England skipper Nasser Hussain cited poor batting on the second morning as a primary cause of England's defeat in the second Ashes Test at Adelaide. The tourists were in an apparently strong position at the start of the second day, but failed to build on a promising start.

"We had our chances on the first day," Hussain said. "We put ourselves in a good position and then tossed it away to be honest. To lose seven for 30-odd on a pretty flat Adelaide wicket second day was pretty poor really."

Hussain singled out Michael Vaughan and Richard Dawson for praise for their performances in the Test.

"Spirit is not bad in the camp. We know we are letting ourselves down, but we have some star players in our side, like Vaughan and Dawson. Those things lift us and hopefully there will be a few more of those moments in Perth."

"We are really down to the bare minimum with players now. We have got to address the fitness situation of players and make sure that everyone who plays is fit and then just work at our own game.

"We are playing against a fantastic side. You can't take that away from them. We have got to try and win the small battle and not concentrate on the big battle.

"In all three disciplines, they have shown if you play positive batting you get runs and if you put the ball in the right areas you get wickets, so I think we can all learn from this Australian side."

Meanwhile a delighted Australia captain Steve Waugh pointed to positive batting as a primary reason for his team's success.

"All round I thought we batted well, we scored quickly and put pressure on England," Waugh enthused. "With our quality bowlers it does put pressure on their batsman in the second innings.

"I was a bit worried with the rain coming and going; if England had hung on it could have been difficult," Waugh admitted.

"The dropped catches were not the best but we made enough chances to win the game. We haven't really talked about it but in the last five Tests we've dropped about 20 chances."

Ricky Ponting was made Man of the Match award for his 154 - a career-best score against England and his fifth century in the last seven Tests.

"Things are going really well," said Ponting. "I'm batting as well as I ever have in my Test career. We were outplayed on the first day but we bounced back well."

© CricInfo Ltd.

This report does not necessarily represent the views of the Australian Cricket Board.