Smith out to prove England wrong

Steve Smith chooses not to recount much of what was said to him when he first encountered the heat of an Ashes contest in England, as a full-cheeked, mop-haired 24-year-old who England believed was ripe for intimidation.

It’s not that he doesn’t remember.

In fact, it’s as safe a bet as him reeling off at least one triple-figure score in the coming series in Britain that he would be able to provide a fairly accurate transcript of what was flung his way in 2013 when England held the whip hand and flayed happily.

Even as a young fringe player cautiously re-calibrating his path back into international ranks, Smith knew that he had to earn his stripes in such fierce international company.

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The England players celebrate the wicket of Steve Smith in the 2013 Ashes series // Getty Images

But now that he has, and enters his fourth Ashes campaign at the venerable age of 26 as the premier Test batsman in the world, Smith recognises that perhaps the England players when he first entered their territory might have underestimated who they were dealing with.

And he can recall whose voices were at the forefront of that chorus.

"I remember Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell getting into me quite a bit,” Smith recalled this week as he got himself ready to lock horns with Bell and a Pietersen-less England in the opening Ashes Test in Cardiff.

“I don't think they really rated the way I played.

“But maybe I've changed their views now, perhaps a little bit.”

A future Australia Test captain who has already taken that coveted vehicle for a spin around the block, Smith is shrewd enough not to cite this formative experience as one that is driving him on to retribution.

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Smith returns to England as Australia's Test vice-captain // Getty Images

However, he does concede that perhaps he was afforded a little less respect than might be polite to a youngster making his way in adult company.

“Probably not quite as much as they might now,” Smith says with that smile which is equal parts infectious and nervous.

“When I came back into that side I'd played two Tests since I'd been back (having been dropped from the Test team) and they were both in India.

“So it was different conditions coming over here against the (English brand) Duke ball.

“I'd never had any real success against them before, so they might view me a little bit differently.”

If they don’t, then perhaps they should.

Smith crowned that series with his maiden Test century, an unbeaten 138 at the Oval that ensured his place in the starting XI for the subsequent return bout in Australia and which became the foundation stone on which he has since constructed an imposing international record.

"Thank goodness I didn't nick that first ball,” Smith recalled with a wide grin.

“For me it was a big moment to know I could get a hundred in Test cricket, that was the period where I felt I belonged a lot more.”

In the 16 matches that have followed his most recent Test innings in England, Smith has piled on centuries at the rate of one every second Test and in most of those has not looked like betraying a weakness on which rival bowlers can pounce.

But reading the British press since the tourists arrived here a fortnight ago, it would seem that the doubts about the precocious youngster’s self-styled capacity to peel off hundreds at will remain.

I'm ready to go now: Smith

From Graeme Swann to Stuart Broad, members of the England team that saw at close range how Smith found his feet at Test level at The Oval two years ago have tripped over themselves to suggest his technique won’t cope with the apparently alien manner in which a cricket ball behaves in England.

Broad went so far as to suggest that, by batting Smith at number three which doesn’t so fanciful for a batsman formally ranked the contemporary game’s best, the Ashes holders are handing their challengers a distinct advantage.

Smith is among many who have viewed these pronouncements quizzically.

"It doesn't bother me at all,” Smith said in response to more questioning about his idiosyncratic batting style.

“People might say my technique's a little bit different.

“I don't see it that way, I think all my fundamentals are all the same.

“The thing for me is my defence, as long as my defence is in good order then I feel the rest of my game can expand from there.”

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In truth, Smith doesn’t pay much attention to those who run their expert eye over the way in which he goes about piling on runs.

That’s because it’s unlikely he’ll come across a more eagle-eyed scrutineer of the intricacies of his batting than himself.

An inveterate student of videos of every innings he plays, scanning those occasional mis-strokes and even rarer dismissals for bugs that can be fixed, Smith noticed something was amiss when he was bowled around his legs in a World Cup warm-up match against India in Adelaide.

“I was taking leg stump guard at that point, I now take about that far (holds up his hands indicated he’s shifted it back an inch or so towards leg) outside leg stump, so I'm stepping to where I want to be,” he said.

"For me I just want to keep going out there and performing and doing well.

“So the way I do that is to make sure I keep doing the same things in my routines, in the way I practice and train and all that kind of stuff.”

From the precision with which he lays out his equipment in the dressing room, in uniform, equidistant rows, Smith is a perfectionist who finds reassurance in routine.

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Smith's gloves drying during the recent series in the Caribbean // Getty Images

He is also an endless fidgeter, as anyone who has watched him for more than a few minutes at the crease or in the field will well know, so doesn’t believe that in all that forensic examination of his methods he has come close to signing off a finished product.

"I haven't looked at it and said 'this is what I'm looking for',” Smith says when asked if he feels he’s come close to cracking the code for the perfect technique for his game.

“I don't think it is ever finished.

“I go back and look at footage quite a bit, make sure I'm doing certain things I want to be doing and if it's not what I'm wanting to do I'm trying to get better at that as well, at practice and in games.

“I haven't got to a point where I say 'this is the perfect way to do things'.”

His batting seems destined to remain a work in progress which, given his results of the past 18 months, is worthy of respect in itself.

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