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Labuschagne carefully spreads butter on each surface of a slice of white bread. “That’s essential,” he explains as he closes the lid of his grilled cheese press. “There you go. Then you get it golden on the outside.” He lifts the lid to reveal a perfectly browned of delicious perfection, the gooey cheese happily sizzling within. “Here’s the key technique,” he declares. At which point, he does something shocking and odd.

At this stage, you may feel a layer of boredom is beginning to form across your eyes. The red lights of elaborate writing are going off. You’re no doubt informed that Labuschagne hit 160 for his state team this week and is being widely discussed for an national team comeback before the Ashes series.

No doubt you’d prefer to read more about his performance. But first – you now understand with frustration – you’re going to have to endure three paragraphs of wobbling whimsy about grilled cheese, plus an further tangential section of self-referential analysis in the second person. You sigh again.

Labuschagne flips the sandwich on to a serving plate and walks across the fridge. “Not many people do this,” he announces, “but I genuinely enjoy the cold toastie. Boom, in the fridge. You get that cheese to harden up, go bat, come back. Alright. Toastie’s ready to go.”

The Cricket Context

Look, here’s the main point. How about we cover the match details out of the way first? Little treat for your patience. And while there may still be six weeks until the series opener, Labuschagne’s century against the Tigers – his third in recent months in all cricket – feels importantly timed.

We have an Australia top three badly short of consistency and technique, revealed against South Africa in the Test championship decider, exposed again in the Caribbean afterwards. Labuschagne was left out during that tour, but on some level you felt Australia were desperate to rehabilitate him at the first opportunity. Now he appears to have given them the perfect excuse.

And this is a approach the team should follow. Usman Khawaja has one century in his past 44 innings. Konstas looks hardly a Test match opener and rather like the handsome actor who might act as a batsman in a Bollywood epic. None of the alternatives has presented a strong argument. One contender looks finished. Marcus Harris is still surprisingly included, like moths or damp. Meanwhile their skipper, the pace bowler, is injured and suddenly this appears as a surprisingly weak team, missing authority or balance, the kind of natural confidence that has often helped Australia dominate before a match begins.

The Batsman’s Revival

Here comes Labuschagne: a leading Test player as in the recent past, recently omitted from the one-day team, the right person to bring stability to a fragile lineup. And we are advised this is a calmer and more meditative Labuschagne currently: a pared-down, back-to-basics Labuschagne, no longer as maniacally obsessed with minor adjustments. “It seems I’ve really simplified things,” he said after his ton. “Not really too technical, just what I must bat effectively.”

Of course, nobody truly believes this. Most likely this is a fresh image that exists only in Labuschagne’s own head: still endlessly adjusting that approach from dawn to dusk, going deeper into fundamentals than any player has attempted. You want less technical? Marnus will take time in the practice sessions with coaches and video clips, thoroughly reshaping his game into the least technical batter that has ever played. This is simply the quality of the focused, and the trait that has long made Labuschagne one of the most wildly absorbing cricketers in the sport.

Bigger Scene

Perhaps before this very open England-Australia contest, there is even a type of interesting contrast to Labuschagne’s unquenchable obsession. For England we have a squad for whom technical study, let alone self-analysis, is a forbidden topic. Feel the flavours. Be where the ball is. Live in the instant.

For Australia you have a batsman like Labuschagne, a individual utterly absorbed with cricket and totally indifferent by public perception, who finds cricket even in the spaces between the cricket, who treats this absurd sport with precisely the amount of odd devotion it demands.

His method paid off. During his intense period – from the time he walked out to come in for a hurt Steve Smith at the famous ground in 2019 to around the end of 2022 – Labuschagne was able to see the game on another level. To access it – through pure determination – on a different, unusual, intense plane. During his days playing Kent league cricket, teammates would find him on the day of a match resting on a bench in a focused mindset, mentally rehearsing all balls of his batting stint. Per the analytics firm, during the initial period of his career a statistically unfathomable proportion of catches were missed when he batted. Somehow Labuschagne had anticipated outcomes before anyone had a chance to change it.

Current Struggles

Maybe this was why his performance dipped the moment he reached the summit. There were no further goals to picture, just a empty space before his eyes. Additionally – he began doubting his cover drive, got stuck in his crease and seemed to forget where his off-stump was. But it’s part of the same issue. Meanwhile his coach, D’Costa, reckons a emphasis on limited-overs started to undermine belief in his alignment. Encouragingly: he’s recently omitted from the 50-over squad.

Surely it matters, too, that Labuschagne is a devoutly religious individual, an evangelical Christian who believes that this is all basically written out in advance, who thus sees his job as one of reaching this optimal zone, no matter how mysterious it may look to the ordinary people.

This approach, to my mind, has consistently been the main point of difference between him and Smith, a more naturally gifted player