Willy Wonka came up with the Everlasting Gobstopper and the Scrumdiddilyumptious Bar.

Germany’s Willy Wonka, Hans Riegel Sr (Haribo), has the Schnecken!, the Stafetten! and the Klaxx!

Ricky Ponting made uninspired decisions and had no luck with the toss. The selectors left out Stuart Clark when he should have played and left him in when he should have been out. Johnson’s fear of Lord’s and his mother was very costly. Australia failed to turn advantage into victory and had more batting lapses. Yes, all these factors contributed to our recent series loss in England.

But I believe the Ashes were gone the minute England unveiled its impressive armoury of …. underbiters.

For the Australians, arriving at the crease was like entering a malocclusion horror show. There peering from between the stumps and sniggering was the Muttley mug of Matt Prior. With a shudder you turned only to be confronted with the Graemes Swann and Onions, their prominent mandibles quivering in anticipation.

In the second innings at Edgbaston as Swann skipped in to bowl “THAT BALL” Ponting was focusing on THAT MOUTH!

In the first innings the commentators believed Onions got Ponting out attempting to hook when in fact Ponting was attempting to turn away from the Onions face.

If  that wasn’t enough, our dismissed batsmen trudging from the field  had England team director Andy Flower’s misaligned masticator grinning down at them from the balcony.

Ian Bell, squatting at silly mid wicket, tried his hardest to put off the Australians by highlighting his squirrel-like lips with zinc.

Australia countered, with some  effect,  by having Peter ‘Gingivitis’ Siddle frighten the umpires into giving batsmen out by also wearing zinc on his lips. Unlike Andrew Symonds, Siddle’s teeth aren’t in great shape and when contrasted with the brilliant white of the zinc take on the yellow-green hue of trench mouth.

When appealing he resembled the psychotic circus ringmaster from The League Of Gentlemen, Papa Lazarou (“You’re my wife nooow!”)

Pete and Papa Lazarou

Opposition supporters say they’re chokers. Wayne Bennett said they were unlucky. But I know the real reason St George-Illawarra failed to win the premiership: LONG WHITE SOCKS.

Wearing long white socks never did anyone any good. They were for scrawny men in safari suits and five year old boys forced to go to Sunday School. There was a packet of Holeproof Long White Business Socks (and a couple of Speckled Fawn) that remained unopened while doing the christmas present rounds of our extended family for the entire 1970’s.

White socks highlight the moving legs which is the aesthetic domain of dancers, football (soccer) players and piston-legged sprinters. Put them on a rugby league player and he looks like Margot Fonteyn running with the bulls.

The high number of female spectators at such a masculine game can’t just be explained by unfortunate wives, girlfriends and mothers being dragged along. Many will enjoy the game itself but there must also be those there to stare: the female gaze.

Firm behinds and muscular thighs, arms and chests, not to mention the sculptured calves of Matt Cooper, seem to rate highly on the scale of women’s sexual aesthetics. And these all-white, second-skin kits certainly highlight these regions.

However, as women also know, white jumpers make your torso look bigger. Adding a white jersey to the ensemble may give you a slight psychological advantage when you’re standing in front of the opposing prop (commentators are often sucked in: “Aren’t they a big team?”) but if you don’t have the svelte muscular frame things are going to get ugly.

The muscular but rotund Wendell Sailor looked like a pot roast in white Glad wrap.

And Eorl Crabtree is a hulking 6ft 6in, 122kg prop but wearing his England all-white strip and ponytail he appears to want to be more than that. I can just imagine him in the bar after a match untethering his hair and twirling his head about like Terence Stamp in Priscilla Queen Of The Desert.

Rugby league has its share of exhilarating dancing with the twisting and sidestepping of Greg Inglis and Jarryd Hayne. Ultimately, though, the game is about power and impact.

St George – Illawarra should have dressed for that, not Swan Lake.

NEXT WEEK: England’s Underbites: Why Australia Lost The Ashes