Australian cricket start Steve Smith endured a bad return to Sheffield Shield cricket during the game against Victoria. The veteran star was out for a duck in the 2nd innings when Scott Boland got the ball to move in. Australia’s star batter shouldered arms to the ball that came in and the umpire was quick to send the batter back.
In the first innings, Smith was out for 3 runs after facing 29 balls. Fergus O Neill got the key wicket of Smith caught by Sam Harper as New South Wales were bowled out for 136. This will cause huge concerns in the Australian camp ahead of the huge Border Gavaskar Series against India starting in November.
Smith took over the opening spot after David Warner's retirement post the SCG Test of Pakistan. According to reports, Smith is set to revert back to his number 4 spot against India. The ploy of using the 34-year-old as the opener hasn’t got results and the Australians are set to go in a different direction.
‘They hated me up top’ – Steve Smith makes massive statement about his batting position
Australian cricket star Steve Smith recently spoke to the media about his batting position. Fox Sports quoted the Australian batting star as saying, “It was good fun having a crack at something new, batting up top. I still feel I could do a job there, for sure.”
The 34-year-old also said, “Obviously, there’s a spot there now with Greeny out, and I think just conversations we had after New Zealand with particularly Marnus and Uzi, they hated me up top, to be honest.”
Elaborating on the statement further, Smith was quoted by Fox Sports as saying, “They wanted me behind them. So that was a big part of it. And then, obviously, I’ve got a decent record at four. I’ve done pretty well at four for a number of years now and I feel like it’s probably where I can have my best input for this team at the moment.”
Smith also revealed the chat with Geroge Bailey and his decision to move to the number 4 spot. “I got asked where I’d prefer to bat and said four. I didn’t ask. But I also said I’m happy batting wherever. I’m not too fussed. So I saw a few things last week saying that I’ve requested to bat at four. That wasn’t the case. I said I’m happy to bat wherever you like me to bat, but yeah, four would be my ideal position,” he said.
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