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Follow Us'I don't feel like I'm out of form – just out of runs'
There’s a fine between the two. More often than not, that line is blurred as ‘runs’ are often viewed as the ultimate currency in cricket.
But only a cricket nut like Steve Smith can draw that fine line.
Across his last 23 innings, Smith hadn’t scored a single century and was being exposed in front of the stumps, an area where he previously nonchalantly flicked. Since that 91* against West Indies, Smith’s credentials were questioned with him posting scores of 6, 0, 31, 9, 11, 17, 0 and 2.
Someone as bankable as Smith getting out for single-digit scores and just one fifty in 2024 was always going to garner attention. It is almost like watching Roger Federer go a year without competing for any grand slams.
When something like that happens, usually a lot of fingers are going to be pointed, and in Smith’s case, it did happen, considering his lean patch of form. That exaggerated trigger movement was the point of discussion.
Courtesy: Fox Sports
If in Perth his front foot was closed, he exposed his stumps too much in Adelaide. So, that triggered a response from the right-hander, who, by his own admission, wanted to work on a ‘certain trigger movement’.
"In an ideal world, I probably wouldn't hit as many balls as I do in the lead-up … it's just if I need to feel a bit better with something or work on a certain movement, or whatever I might need that last session,” Smith told cricket.com.au.
At Gabba, when Smith took his guard and moved excessively towards the off-stump, immediately all the commentators jumped on the bandwagon, highlighting all the different ways in which the right-hander could be dismissed.
Over the next half hour, the discussion was consistently around how extravagant Smith’s movement around the crease was. But the thing that everyone missed was the ‘mental fortitude’ that Smith brings to the table. The 35-year-old soaks in it all and, if anything, rebounds all of that pressure back on the opposition.
That’s really what separates Smith from everyone.
It isn’t just the runs; it is his mental toughness that has, time and again, helped Australia achieve ultimate Test greatness. Everyone remembers the runs in the 2019 Ashes, but what is often forgotten is how gritty those runs were.
Facing Jasprit Bumrah, like facing Jofra Archer, is no joke.
While Archer tested Smith on the bouncer front, Bumrah’s form is such that he hardly broke a sweat while bowling to the former Australian captain. If he hadn't trapped him right in front of the stumps, he had drawn him on the front foot to get that edge.
But on December 15, Smith was far away from wanting to play Bumrah’s games. He wanted to dictate the play, even if it turned into a bloodbath, and every move was like a seven-hour classical chess contest between Gukesh and Ding Liren.
Smith couldn’t have looked uglier with the bat, but the aesthetic was far away from what he wanted when he walked out to bat at 75/3. There were multiple close shouts, some closer than it should have been - like when the right-hander left a delivery that almost trapped him LBW.
“I’ve played long enough to know that the game turns around. Last time, I was unlucky down the leg side. Today, luck was on my side. On another day, I might have nicked one of those balls,” Smith said post the day's play in Brisbane.
During that session, the 35-year-old was just looking to survive, even if it meant that his exaggerated stride was going to fetch him only six runs in an entire session. It was that kind of a mask that Smith had worn. Even as the wickets fell at the other end, Smith was existing in his own world.
“I've felt that when he's in the zone and batting well, I go unnoticed. I thought he was moving really well. I didn't feel I would lose my partner at the other end, so that gives me some (freedom) too,” Travis Head told broadcasters after the day’s play.
Across his first sixty deliveries, Smith was beaten only six times, once every ten deliveries. But what separated Smith’s knock here from his previous 20 innings was how he continued to find runs and boundaries once he got to his half-century.
In the mini-session between lunch and drinks, Australia scored 46 runs in 11 overs. It was during that session that the right-hander loosened his shoulders and started picking gaps and finding boundaries with relative ease.
It was evident in how Smith took on Ravindra Jadeja, India’s weakest link on this track, scoring 21 off 29 deliveries. Apart from that, Smith also took on the youngster Nitish Kumar Reddy in that ten-over phase before the second new ball, scoring 30 off 34, which helped him race away.
Unlike other batters, you don’t really associate runs as the only metric to judge whether Smith is in form or not. It is usually in the way his hands move, in the way he wields his bat and if he gets the ball onto the middle of the bat.
Smith did that in Brisbane. He moved his bat towards the moving ball so that he crunched the ball with the middle of the bat. Ultimately, Smith brought up his century, his first in 1 year, 5 months and 16 days.
Like Gukesh, Smith's emotions were all over the place. He was zen at the beginning, then pulled out of a punch and later showed his bat towards the dressing room, almost reminding everyone of his legacy.
Not just that, Smith exhibited a never-die display that ultimately resulted in him bringing up his century, like how Gukesh waited his time before checkmating Ding. Crabby, ugly or lucky, Steve Smith and his century won't give two cents, like how Gukesh wouldn’t care about Magnus Carlsen’s comments.
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