Smith responds to Yasir’s seven-fingered salute

Pakistan’s Yasir Shah may have woken the beast with his seven-fingered salute at the Gabba, with Steve Smith saying it’s motivated him to not get out to the leg-spinner again in Adelaide this week.

Yasir handed Smith a rare Test failure in Brisbane, bowling him for just four and celebrating by holding up seven fingers to signify it’s the seventh time he’s dismissed the world’s best Test batsman in the longest format.

Speaking in Adelaide on Tuesday, Smith pointed out that some of his past dismissals to Yasir – including the one at the Gabba last week – came when he was trying to be aggressive and had played a “funky” shot in order to quickly lift the run rate.

And he flagged he would adopt a much more cautious approach against Yasir in the second Test, starting on Friday, in order to not get out to the leg-spinner again.

“It gave me a bit more motivation next game to not get out to him,” Smith said of Yasir’s celebration.

“I’ll be a little bit more disciplined against him.

“It was interesting. A few of the times he’s got me out, I’ve been on a few runs and been slogging. There’s been a couple of second innings ones where I was playing some funky shots. So I’m not too worried. 

“I thought he bowled really well at the Gabba, got some good drift and a little bit of a spin on a wicket that wasn’t spinning that much. He bowled well and we’re going have to play him well this game.”

Yasir dismissed Smith three times in four innings during Australia’s away series in 2014, when the leg-spinner was on debut and Smith had only just started his ascent towards becoming the best batsman in the world.

The leggie added three more dismissals of Smith on their tour of Australia three years ago, two of which came when the hosts were speeding towards a declaration in their second innings. Smith was caught on the long-on boundary in the first Test of that series and then dismissed playing a risky paddle sweep in the third Test in Sydney, while Yasir also found a more conventional edge behind on the opening day of the SCG Test.

With Australia again cruising towards a massive total in Brisbane last week, Smith was given a licence to take the game on by coach Justin Langer, which resulted in two swipes across the line, one that found the mid-wicket boundary and another that clattered into his stumps.

“The situation we were at was a pretty good one, the boys batted beautifully up the top,” Smith explained.

“I actually spoke to JL in the morning (and asked) ‘how should I approach this today?’. He (said) ‘do what you want to do’.

“I thought about being quite aggressive and it didn’t work.”

Smith found himself in an unusual position in Brisbane, coming to the middle with 351 runs already on the board and the Australians looking to ram home their advantage.

In complete contrast, Smith’s dominant Ashes campaign this year came despite Australia’s top order misfiring badly, with the former skipper walking out to bat after the 10th over just once in seven innings.

And the prolific right-hander, who punished himself for his failure in Brisbane by jogging from the Gabba back to the team hotel after play, admitted the higher stakes bring out the best in him.

“It’s great for the team when there’s no pressure on,” he said. “It means someone else or a couple of guys have done a really good job, which is good.

“But I do like batting under pressure and trying to help the team post a total and dig them out of a hole if we’re in a hole. I probably do bat a bit better when there is that pressure on.”

Domain Test Series v Pakistan

Australia squad: Tim Paine (c), Cameron Bancroft, Joe Burns, Pat Cummins, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Michael Neser, James Pattinson, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Matthew Wade, David Warner

Pakistan squad: Azhar Ali (c), Abid Ali, Asad Shafiq, Babar Azam, Haris Sohail, Imam-ul-Haq, Imran Khan Snr, Iftikhar Ahmed, Kashif Bhatti, Mohammad Abbas, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Musa Khan, Naseem Shah, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Shan Masood, Yasir Shah.

First Test: Australia won by an innings and five runs.

Second Test: November 29 – December 3, Adelaide (d/n) (Seven, Fox & Kayo)