Australian cricket fans voted with their feet in Perth yesterday

There were no official figures from the crowd at Optus Stadium yesterday where South Africa dominated Australia by six wickets with 124 deliveries in the first of three ODIs.

It was estimated that there were 9,000 in the 60,000 state-of-the-art halls, but even that modest figure was generous.

It looked more like two men and a dog.

Cricket fans do not forgive when their pride and joy play cricket, and Cricket Australia is an arrogant, controlling and intimidating governing body, as described by the independent review.

We can summarize the debacle of yesterday by comparing the first power games of 10 outs – Australia scored 3-19, with South Africa responding between 0 and 57 years.

Skipper Aaron Finch added to the confusion by making two extraordinary decisions.

He failed to review when he was hit over the protective roll and received a leg before. Chris Lynn nodded to the non-strikers. Had he said yes to a critic or skipper did you leave? It was a lack of communication on the part of the drummers.

Finch was walking, but the exam proved that the bullet would have easily cleared the stumps – a missed opportunity.

Aaron Finch and his disappointed teammates (AAP Image / Richard Wainwright)

In defending a lean 152, Finch ignored Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins with the new ball, and gave it to Nathan Coulter-Nile who was quickly stuck for 16 points and fired.

Previously, Coulter-Nile had the best score with 34 of 31, five to four and a maximum of nine batting.

The man of the match belonged to South African veteran Dale Steyn, the eldest of the game at age 35 and 130 days, with 2-18 out of 7, with 32 point balls, on a receptive box.

He made his debut in 2005 for a long time, but he was only his 119th ODI, thanks to a series of injuries.

As he said at yesterday's presentation, "It's good to end a match in Australia without breaking down."

It's Australian cricket that has the wind in its sails, with no end in sight.

This is the 17th ODI Australia that lost 19 starts, well before the long suspensions of Steve Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft.

The Australians have won four of the last five Cricket World Cups.

In 1999, the Australian beat Pakistan by eight wickets to the Lords, defeated India in 2003 by Wanderers by 125 points, defeated Sri Lanka by 53 in Barbados in 2007 and will be the defending champion. Next year after defeating New Zealand at the MCG by seven wickets in 2015.

It is almost impossible to see Australia improve enough to compete between May and July in England and Wales.

If these statistics are not worrying enough, the Australians have not won the Ashes in England since 2001 – 17 years ago.

They were beaten 2-1 with two draws in 2005 and 2009 – and lost 3-0 with two draws in 2013.

In short, Australia has won only two events in England in the last 15, so the rot is coming.

Despite the gloom, there were two positives yesterday – not having to listen to Mark Nicholas or Michael Clarke in the comment box.

We must be grateful for the little kindness.