Join now and get your first month for just $1 ><\/a><\/p>\n\u201cEngland had a really good side at that point,\u201d Smith recalled.<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/1761200708_112_poster-fallback.png\"\/)
<\/p>\n
\u201cI was just coming into the team. I was only playing in my third, fourth and fifth Test matches.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was young, batting down the order and trying to find my way. That was tricky, and I probably wasn\u2019t quite ready at that stage either.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hadn\u2019t figured out how I wanted to go about playing. I was still a bit of a bits and pieces player. I was bowling disgusting leg spin. <\/p>\n
\u201dJust trying to find my place, so that was tricky at that stage.\u201d<\/p>\n
Australia’s Steven Smith in 2010. AAP Image\/Joe CastroSource: AAP<\/p>\n
Smith was dropped from the Test side before his triumphant return in 2013, helping Australia whitewash England during that summer\u2019s Ashes series.<\/p>\n
Over the past 12 years, the right-hander has accumulated 10,218 Test runs at 57.40 with 36 hundreds, making him comfortably Australia\u2019s leading run-scorer during that period.<\/p>\n
However, Smith confessed the \u201cweight of expectation\u201d on him created extra pressure in the Test arena, acknowledging failure is more common than success when being a Test batter.<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes the bigger and better you get, the more you\u2019re expected to do well,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n
\u201dThat weight of expectation can perhaps weigh on you sometimes, so managing that expectation can be a tricky game sometimes.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a batter, you\u2019ve only got one chance. You get a good ball or you do something silly and you\u2019re back in the sheds. Particularly on the wickets that we\u2019re playing on at the moment, there is quite a lot in them and you need some luck to score some runs, there\u2019s no doubt about that, particularly as a top-order player.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith pinpointed his dismissal to Indian speedster Jasprit Bumrah during the series opener of last summer\u2019s Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Perth, where he was trapped on the pads for a golden duck by an unplayable delivery that deviated viciously off the deck.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think back to last year at Perth, I got one from Bumrah, hit me on the pad,\u201d Smith recalled.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember quite a lot of people actually saying, \u2018Geez, look at the position Steve\u2019s in here.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s he doing?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cI look back at the numbers and it deviated like two-and-a-half degrees. And I\u2019m like, \u2018If I\u2019m hitting that, I\u2019m actually doing something horribly wrong.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201dJust for me, knowing that I\u2019m doing the right things and then trusting it, that it\u2019s going to work over a long period.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, Smith isn\u2019t as forgiving when he makes a mistake in the middle, confessing he can be his own harshest critic at times.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I do something wrong, I get pretty angry at myself,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n
\u201cGenerally that night, I\u2019ll punish myself. I might punish myself by going and doing a few runs on the treadmill or something like that. <\/p>\n
\u201cI always evaluate my innings and what I could have done, should have done, did wrong.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve got to be honest with yourself.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I make a mistake and it\u2019s a stupid one that I know that I shouldn\u2019t make, that\u2019s when I get angry at myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
Steve Smith of New South Wales. Photo by Bradley Kanaris\/Getty ImagesSource: Getty Images<\/p>\n
The first Ashes Test between Australia and England gets underway at Perth Stadium on November 21.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s our worst team, obviously, since 2010, that\u2019s the mail anyway,\u201d Smith laughed, referencing recent comments from former England bowler Stuart Broad<\/a>.<\/p>\n\u201cThere\u2019s obviously been the back and forth and plenty of banter, which I don\u2019t like to really get involved in.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to be a wonderful series. I think England are a really good side at the moment. We\u2019ve been a really good side over the last three or four years in particular, making two Test Championship finals. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to be exciting. Can\u2019t wait.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In an exclusive interview, Australian vice-captain Steve Smith has confessed he \u201cprobably wasn\u2019t quite ready\u201d for Test cricket…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":254074,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":["post-254073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cricket","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}