My sympathies to Jason Gillespie. Less than a year ago, the lank-haired laddo was a linchpin of a much-vaunted Australia pace attack. Then came the Ashes and in a trice he was gone, hero to zero with little left, it seems, but to maybe audition for the lead role should they ever make a biopic of Frank Zappa.

In fairness to Trevor Hohns and his fellow Australia selectors, it was perhaps time to move on. There is only so much humiliation a nation can take no matter how much airbrushing there has been to convince themselves the Ashes defeat never happened. But not to invite Gillespie to the Veterans Reunion Tour to South Africa is just rank bad manners. Through the years this chap flogged his way through over after over in the cause of Australia's world dominance and this is the thanks he gets. Think of the cocktail parties he'll miss.

Damien Martyn got his invite, even if it is a bit of a nuisance since he had planned to be in Melbourne for U2's concert and also play a game for his club side in Perth. Same for Michael Kasprowicz. In fact, 11 of the 14-man Australia squad for the South Africa series took part in the Ashes defeat. Such is the price of failure.

It just shows how the best-laid plans can be turned on their head. Last September, as the England team rumbled its way by bus to its Trafalgar Square celebration, it was possible, so it seemed, to glimpse into the future. The Australians, one of the great sides of all time, were getting old together, a log jam at the top blocking the development of those coming through the system. Things must change, the baton passed on, if they were not to suffer another defeat at home next winter.

As for England, consistency of selection was a key element in their success, for it was not until the final Test, which Simon Jones missed because of his ankle injury, that they made any change. This, it was surmised, was a team still in the developmental stage, one far from the finished article and which could only get better.

This week, then, has been a revelation, as Australia have gone back to the future and England who, even if it has been forced upon them, have moved on to the next generation. Of the three unexpected successes of the Nagpur Test, Alastair Cook's century is perhaps the most significant, for here is a youngster, just 21, who has come into his first match with a technique that good judges suggest will stand him in good stead for many years, an appetite for runs and the temperament for the game at the highest level. This is the sort of arrival into Test cricket that once characterised the Australian system, and which was anathema to England.

If all goes as it ought, Cook may well become the first Englishman to reach 10,000 runs. But Paul Collingwood's was an Australian-style effort, too, the back-up boy who can slot into a successful environment. And the sight of Monty Panesar flighting and spinning the ball past some of the finest players of spin in the game will not have gone unnoticed: suddenly Sydney does not look such a comfortable option for Australia.

In backtracking, Hohns has done few favours for the credibility of a system once the envy of the world. Now the reaction is to recognise a shambles with no direction. In India we are seeing a series fought out between a blend of youth and experience on both sides, and it is invigorating to watch. Much the same applied in Pakistan before Christmas. The Australian machine, meanwhile, is becoming a laughing stock. Martyn, once acclaimed, can greet his selection with incredulity, while Brad Hodge, a double-century maker not so long since, has been discarded.

A friend in South Africa with the Australia team told me they soon won't be asking the Australian side for birth certificates, they'll want carbon dating.