Graeme Swann may not believe Australia's current Test team carries the swagger or the fear factor of its illustrious predecessors but he's learned they at least share some of the earlier generation's fondness for pre-Ashes theatrics.

While laconic off-spinner Nathan Lyon – Swann's direct counterpart in recent England-Australia battles – isn't about to issue a Glenn McGrath-esque 'five-nil' prediction he has unashamedly lifted a chapter directly from the Shane Warne Book of Bluster.

In addition to being the greatest leg-break bowler the game has seen, Warne was a master of spinning a web of intrigue around opponents by routinely suggesting he had perfected yet another 'mystery ball' and goading rival batsmen to chance their arm against him.

So using Warne's taunting as a template, Lyon today returned fire against Swann's recent suggestions that England's batsmen should attack Australia's spinner because he represented their "weakest link".

Employing a persona as dry as the English pitches he expects to encounter over coming months, Lyon revealed he has developed a never-before-seen delivery to add to his bowling arsenal that Swann had dismissed in recent days as containing "no mystery".

According to Lyon, whose public comments are often as economical as his increasingly tidy Test match bowling, he is ready to unveil a new weapon to complement the covert delivery the 27-year-old first unleashed a couple of years back and which he christened quite simply 'Jeff'.

Pressed for details of the prototype that has been developed at Cricket Australia's Bupa National Cricket Centre in Brisbane over the past year or more under the eye of his bowling mentor John Davison, Australia's most successful off-spinner was theatrically coy.

Lyon with the Frank Worrell Trophy // Getty Images

As Warne well knew, once you removed the mystique from a 'mystery' ball you're left with nothing more exotic than a 'variation'.

"It's the Square Jeff,' Lyon eventually confessed today, claiming he didn't launch it during the recent two-Test series in the Caribbean because the Australia pace bowlers did such a job on the West Indies batting that an X-factor would have been surplus to requirements

"I haven't used it in international cricket (but) John Davison has seen it a fair bit.

"I've been working on it for a couple of years, you guys (media) just haven't noticed it."

Quizzed as to the similarities between Square Jeff and its older sibling – variously described by those who dare lift the secrecy cloak as a backspinner posing as a 'doosra' (the Urdu name for an off-spinner's wrong-un) – Lyon studiously channelled Warne's character of a decade earlier.

"There's a couple of differences, you'll just have to wait and see," he deadpanned.

"I can't let all of my secrets out."

Video: Lyon's new delivery against Pakistan

The man who, during the series in the Caribbean, overtook turn-of-the-20th-Century tweaker Hugh Trumble to become Australia's most successful Test off-break bowler was more forthcoming when asked about Swann's exhortation for England's batters to go after the young man from Young.

While pointing out that he did not consider Lyon to be a "weak spinner" but simply the most suitable target for the home team to attack, Swann claimed that Lyon boasted a repertoire that contained nothing other than an off-spinner and an arm ball and was therefore ripe for the plucking.

Launching a robust counter-thrust in this phoney war, Lyon announced he'll be delighted to see England's batting line-up – expected to be stacked with seven left-handers among its 11 members - swing hard and often.

"Perfect," Lyon smiled when asked for his response to Swann's battle cry to take down Australia's spinner.

"I've been having that done (to me) for 41 Tests now so I'm getting used to it.

"I'm up for the fight and I'm looking forward to it, so it's nice for Graeme Swann to come out like that.

"I'm confident in my skill to get the job done for Australia, especially because they've got several left-handers in the squad which I'm quite excited to be bowling at."

Swann, who suddenly quit Test cricket in the midst of England's five-nil series loss in Australia 18 months ago, was the leading wicket-taker when the rivals last met in the UK in 2013 when bare, dry pitches played to his strength and blunted the impact of both team's seamers.

Video: Watson's demolition job on Swann in bowler's final Test

Now, with Swann retired to the BBC commentary box and Australia packing an even heavier artillery of quicks than two years previous, Lyon is expecting curators from Cardiff through to Nottingham to roll out pitches that offer little but toil for bowlers of all denominations.

"With the pace that we've got in our squad … there is no real weak link there, so I dare say they (ground staff at the Test match venues) will be taking the speed out of the pitches," Lyon said.

"I think that they're going to make pretty good batting pitches and try and take the game as long as they can.

"So I'm expecting something pretty similar to last time (2013), probably good batting wickets and hopefully they'll take a bit of spin and that may play into my hands."

The two days of training the Australians have undertaken since arriving in England last week have encouraged Lyon, who extracted occasional bounce from the practice pitches at Merchant Taylors' School north-west of London that are thought to be representative of the sort of tracks that await later in the summer.

And while Lyon's favoured mode of attack – operating from around the wicket allowing him to drift the ball in and spin it away from left-handers – further fuels his confidence heading into this Ashes campaign, so too does recent wisdom imparted to him by cricket's most successful spinner Muthiah Muralidaran.

Video: Lyon works with Muralidaran in Colombo

During his stint as a consultant coach with the Australia team in the UAE last October, Muralidaran counselled Lyon not to tinker too much with the pace of his bowling as he encountered varying pitch conditions around the world.

It's an insight that Lyon, who boasts a similar strike rate (a wicket every 66.16 deliveries) to Sri Lanka's record-breaking spinner (66.08) at the same stage of their careers (41 Tests), has taken to heart and which he believes will hold him in good stead regardless of the English pitches that await.

"I did lot of work with Murali a year ago and one of his big (pieces of) advice was that my stock pace would always work no matter where you are in the world," Lyon said.

"It's just being able to have that variation of going up the gears and down the gears, so I'm not going to change too much.

"I know what works for me and I'm going to back myself."

It's a parting line of which Warne would have been proud.