Legendary Australian batter Steve Smith was unwell for the third Ashes test. But columnist ROBERT MACKLIN praises the acting captain’s leadership in winning the second test.
The dramatic finale to the second Ashes Test revealed yet another facet of the enigma that was the then acting captain of Australia’s mighty cricket team, Steven Peter Devereux Smith.
First, he broke a deadly partnership diving for a magical catch at first slip. Two more pearlers left his team only 65 runs away from a guarantee that the Ashes are Australia’s sine die.
But as they stuttered towards the total with a storm approaching plus a forecast of rain that might let England off the hook, suddenly it didn’t look so easy. Travis Head, the Magic Pudding of Australian batting, wafted the pink ball skyways. An easy catch.
Then came South African-born Marnus Labuschagne. Alas, the moment proved too much. He stood to attention, his bat at the ready, while the Black Knight Jofra Archer loosed a fireball that creased his snow-white glove. Out!
The ‘Gabba trembled in fright. Still 23 runs to get as the clouds covered the sun.
It had been a long four days – England had won the toss; batted okay with Joe Root finally scoring a century on the hard Australian Test pitches. But then, as acting captain, Smith led the batsmen and the maturing Mitchel Starc added 77 to a deadly spell of bowling, the way was cleared for a victory that Stephen Peter Deveraux Smith needed more than anything.
For it had been much longer since that 2018 nightmare when “Sandpapergate” had burst upon a disbelieving world. It seemed so crazy, so out of character for our then captain to have a teammate tamper with the ball to gain some advantage (maybe) in that third South African Test match.
This from a man so dedicated to the game that only Bradman gave more of his life to its skills and its spirit. But while I for one never believed that he had authorised it, others I respect most certainly did.
Indeed, the author Peter Thompson with whom I have shared a byline in six of our well-regarded books – and who lived thereafter in London – is as certain as he is unforgiving.
“In my opinion he should never have been given the responsibility of captaining Australia again,” he said. “The captain speaks for the whole team and he has made a complete dog’s bollocks of it. He has a tin ear, and it showed before the First Test when Monte Panesar called him a cheat and he responded by saying in effect that Panesar was so badly educated that his opinion didn’t count, a racist remark that probably alienated thousands of Asian cricket fans.
“Then at the end of the second Test he criticises the only black player in the England team with an offensive on-field remark that suggested he hadn’t given his best during the match, probably alienating thousands of black cricket fans.”
Lifelong friends, we only agree on Peter’s final remark: “This is all manna from heaven to the loudmouths in the Barmy Army and they will continue to sledge him for the rest of the series.”
But I believe that Steven Peter Devereux Smith was more aware than either of us that when he reached the wicket, a moment had come to rise above that rupture – whatever the truth might be, whatever agreement had been reached as the shock-horror of the crisis demanded an accounting.
Little wonder he was confrontational to Jofra Archer and to Ben Stokes, that opponent from Central Casting. With nine powerful strokes, filled with a second-by-second drama, he knocked that 23 for six. In the finest spirit of the game, it looked and felt like a true captain’s knock.
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