"Disgrace to the baggy green," was the headline lament of The Australian newspaper in its coverage of the test team's innings and 80-run defeat in Hobart on Tuesday.
"Australia's endemic problems, demand a long-term approach but in the short term changes must be made for Adelaide," the paper's cricket writer Andrew Faulkner wrote.
Australia, who lost the opener against South Africa by 177 runs in Perth, head into the series finale at Adelaide Oval riding a five-match losing streak, with confidence at rock bottom.
"Worst XI - Australian cricket in crisis after record capitulation," read a headline in the Courier Mail.
"Australia's players are overpaid and mollycoddled to the point where the priceless quality that separates the great from the good – resilience – is almost invisible," Robert Craddock wrote in the paper.
Former captain Allan Border, who like current skipper Steven Smith had to carry the team through a low point in the mid-1980s, put the blame squarely on the players.
"Tuesday was a terrible day at the office for every member of the Australian cricket team – and every supporter, too," he wrote in Sydney's Daily Telegraph.
"Nothing has changed in regards to team managers, staffing and high-performance.
"And that's why the players have to take responsibility."
Ricky Ponting, another former captain, was scathing of the team's batting, which produced a paltry first innings total of 85 in Hobart and another collapse when they lost eight wickets and scored just 40 runs in the session before lunch on day four.
"The Aussie batters, they just didn't know where to go, what to do," Ponting said on BT Sport.
"They got very defensive minded and when they do that – it's been shown through this test series – their techniques aren't good enough to stand up."
News Ltd newspapers put pressure on chairman of selectors Rod Marsh to step down now, rather than in mid-2017 as he had previously announced.
