*Official* Third Test at Old Trafford

[FaaipDeOiad]

Smiffy is 30 runs away from fully gaining the support of Australian public IMO. Watto one failure away from losing it (if he hasn't already).

Yeah the first non-Clarke batsman to make a century on this tour really has the chance to cement their place in the team for a while. There's been such a long drought.

Though actually I think the last Australian batsman to score a century other than Clarke was Wade, so who knows.

 

[Cabinet96]

Yeah, Clarke was the only one of Australia's last six test centurions to play at Lords. Wade, Hussey, Ponting, Cowan and Warner were all not playing for various reasons.

 

[outbreak]

Smiffy is 30 runs away from fully gaining the support of Australian public IMO. Watto one failure away from losing it (if he hasn't already).

he is winning people over. To be fair a lot of the hate he has gotten has been to do with the media, warnie, australia touting him up as a front line spinner and the fact that he's a lower order batsmen stepping into a side where the top order can't make runs. Same as some of haddin's hate, yeah he never adapts his game and goes out slogging but in fairness it isn't 6 and 7's job to make your runs every game.

 

[dermo]

 

[NUFAN]

he is winning people over. To be fair a lot of the hate he has gotten has been to do with the media, warnie, australia touting him up as a front line spinner and the fact that he's a lower order batsmen stepping into a side where the top order can't make runs. Same as some of haddin's hate, yeah he never adapts his game and goes out slogging but in fairness it isn't 6 and 7's job to make your runs every game.

Smith has won me over tbh. He won me over when he started to make fighting knocks for NSW and has continued it on against India and now England. I was totally against his technique when he first came onto the Test scene, but he is so much more tighter when meeting the ball and I rate his shot selection, He is not prone to soft dismissals as much at all either.

 

[Top_Cat]

Surely most of the angst with respect to Smith has been about his bowling?

 

[Dan]

Smith's always been a guy who worked his arse off though.

I'm not sure if someone said it on here or if I got it from guys locally, but apparently throughout his junior career down our way he was constantly overlooked by rep selectors, and never got the chances that a lot of other guys did. But his father took him down to the nets and he worked hard, got himself into the system (a huge effort at Sutherland; so much ****ty politics in the lower end of the grade club), and has continued to work on his game ever since.

 

[Burgey]

Ain't but no one be hating on the People's Champ*













*Except Poms, and who gives a **** about them?

 

[Ruckus]

Smith has won me over tbh. He won me over when he started to make fighting knocks for NSW and has continued it on against India and now England. I was totally against his technique when he first came onto the Test scene, but he is so much more tighter when meeting the ball and I rate his shot selection, He is not prone to soft dismissals as much at all either.

yeah agreed, been very impressed with him. He is obviously a natural batsman rather than bowler...kind of begs the question of how good he could actually have been right now if he focused on his strength from the beginning without the whole all-rounder saga.

 

[Cabinet96]

Ain't but no one be hating on the People's Champ*

*Except Poms, and who gives a **** about them?

Hey, that's not true for all of us.

 

[Burgey]

Hey, that's not true for all of us.

Good man!

 

[Raghav]

First day of the test match, the pitch seems to be road ..

 

[Top_Cat]

yeah agreed, been very impressed with him. He is obviously a natural batsman rather than bowler...kind of begs the question of how good he could actually have been right now if he focused on his strength from the beginning without the whole all-rounder saga.

He's a good bowler too, leg-spin is just hard. Guys who focus on that usually can't bat as well as he does so it makes the decision easier.

It's the dilemma with all-rounders; at what point do you make decisions about your strengths and which one's more likely to get you in the team? And, of course, there's how the player sees themselves, what they want to do, etc. Steve Waugh took years to give up bowling (his back made that decision for him, probably) and blokes like Watson still haven't really figured out what they want 10 years later. It's a tough decision and for Smith, I doubt it's settled because he's clearly still working on his bowling too.

Have said a few times, Ritchie Benaud was a part-time bowler for the first 8 years of his Test career so there's precedent for a bloke becoming a world-class bowler after years of being a mid/lower-order bat. Again, depends on what the team needs, what Smith wants out of the game, etc.

 

[GotSpin]

I didn't think it was that much of a road. Yeah batting conditions aren't tough but England bowled fairly poorly

 

[the big bambino]

he's still got to go home though and deal with the fact he is a man trapped in a womans body

It'd explain why he loves himself.

 

[Ruckus]

He's a good bowler too, leg-spin is just hard. Guys who focus on that usually can't bat as well as he does so it makes the decision easier.

It's the dilemma with all-rounders; at what point do you make decisions about your strengths and which one's more likely to get you in the team? And, of course, there's how the player sees themselves, what they want to do, etc. Steve Waugh took years to give up bowling (his back made that decision for him, probably) and blokes like Watson still haven't really figured out what they want 10 years later. It's a tough decision and for Smith, I doubt it's settled because he's clearly still working on his bowling too.

Have said a few times, Ritchie Benaud was a part-time bowler for the first 8 years of his Test career so there's precedent for a bloke becoming a world-class bowler after years of being a mid/lower-order bat. Again, depends on what the team needs, what Smith wants out of the game, etc.

Smith has always said he sees himself as a batsman. His role as a much younger player has always been as a batsman, which is why it appears more natural to him. The all-rounder bowling thing came later on.

Given the team context atm he should def be focusing 100% on batting now though imo. His bowling should just be there as some useful part-time stuff, a la Marcus North.

 

[Son Of Coco]

hasn't yet been hit on the nuts either

Hit on the nuts?

 

[Son Of Coco]

Don't think it was a road for the first two sessions tbh. By no means bad to bat on, but not a road.

People scored runs. Ipso facto - it was a road. It's strong logic.

 

[Son Of Coco]

Faaarrrk ****ehouse score to wake up to.

Don't beat yourself up mate, I'm sure she looked lovely when you took her home from the pub last night.

 

[wellAlbidarned]

that khawaja shot just has no words. "WTF, swann turns it? Thought I could just blast through the line off a length"

Good to see superClarke back in business, as well as Rogers making another mark.