SMITH WON’T SWEAT SHORT STUFF
... and dares India’s quicks to try their luck
St eve Smith has dared India to try and exploit hisso-calledweakness toshort-pitchbowling, setting the scene for a fiery start tothesummer.
The Australian superstar was famously head hunted by England fire brand J of ra Archer in the 2019 Ashes, before New Z ea lander Neil Wagner set out the first plausible blueprint for how to bowl to Smith last summer, after containing himwithaseries-worthof unrelenting short balls.
As the Australians brace for an all-out attack on the world’ s No .1 bats man, Smith has a simple message: bring it on.
Smith is adam ant the chinmusic is no this Achilles’ heel and says if India’ s quicks try to follow Wagner’ s game plan to suffocate him with pin point accuracy, it will be at their peril.
“It’ s no dramas for me. I just play the game and sum up the conditions, how they’ re trying to get me out and being able to counter that ,” Smith said on Friday .“I mean, a few different oppositions have tried it and they’ ve certainly found it more difficult to( execute) the way Wagnerdid.
“He’ s got an amazing skills et where his speeds go up and down… everything is between your ribs and your head.
“If teams are trying to get me out like that it’ s probably a big benefit for the team because it takes a lot out of people’ s bodies if you continually bowl short.
“I’ ve faced a lot of short bowling in my life and I haven’ t had too many stresses with it. Is uppose we’ ll just wait and see .”
The lasting image of the acclaimed Amazon documentary The Test, was Smith’ s dramatic du el against Archer, where he was floored by a vicious bouncer at Lord’ s, only to return to the crease. Smith said he was never scar red by the experience against Archer, evidenced by his Ashes-sealingdouble-blcenturyin thefourthTest.
“I never really look at it too much that way ,” he said .“It was a bit up and down at Lord’ s. That happened and I came back and made a couple of big scores. I moved on and trusted myself .”
However, Smith’ s team mate MatthewWade—anothertarget of the flying Kiwi Wagner last summer—sensesastormis coming in the shape of a fear some Indian attack led by Jaspri tB u mr ah, and emboldened by India’ s historic series victory on Australian soil two summersago.
“I think( short bowling tactic) will definitely be used, not just to Steve but to all our batters ,” warned Wade .“When the wicket gets flat I’ m 100 percent sure India will go to that kind of plan .”
JoshHaz le wood said if B umr ah—who decimated Australia twosummersago—canget sucked into trying to bowl at Smith like Wagner did, Australia willbecheering.
“If someone like Bum rahtri es to replica te, I think that’ s a win for us to be honest ,” he said.
“It takes away from how he took all his wickets last time .”
Smith made two half- centuries against New Zealand, but to not see him make a to nina summer was a shock given his Bradman-like feats either side of his 12- month suspension. The 31year-old say she has learnt from the Wagner experience.
“Probably( I could have been) a bit more selective with Wagner’ s short balls ,” Smith said.
“But, ultimately, I faced a lot of balls. We always talk about wearing opposition teams down and if they’ re bowling short and I can’t score as easily as I’d like, it’s still of benefit to the team.
“When they tire, we get loose balls. We won that series 3-0 and others were able to score somebigruns.”