to spend weeks wearing a foam support.

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O’Rourke also warned that “a firm, hearty shake inspires confidence in others” and “people who go around inspiring confidence in others are probably trying to sell them something”. Quite. Australians are selling the idea that they have reformed. Paine says they want to start “living our actions”. He recently revealed that the senior players spoke about changing their behaviour back when Steve Smith was captain but never actually did anything about it. The handshakes are supposed show that they have changed their ways.

The Australians were awfully worried about how much stick they were going to get from the English crowds. “We think it’s going to be pretty full-on,” Paine said before the game. It wasn’t. Here at the Oval at least, there was barely a peep or squeak of abuse. The only time the crowd broke out into anything other than a burble was when Paine sprinted 30 yards from the stumps to claim a top-edge hit by Jos Buttler and then spilled the catch as he fell to earth. Otherwise it was just that familiar old thrum, the applause of fans, the idle chatter of old friends.

Some wiseacre investment company tried to stoke it up by handing out squares of sandpaper outside the ground. The stewards took them off the fans as they came in. But a couple of former Australia players got upset about it anyway. Darren Lehmann had a dig at the English broadcaster Alison Mitchell just for mentioning it on Twitter. “You’re better than that,” Lehmann told her. Odd to see Australia’s former coach staking out the moral high ground since it wasn’t so very long ago he said he hoped the Australian public would “give it to” Stuart Broad so hard during the Ashes that “he cries and goes home”.

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Lehmann has a new job coaching Australia’s national performance squad these days. The man who said he was “ultimately responsible for the culture of the team” who committed ball tampering is now “ultimately responsible” for mentoring Australia’s next generation of players. No doubt he will be just as strict with their behaviour as he is quick to police the tweets sent by cricket journalists on the other side of the world.

Unlike Lehmann, this new Australia team at least seem like they are ready to take the rough with the smooth, to accept that their abrasive style of play rubbed some people up the wrong way. Those who know him say Paine is a good man, the right sort to straighten out the team. Whether he is a good enough batsman to be captain, though, is another question. He had a rough day of it here. His dismissal, hitting a neat reverse sweep straight to short third man, was one of the worst in a series of poor shots by the top-order. And it came after he had promoted himself above Glenn Maxwell, too.

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Australia’s 214 was the lowest all-out total they have ever made in a one-day game in England after winning the toss and batting first. At that point the crowd’s refusal to bait them seemed like an act of mercy. But then England made a mess of the chase.

It was to Australia’s credit that they rallied and pushed England as hard as they did. Right now they at least look like what they are, the fifth-best one-day team in the world. It is not much but still more than England, who are supposed to be the No 1, can say for themselves.