What’s the story?
Superstition in the game is no new phenomenon but what Australian captain does is taking it to an all new level.
Steven Smith tapes his shoelaces to his socks while batting. He asks the team physio to do the needful before he puts on his pads to walk out to bat. According to his teammates, the skipper does not like the sight of his shoelaces while batting and hence wants to hide it somewhere out of sight.
Usman Khawaja, the left-handed opening batsman who has played with Smith for a long time says that he is the type of guy who sticks with whatever is going in the right direction and does not fiddling around with it.
“Well, it started during the last season of the IPL due to the kind of pants we were given to wear. I have always had issues with looking at my shoe laces when I am batting. And it wasn’t working because the pant wasn’t long enough and the shoe laces would pop out and that was getting to my head. So I got the physio to tape my shoe laces to my socks. I wear footie socks when I bat. And I got a hundred the first time I got it and I have done it since ” Smith said.
The details
This practice came out when cricket.com.au released a video in which it was pretty evident that the shoelaces were tied to his socks well beneath his pads. Considering the form he has been in the past few years clearly this superstition has worked wonders for him.
In the ongoing series he has amassed 499 runs in 4 Test matches and is by far the best batsman across both the teams.
In case you didn’t know...
The Australian captain who started his career as a leg-spinner who could contribute handy runs lower down the order has quickly established himself as one of the giants in the modern game.
He boasts of an astounding Test average of 60.98 and is by far the best batsman in the current Australian squad.
Also, he is the number 1 ranked Test batsman in the world.
Author's Take
Different players have their own techniques and ways and means of scoring runs or taking wickets. Smith too has a technique which is his own and he somehow manages to utilise this to his advantage. Perhaps, this superstition is more to do with comfort than with anything else.
Whatever it is, there is no denying the fact that Smith is the guy to beat when it comes to batting currently as there are hardly any conditions all across the world where he has not notched up scores!
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