September temperatures nudged eight degrees in Southampton, and Australia succeeded in keeping England’s white ball team cold in their first match since the unveiling of Brendon “Bazball” McCullum as all-format coach.

The Australians battered England at each of their two most recent World Cup meetings – in India last year and the Caribbean in June – a pair of results which contributed to the sacking of Matthew Mott to be replaced by McCullum.

After a three-game trip to Scotland helped them acclimatise, the visitors looked somewhat better attuned for the task than an England side shorn of Test players by international cricket’s increasingly crowded schedule – the red ball series against Sri Lanka ended a couple of days ago.

If Mitchell Marsh’s side kept the door open for England by melting away from the batting crease after a slugging start by Travis Head (59, 23 balls) and Matt Short (41 off 26), a target of 180 proved more than enough for Adam Zampa (2-20) and the returning Josh Hazlewood (2-32) to defend. England were bowled out for 151 in the final over to lose by 28 runs.

Head’s early avalanche, during which he successfully overturned a caught behind decision against him, included cuffing 30 runs from Sam Curran’s first over, the fifth of the innings: four, four, six, six, six, four. Only Ricky Ponting and Glenn Maxwell among Australians have struck as many runs in a single T20 international over.

“We’ve had a consistent theme at the top, and whoever has come in has been able to play that,” Head said. “I’ve worked extremely hard over a period of time to play freely. I took my opportunity a couple of years ago, and the freedom [coach Andrew McDonald and Test captain Pat Cummins] give me has helped as well.”

After some poor fielding displays in the West Indies, the Australians were far sharper this time around, with Tim David and Cameron Green each taking sublime catches in the outfield to help close things out.

Zampa, in particular, proved almost impossible to master, skidding his leg breaks and googlies towards stumps and pads, and giving up only a solitary boundary in four overs while plucking the wickets of debutant Jacob Bethell and “finisher” Jamie Overton.