Steve Smith: Derision to Domination

Less than five years ago his inclusion caused astonishment, now Steve Smith arrives on our shores as the World's best.

It is understandable that Steve Smith’s English adversaries have taken more convincing than the rest of the cricket world.

Smith’s underwhelming offerings in the 2010/11 Ashes defeat resulted in his heckling by crowds, derision from critics, and exile from the Australian team for more than two years. At just 21 years of age he became a scapegoat for that summer’s resounding mess. It was an unforgiving introduction.

“I’d obviously had a taste of it at quite a young age where I probably wasn’t quite ready to stand up to Test cricket,” Smith reflects in a Jamaican hotel.

“It wasn’t a case of thinking, ‘Am I ever going to get back?, it was just about getting my game to where I wanted to get it to, and I think I’m well on the way to that.”

Stinging criticism has the potential to cripple even the most gifted, but silencing those doubters has been integral to the virtuoso Smith’s relentless drive to the top of the world batting rankings, a gong he earned as he arrived for this Ashes defence.


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