Smith and Mount Marco
Recently I saw Steve Smith play in a T20 in Dublin, and yet today he showed more intent than he did in that innings. Obviously pitches play a part, but it was clear he thought Australia needed fast runs, and he was the man to give them.
In the first innings, he slapped Keshav Maharaj down the ground a couple of times. So when he did the same to Simon Harmer in this innings, it made sense. In 2010, he made his debut against Pakistan in England, and in his second match, at Headingley, he kept hitting Danish Kaneria into the empty stand.
So we know this is his shot against spin, no issue there.
But it happened after Anrich Nortje hit him on the head. And there were a few shots where it looked like he was concussed. We have previous on that, because it occurred at Lord’s after Jofra Archer hit him.
What was crazy in the Harmer over was Smith had hit a six over long-on’s head once, and he tried to do it again. It is his shot against this bowling type, but he’s also not a power player. On top of all that, at long on was Marco Jansen and his 12-foot wingspan.
The giant South African did fumble the ball, before finally taking it.
But think about Smith’s batting brain. It is as big as anyone’s before him. Would he take this option normally? So either the third innings declaration played a part, or he was still shook up from the knock on his magnificent head.
Nortje nonsense
South Africa had a tiny chance of a comeback when Anrich Nortje splattered Nic Maddinson’s stumps. And at that point, Australia were slightly jumpy.
Then Nortje bowled one great over of short stuff. Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne hopped around quite a bit. So they went with bouncers, but Australia hammered them.
One of the reasons is the field. Instead of having a full defensive Wagner field, they kept all their normal fielders, and just put out three players, two behind square on the leg side with a deep point.
After that, Marnus hooked a four in the gap. These things happen. But then he played a back-foot cover drive past the deep point. Next over Smith was facing, and he hit one to the right of the offside sweeper, then left, and then right again.
Bavuma probably should have given more deep fielders, but it was also a bit unfortunate that there were five boundaries either side of the fielders.
However, they were bowling short and fast without full cover against two guys who can handle it.
And that little moment is kind of what broke South Africa. Maybe they had to take a chance to bowl short, but did they have to do it without the fielders out? Australia wanted to score anyway, so why not play on their egos?
