Michael Clarke staring at an unlucky seven losses MICHAEL Clarke has denied reports he intends to retire in the near future but whenever he departs he trusts it will not be with the unenviable record of having led the Australian team to a record seven straight Test defeats. It has been forecast on a number of occasions that Clarke could walk away from the game following the second chapter of the Ashes series in Australia next summer. But the embattled Australia captain indicated yesterday that, as bad as things might be, he wasn't going anywhere. "I'm not ready to walk away from cricket," Clarke insisted. I love the game as much now as I ever have, that's for sure. I'm 32, not 36, so luckily I've got a few years before I have that discussion. It goes entirely against Clarke's grain to quit while the team is in the grip of a history-making losing sequence. The Lord's defeat saw his team equal the record of Kim Hughes's side that lost six Tests in succession to the swaggeringly self-assured West Indies in 1984 and if Clarke's men were to lose the third Ashes Test at Old Trafford over the next few days, they would join Percy McDonnell's 1888 side as officially the worst Australia team of all time. "I won't have that discussion with the team," Clarke cautioned "That record is irrelevant. Play our best, give ourselves every opportunity and I'm confident we can win this Test match. It would help considerably if Clarke could merely win the toss. He has lost both coin tosses so far in the series and, although it becomes almost academic what he calls while Australia continues to bat so poorly, it would certainly do the morale of his players no end of good to feel that they for once are setting the terms. It is not making excuses to say the rub of the green pretty much went exclusively England's way at Lord's - Jonny Bairstow bowled off the only no-ball Peter Siddle sent down in the match; Ian Bell caught by Steve Smith in the gully but not given; Joe Root, on eight, edging straight between keeper and first slip with neither reacting ... he went on to make 180; Chris Rogers wrongly given out lbw to a ball so bad he lost it in flight when it soared above the sightscreen; a not-out ruling in favour Ashton Agar overturned by the third umpire even though no edge showed up on Hot Spot. Yes, good teams make their own luck and presumably the corollary is that bad ones manufacture their own as well. Still, they would not be human if they were not waiting for a sign that their luck has turned and a correct call at the coin toss, followed, it must be said, by 650 crisply struck runs - Clarke's own target - would get them away to a flyer. As hugely important as first-innings runs are going to be, this "not aesthetically pleasing" Old Trafford pitch, as England captain Alastair Cook described it, is going to spin like a top on the last day or two. England seemingly holds all the spin trumps. Graeme Swann is joint leading wicket-taker in the series, Monty Panesar owns this particular piece of Manchester real estate, Smith and Clarke both have aching backs and Ashton Agar is still a teenager learning his spin-bowling craft. That throws an awful lot of pressure on to Nathan Lyon who, it will be remembered, had all day in Adelaide to take six South African wickets last December for a famous victory over the world No 1 side and couldn't do it. But Lyon, who looks set to be one of three new faces in the side, along with Dave Warner and probably Jackson Bird - replacing Agar, Phil Hughes and James Pattinson - is resilient and doggedly determined. If he gets a second chance to bowl Australia to an important victory, the belief is that he will seize it.