While England’s Test players failed to show any form in another ODI defeat against New Zealand<\/a>, 36-year-old Smith scored his 53rd first-class hundred in his first innings of the Australian summer at the Gabba.<\/p>\nHe started slowly – he had only 12 from his first 58 balls – but grew into the innings, albeit against a Queensland bowling attack lacking international quality.<\/p>\n
Smith reached his century in 158 deliveries and hit 20 fours and a six before being caught at gully late in the day. New South Wales were 349-5 at the close. <\/p>\n
Smith’s knock included a partnership of 202 with number three Kurtis Patterson, who made 122 from 261 balls to press his case for a place in Australia’s Ashes squad. Patterson played two Tests in 2019.<\/p>\n
There are a number of question marks around Australia’s top order going into the Ashes, largely around who will open with Usman Khawaja and who will slot in at number three.<\/p>\n
Sam Konstas’ struggles continued in Brisbane as the 20-year-old was bowled middle stump while shouldering arms to seamer Hayden Kerr for 10.<\/p>\n
Konstas opened in Australia’s most recent Test but has only passed 50 once in seven innings this season in domestic cricket. <\/p>\n
Elsewhere, former Test opener Cameron Bancroft made a timely century for Western Australia against South Australia.<\/p>\n
All-rounder Cameron Green, who batted at three in West Indies but has been struggling with a side injury since, made a six-ball duck in the same game. <\/p>\n
He did not bowl on day one, raising doubts about whether he will be able to play a full part as an all-rounder from the start of the series against England.<\/p>\n
Jake Weatherald, another candidate to open, was out for a duck in Tasmania’s Shield match against Victoria. <\/p>\n
Green’s rival for the all-rounder spot Beau Webster was out for 11. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia batter Steve Smith made an ominous 118 for New South Wales in the Sheffield Shield as he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":232023,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-232022","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cricket","8":"tag-cricket","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232022"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232022\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/232023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}