Australia lucky to be a Top 10 side: James Sutherland

James Sutherland, Cricket Australia chief executive, admits Australia is "lucky to be a Top 10 side" after they embarrassingly suffered a fifth straight Test defeat.

Just several months ago, Australia was the number one ranked Test team in the world but have slid down the rankings after a series whitewash in Sri Lanka and consecutive thrashings to South Africa on home soil.

Australia's disastrous innings and 80-run loss against South Africa in Hobart has intensified the pressure both on-and-off the field and Sutherland admitted he is feeling the strains of pressure. Sutherland and Pat Howard, Australia's high performance manager, flew to Hobart on Tuesday (November 15) in a desperate bid to come to grips with Australia's nightmarish performance.

Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday (November 16), Sutherland said he would leave his future up to the board to decide. "Ultimately that's a decision for the board as to whether I'm the right person to lead. But Australian cricket broadly speaking is in good shape," he said. "Now clearly the performance of the Australian team over the course of the past three months is not good enough and is not in keeping with our fans' expectations or expectations for the game.

"But three months ago we were the number one team in the world in Test cricket and One-day cricket. We are not today and we are not shying away from that issue. It's my responsibility to lead the people to turn this around. We're lucky to be a Top 10 side at the moment, but I also do believe that by sticking to the process the players can work through that and can turn things around," he added.

Australia looked set for another golden period when they didn't lose a Test in Steve Smith's first 11 matches as skipper, culminating in them reclaiming the world's No. 1 Test ranking. However, few could have envisaged this startling spiral.

Sutherland said changes would be made for Australia's team for the third Test in Adelaide starting on November 24. "You can't just flick a switch when you're in a rut like this. You actually need to close ranks work very hard, be very focused on process and work together as a team," he said. "Now clearly there's going to be changes for the next Test match and it will be a different group of players that gather for the next Test match.

"I don't know how many changes there will be or anything like that. But those players that are there from this Test match need to be very clear about the challenge and how they bring people, maybe some new people into the team. There's no short cuts and in the short term we've got to just knuckle down and work very hard," Sutherland stated.