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Where to bowl to Steve Smith?

Where to bowl to Smitteh?

  • Straight

    Votes: 5 27.8%
  • Wide

    Votes: 12 66.7%
  • Straight early, wide once set (the cop-out option)

    Votes: 1 5.6%

  • Total voters
    18

vic_orthdox

Global Moderator
You bowl to him the same way as 99% of other batsmen early on. Just outside off, try and make him play as much as you can and if he doesn't play at least don't give him free runs and make him chase bat on ball. If he gets set there's other things you can try but that's definitely the best way to get him early and Finn showed it quite well.
Yeah, it's just that it's an extra couple of stumps further outside off, because you can be taken from just outside off stump through the leg side.
 

Dan

Hall of Fame Member
Yeah, I think there's a tendency to get too funky with plans to specific batsmen.

Use the new ball for what new balls are for, then, if they survive, try out the highly-specific bowling plans.
 

Uppercut

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Yeah, I think there's a tendency to get too funky with plans to specific batsmen.

Use the new ball for what new balls are for, then, if they survive, try out the highly-specific bowling plans.
Yeah I thought this earlier when Ponting was asking why they hadn't bounced Rogers more. James Anderson was bowling, the ball was new, there was grass on the wicket and clouds in the sky. Bowling short would have been madness, there's a time to just play to your own strengths.
 

Shady Slim

International Coach
ah there is this strategy england used before to nullify a great batsman, what was it called...

involved deliveries to the leg side, ah...

the captain was doug sardine or something, **** me what was the name of the strategy...

er, lengthline?
 

Prince EWS

Global Moderator
Yeah I pretty much agree with Vic here. It's so much that you should bowl consciously wide, but that a good line to Smith is a touch wider than it is to most batsmen because of how he sets himself up. This isn't a silver bullet -- Smith's a good batsmen, he's going to score runs a lot of the time -- but it's the best way to bowl to him.
 

Burgey

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I think nowhere near as good is fair. He's happy to play off-side shots and does so very well but he'll still make far more mistakes doing so than he does playing leg-side.
That goes for almost every batsman not called Phillip Hughes tbh
 

Son Of Coco

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
He's a definite LBW candidate when he gets set in my opinion. Showed this clearly in the West Indies.
 

Hurricane

Hall of Fame Member
Bowl left armers at him angling across him and get him caught in the slips. When nz plays it will be boult's job to get him out. Smith will probably win that battle as boult is still young and doesn't bowl with enough wisdom yet. However a good left armer can stop him shuffling across his stumps and expose his off side weaknesses.

I have no faith we will get him out and I doubt we will develop any plans for him however. Our efforts will consist of bowling like pews said which inevitably result in him tonning up 50% of the time.

If teams weren't cognitively challenged then they would set some leg side traps to him and work over his technique in a thorough test.

But most teams are stupid so I don't see anyone trying anything inventive other than just hoping he gets himself out.
 

OverratedSanity

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Bowl left armers at him angling across him and get him caught in the slips. When nz plays it will be boult's job to get him out. Smith will probably win that battle as boult is still young and doesn't bowl with enough wisdom yet. However a good left armer can stop him shuffling across his stumps and expose his off side weaknesses.

I have no faith we will get him out and I doubt we will develop any plans for him however. Our efforts will consist of bowling like pews said which inevitably result in him tonning up 50% of the time.

If teams weren't cognitively challenged then they would set some leg side traps to him and work over his technique in a thorough test.

But most teams are stupid so I don't see anyone trying anything inventive other than just hoping he gets himself out.
I think exactly the opposite is true. Teams who get too cute trying to formulate funky tactics like leg slips or short mid wickets are going to get pummelled imo. Just bowl to him normally, good outsingers outside off will trouble him, as they trouble every single batsman.
 

Adders

Cricketer Of The Year
I've bit my lip all through this series LT.......... but it's Friday night, I've had a couple of beers and this really needs to be said.

You are the pits as a cricket fan.

Before this series you gave England no hope and ****canned our side relentlesly. Yet after each win you wade in with the most smarmy, ****y, put downs on the Aussies of any one here.........it seriously is stomach churning.

Steve Smith is a class batsmen and if you seriously think he's a FTB you're an idiot.
 

Lillian Thomson

Hall of Fame Member
I've bit my lip all through this series LT.......... but it's Friday night, I've had a couple of beers and this really needs to be said.

You are the pits as a cricket fan.

Before this series you gave England no hope and ****canned our side relentlesly. Yet after each win you wade in with the most smarmy, ****y, put downs on the Aussies of any one here.........it seriously is stomach churning.

Steve Smith is a class batsmen and if you seriously think he's a FTB you're an idiot.
Couldn't agree more.
 

Niall

International Coach
Is Graeme Swann vindicated?
Its a good question.

One match winning knock and total failure in the other three tests isn't the sort of returns that is really acceptable of a player of his stature.

However he did gun it in England last time around and has scored runs in every test nation bar New Zealand (not his fault tbf), so don't really think the "flat track bully" stuff is a really fair criticism at the moment.

I dunno about him as a number three though, I'd have probably persisted with him in the middle order where was so good.

It will be fun to see how he responds, this is the first time in a long time he has been exposed since his early days.
 

Lillian Thomson

Hall of Fame Member
However he did gun it in England last time around and has scored runs in every test nation bar New Zealand (not his fault tbf), so don't really think the "flat track bully" stuff is a really fair criticism at the moment.
Despite the ramblings of a self confessed drunk I never said anything about Smith being a flat track bully. My post was a harmless throw away quip based on his up to then three dismissals on less favourable surfaces since Lords. Though it has to be said he'd get no prizes for his subsequent fourth either.
 

Black_Warrior

Cricketer Of The Year
Problem with guys like Smith, Hussey who go on an unbelievable run scoring spree, is that it is obviously not sustainable over a considerable period of time. So when you go from averaging in the 80s to averaging in the 50s, that's like a 30 run drop so it appears that they are just flat track or home track bullies.

I think Steve Smith is a very good player, and I don't believe that he is a flat track bully or a home track bully by any means. He had an average Ashes so far, which appears worse than it is because of the last 12 months he has had.
 

Adders

Cricketer Of The Year
Despite the ramblings of a self confessed drunk
:laugh: A couple of beers on a Friday night makes me a drunk does it? Well I'd say that's pretty much most of cricketweb ****ed them................off to rehab for all of us!!

I never said anything about Smith being a flat track bully. My post was a harmless throw away quip based on his up to then three dismissals on less favourable surfaces since Lords. Though it has to be said he'd get no prizes for his subsequent fourth either.
Your post in this thread may have been a harmless throw away quip, but on top of everything else you've posted before and during this series it all adds up to being extremely cringeworthy material. Like I said I felt like calling you out when you pissed everyone off after Cardiff but I refrained.............last night I thought sod it and did.
 
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