At the turn of the century, Australian sport was the envy of every nation throughout the world, particularly to us in Britain.

The Sydney Olympic Games in 2000 were universally hailed as an overwhelming triumph, with the host nation coming fourth in the medal table: a remarkable achievement for an island with a population of just 22m people.

Thirteen years ago, the Olympic Games was not the only sporting arena in which the Australians were excelling. Their national teams were World Cup holders in rugby union and rugby league; their cricket team had won the World Cup and also held the Ashes, while Pat Rafter had held, albeit briefly, the world No.1 tennis ranking.

Australian sporting greats were superstars the world over. Cathy Freeman was the face of the Sydney Games. Ian Thorpe was the greatest swimmer the world had seen. Shane Warne was the best bowler of all time and the Australian Institute of Sport was extolled as the finest sporting establishment in the world.

Yet now those halcyon days of Australian sporting dominance are most certainly in the past. London 2012 was the country's worse performance in an Olympic Games for 20 years; they finished 10th in the medal table with just seven golds, less than half what they collected in Sydney, where they won 16 in total.

If the British & Irish Lions defeat the Wallabies in the deciding Test tomorrow, it will be Australia's first series loss to the Lions since 1989.

The Ashes begin next week too, and few observers give the Australians any hope of claiming victory such is the disarray their team appears to be in. If England retain the Ashes, it will be their fourth victory in five series; an astonishing fall from grace for the Antipodeans, who were utterly dominant throughout the 1990s and early 2000s.

To rub salt into the wound, earlier this year a Crime Commission report found that doping and match-fixing were present in a variety of sports within Australia, while also uncovering links between sports administrators and organised crime. The day the commission released its findings was described as "the blackest day in Australian sport".

So where has it all gone wrong for a country which was lauded for their world-class athletes and their Institute of Sport, which became the template for every country with sporting ambitions? There are many theories bandied about in an attempt to explain the decline, none of which are conclusive.

It is a predicament which we in Britain should pay close attention to if we do not want to find ourselves in a similar position in a decade's time. Sydney was Australia's most successful Games, as was London for GB. Australia is also a country which has a similar culture to the UK, so is suitable for comparison.

The Aussies experienced the notorious "Olympic hangover"; they performed well at their home Games but were unable to sustain their success. They would keep their form going until Athens four years later, but the systematic flaws had begun to creep in in the aftermath of Sydney. Funding which had been pumped into sport was cut.

In 2009, the Australian Olympic Committee warned that "since 2000, Australian Olympic sports have operated on, at best, static, and in all likelihood, declining budgets while the international environment becomes more competitive and requires more athletes to commit to a full-time training regime". In other words, Australia poured all of their resources into their home Games, after which funding streams fell. Britain appears, for now at least, to be avoiding this pitfall. Just last week George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced that funding for elite sport would not be cut over the next four years, guaranteeing £500m for Olympic and Paralympic sport ahead of Rio 2016.

Another reason for Australia's decline is that they have become a victim of their own success. As more and more nations place a high importance on elite sport, significant sums of money are being made available, resulting in many Australian coaches being lured from their homeland. Indeed, the Scottish Institute of Sport is modelled on the Australian prototype, and many of the SIS coaches and support staff are from Australia.

In addition, Australia's 2009 Crawford Report cited possible issues with children specialising in one sport too early, suggesting that participating in a variety of sports until their teenage years may be more beneficial in the long term. Coaches in Britain should take heed of this point, as children in the UK are being pressurised into selecting one sport at an increasingly early age these days.

It is perhaps of benefit to Britain that Australia has made these mistakes and is now experiencing a decline in their sporting prowess. If we can avoid complacency in the aftermath of London, and learn from Australia's mistakes, we can prevent a similar fall from grace.