England have lost paceman Craig Overton and may make a further change as they try to restore some pride in Tuesday's fourth Melbourne Test after surrendering the Ashes to Australia.

It's been a tour from hell for Joe Root's beleaguered team, succumbing to three heavy defeats which rendered the last two Tests in Melbourne and Sydney "dead rubbers."

Several other under-performing senior players, notably Alastair Cook, Stuart Broad and Moeen Ali, have also been under the gun as some critics call for their axing.

Cook, who became the first Englishman to play 150 Tests during the series, has scored just 83 runs in six innings, while Root has two half-centuries but only a total of 176 runs at 29.33.

In comparison, Australia skipper Steve Smith is in cracking form and is coming off a Test-best 239 in the third Test. He is averaging 142 for the series.

The Australian skipper is gunning for his fourth consecutive Melbourne Test century.

Even with pace spearhead Mitchell Starc out with injury, Smith has vowed no let-up in short-pitched bowling against England's tailenders, despite claims the umpires should give the lower order more protection.

"We obviously had a plan from the start of the series that we were going to bowl a lot of short stuff to those guys, much like we did back in 2013," Smith said in the past week.