MATCH STORIES
Follow Us‘You might be the best wicketkeeper in the world, but mate, with due respect, we don’t feel you’re the best fit for this team.’
Private conversations seldom tend to leave the dressing room, but it wouldn’t have been a surprise had Ben Stokes said these exact words to Ben Foakes in the lead-up to the West Indies Tests.
Glovework-wise, Foakes is up there as one of the best to have ever played Test cricket. For the kind of wicketkeeper he is, Foakes is a pretty solid batter, too. But there’s one thing that has constantly bothered Stokes and Brendon McCullum, and that’s the rather passive nature of the 31-year-old—or, to be more specific, his strike rate.
In the aftermath of the India series earlier this year, Foakes’ strike rate in Tests read 47.24.
This England unit under Stokes have prided themselves on taking the game to the opposition. Yet, Foakes, despite batting at No.7, finished the India Tests with a strike rate of 39.4, by some distance the lowest among all English batters in that tour.
And so Stokes, McCullum and Rob Key made their move ahead of the summer. Out went Foakes, in came Jamie Smith, the former’s understudy at Surrey.
Before this series, Smith had played only three games as a wicketkeeper for Surrey since the start of 2023, yet England picked him anyway and gave him the keys.
They asked him to do just one thing: play the situation but, more importantly, take the aggressive option whenever an opportunity arises.
Three Tests in, young Smith has already vindicated the England think-tank’s decision to trust their gut and gamble on him.
For the 24-year-old has done exactly what England wanted their wicketkeeper to do, batting at No.7, which was to play smart, aggressive cricket.
In his very first innings, Smith consolidated after coming into bat in a tricky spot and then cut loose while batting with the tail. During his time with the Test side, Foakes did the former a lot, but he simply was not capable of doing the latter. He was not able to score runs with the tail, let alone score runs quickly.
It took Smith all of one knock to eclipse Foakes in that regard.
If gear-switching was the need of the hour at Lord’s, then what Smith needed to do at Trent Bridge was go in fourth gear throughout his knock. And he did just that, collecting 36 (54) after walking in at 281/5 in the 58th over when England’s run rate was close to 5.0.
On the second day of the ongoing Test at Edgbaston, the right-hander needed to do more of what he did at Lord’s, considering he was walking in at 169/6, with England marginally behind in the game. With a set Joe Root at the other end, all Smith needed to do was give his senior partner a hand till West Indies’ total was within reach.
But then again, natural Bazballers don’t just ‘give a hand’. They join hands with the set batter and pummel the opposition together.
On the day, Smith outed himself as an inborn, instinctive Bazballer.
169/6, still trailing West Indies by 113? “Hah, no problem, I’ll just smash 95 off 109 balls, thanks.”
After getting his eye in for nine balls, Smith decided to take on the Windies bowling. Alzarri Joseph, who had just got Stokes out with a short ball, prolonged the short ball strategy. But Smith took on the bouncers and collected a four and a six off his 10th and 11th ball of the innings to race to 15 off 11.
The wicketkeeper batter spent his next thirty-odd minutes just being busy, going at about 65-70 by collecting singles and doubles. Then, when the opportunity arose, he swept Gudakesh Motie to the boundary twice in two balls to collect eight more runs and move to 37 off 38 balls.
Smith stitched a 62-run partnership with Root to ensure England got close to parity, but, really, it was his partnership with Chris Woakes, and how he batted with the seamer, that served as a real-time vindication of England’s move to fast track the 24-year-old’s selection.
Many a time in the past, England have found themselves in positions similar to today (231/7) with Foakes as the last recognized batter. And while Foakes managed to prolong the innings by batting long, he seldom managed to get runs on the board and worry the opponent.
Smith, however, stitched a 106-run partnership with Woakes, with 58 runs in the stand coming off his bat.
In the one hour post Tea, he showcased gears that Stokes & Co had been begging to see from their wicketkeeper batter for the longest time.
Smith was on 57 (75) at Tea, with England still trailing by eight runs. Sensing that the visitors were tiring, he walked out of the other side of the break a completely different batter, hammering 38 off 34 balls.
In fairness, the 24-year-old was helped out by some really ordinary bowling from the Windies seamers, who kept feeding to his strength, which is the pull shot.
Still, Smith seamlessly dispatching anything remotely short was a sight to behold.
The right-hander executed six pull shots against pace in the hour after the Tea break. These six hits yielded a whopping 17 runs, with four balls travelling to the boundary.
In fact, three Tests in, Smith has already made the pull shot a trademark of sorts. Across his four innings in this series, the Surrey man has played 15 pull shots against pace. And he’s collected 37 runs at a mind-boggling strike rate of 246.7.
On the day, the young wicketkeeper batter deserved nothing but a ton. But it wasn’t to be, as he was undone by an off-cutter from Shamar Joseph that kept low.
Getting to the three-figure mark would have made Smith the youngest English wicketkeeper to score a Test ton. But he still has a month or so to achieve that record. If his batting in this series is any indication, he should seal it comfortably in the Tests against Sri Lanka.
Early days — very early days — but Smith is proving to be the wicketkeeper batter that Foakes simply couldn’t be.
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