Darren Lehmann's old school coaching style in contrast to England's military discipline Darren Lehmann's old school approach appears to be working for Australia. IF Darren Lehmann can pull off an Ashes series win it will be a poignant moment for cricket coaching and the grim-faced sports world beyond it. The coach who makes it his business to try and wind-down his players while the rest of the coaching world seems obsessed about winding them up will give his and other sports something to think about it if Australia raises the Ashes urn this summer. Of course Australia are a long way from winning the series and it is over-simplify things to say Lehmann's philosophy is all about putting a smile on the dial. He can go off at times and there is a hard edge that underpins his efforts. But beneath everything he tries to do is the basic message that "in the end it's only a game ... try and enjoy it." Every successful coach creates a generation of imitators but this cannot be taken for granted in Lehmann's case. Lehmann's mantra has been shaped by the colourful life he has led but the road he tread is closed forever now. The days of playful semi-professionalism and chatting about everything and nothing for hours after stumps with his late mentor David Hookes, beer in one hand and a fag in the other, essentially belong to an era that will never return, even though beers are back in the Australian dressing room. It's hard to imagine another modern coach convincing cautious Indian players to have an ice bath by doing a giant bomb dive as Lehmann did with the Deccan Chargers in the Indian Premier League. Coaches who follow Lehmann will have been raised in a far more serious and structured professional world than the one he entered in his teenage years when he was also working on the construction line at the Holden Plant in Adelaide. Big money has changed things. The margin between making it and not making it can be as fine as one innings as Glenn Maxwell found out when he landed a million-dollar Indian Premier League deal essentially on the back of a hurricane 50-over innings for Australia. It is hard to relax when you know how much is at stake each innings. You can understand players being on edge but that only increases the worth of someone who can somehow switch the pressure valve and watch the worthless hot steam hiss into the ether. There is no one way to find success with a cricket team. Lehmann's Ashes rival Andrew Flower has gone the stern-faced route to success and he has done a splendid job. With the bearing of the military major Flower had whipped just about every ounce of potential out of an England side who often seemed to perform above the sum of their parts. Stuart Broad revealed recently that Flower rules England much in the way that Sir Alex Ferguson ruled Manchester United - by fear. Broad said that very few players pick up the phone when Flower rings, preferring to collect their thoughts and ring back a few minutes later. "He's got an assassin-like movement about him," said Broad. He's never going to stand up and shout the walls down unless you've played really badly, but when he says something you know exactly what he means. He's got a fear factor definitely, I can imagine like the United players would have been around Fergie. Website Cricinfo last week quoted an English player as saying, "It can feel as if there is no escape. It is as if everything you do is being analysed and stored away. If you are not careful it can wear you down.