Glenn McGrath may be retired but he’s still playing an active role in plotting the downfall of Andrew Strauss’ side.

In his Ashes blog for The Wisden Cricketer website (www.thewisdencricketer.com) Aussie paceman Peter Siddle reveals that ‘Pigeon' McGrath delivered an hour-long masterclass in bowling in English conditions to the Australian seam attack ahead of the Cardiff Test.

According to Siddle, Australia have worked hard on reverse swing in their warm-up games: "It's something that played a big part in 2005 so it's something that we've worked on hard. England used it a lot better than us that time, but we've done our planning and our practice and it paid off for Brett (Lee) at Worcester," blogs Siddle.

"Hopefully we can get it going here in Cardiff and throughout the series. Troy Cooley got Pigeon (Glenn McGrath) to come and talk to the seamers at Worcester for about an hour or so about fast bowling over here and wishing us luck. It's always great to listen to someone with that sort of knowledge, and he made a little joke about us not standing on any cricket balls. . ."

Siddle is also looking forward to getting involved with English crowds. He writes: "I copped a bit in South Africa, but I started to enjoy it and get used to how I'm going to get treated overseas. I've heard the Welsh crowds like to get a bit rowdy, so I'm looking forward to that, it should be good fun. We haven't got any stick yet, so it will be interesting to see how long it takes people to have a good yell at us."