Unconventional. Unorthodox. Eccentric. These are some of the words often used to describe Australian former cricket captain, Steve Smith. To me, it doesn’t really matter what you call him because when he’s batting, he’s an absolute beast. He’ll give you results no matter what the visual appeal may be.
Whether it’s his over-exaggerated leaves or whether it’s his superstitious restlessness before every delivery, Smithy can be very weird at times. However, he’s still one of the best batsmen this world has ever seen. Today, we’ll take you back to one of the finest moments of improvisation we’ve ever seen from this batsman.
It was an ICC World T20 2016 match between Australia and Pakistan and the competition was really heating up as Wahab Riaz was running it to bowl to the batting maestro. Now if you know Riaz, you would know it’s almost impossible to survive against him when he’s got his tail up. However, this battle was being won by Smithy, for sure.
Smith has often spoken about getting into ‘the zone’ and he was surely there in this game as he faced Riaz in the 19th over. Beginning with a guard outside off-stump, he further moved off-side, crossed the wide markers and even nearly got off the pitch as Riaz followed him, but to no avail. Smith managed to pull off an almost impossible shot, much to the shock and surprise of the millions watching the game. See here:
“You look at field … (Wahab) was always going to bowl wide. I genuinely think if he had bowled at stumps it would’ve been an easier shot. I could just tell where it was going to go. When you’re in the zone … you can just tell where it’s going to go occasionally. That was one of those instances,” said Smith later when asked about this marvellous shot.
