In a remarkably honest (and somewhat mucky) admission, Australian captain Tim Paine has hilariously revealed that he soiled himself moments before securing the Ashes urn at the Old Trafford Test last year.

In the dying stages of the riveting fourth Test, Australia needed to clean up England’s tail to secure a win and go 2-1 up in the Ashes series, but skipper Paine had something entirely different to worry about, as he confessed on the Keep it Real podcast, as quoted by news.com.au.

“I was feeling a little bit ill and there were some big, dark clouds rolling in over the grandstand and we only had about seven overs left and obviously we needed that one wicket,” Paine said. “No drinks break left, umpires starting to talk to each other about (bad) light.

“I just had a horrible feeling that I needed to go to the toilet … it was (a) number two and so I basically just thought, ‘Righto, can’t waste any time, I’m gonna have to (go)’.

“I remember saying to Davey Warner, ‘I’m actually going to have to do this,’ and did. Unfortunately, it was one of those moments where the crowd went quite quiet,” he said. “Because I was a bit unwell, it was a bit runny and you could actually hear it hit the ground.

“That ball was bowled I think by Mitch Starc to big (Craig) Overton. Luckily he didn’t edge it because myself and David Warner literally had tears in our eyes, we could not stop laughing.”

Former Victorian wicketkeeper Darren Berry, part of the podcast, probed Paine further, bluntly asking the all-important question for everyone’s clarity: “So you’re telling me, the Australian captain … and no one knows this, you were squatting down behind the stumps, the Ashes about to be secured, Tim Paine soiled himself?”

“Yep,” Paine confessed. “A number of the boys do know about it, I think probably all. Certainly, the slips cordon were aware of it.

“Normally, obviously, you’d run off but, I’m not kidding, there were rain clouds everywhere, it was six or seven overs left, we were down on overs,” Paine replied. “I just thought they’re (umpires) going to call the game off here and we’re going to get stitched-up, so I couldn’t be running off the ground.

“I reckon JL (Justin Langer) would have knocked me out.”

Berry, who had done his research, admitted that his suspicion had been half-baked and that Paine’s admission went beyond what he’d initially thought.

“That’s better than I thought because my spy told me that he actually p***ed himself, but Painey’s gone one step further and said he actually s*** himself,” Berry said.

Paine replied: “Chuck, if I tell you the honest truth, the p*** was about six overs before that.”