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The Australian batsman methodically applies butter on both sides of a slice of plain bread. “That’s the key,” he explains as he closes the lid of his toastie maker. “Perfect. Then you get it golden on both sides.” He checks inside to reveal a toasted delight of delicious perfection, the melted cheese happily bubbling away. “And that’s the key technique,” he declares. At which point, he does something horrific and unspeakable.

By now, it’s clear a sense of disinterest is beginning to appear in your eyes. The warning signs of elaborate writing are flashing wildly. You’re no doubt informed that Labuschagne made 160 runs for Queensland Bulls this week and is being eagerly promoted for an national team comeback before the England-Australia contest.

No doubt you’d prefer to read more about that. But first – you now grasp with irritation – you’re going to have to endure a section of playful digression about toasties, plus an additional unnecessary part of self-referential analysis in the second person. You groan once more.

Marnus transfers the sandwich on to a plate and walks across the fridge. “Not many people do this,” he announces, “but I genuinely enjoy the toastie cold. There, in the fridge. You get that cheese to harden up, head to practice, come back. Boom. It’s ideal.”

Back to Cricket

Alright, let’s try it like this. How about we cover the match details initially? Little treat for your patience. And while there may be just six weeks until the initial match, Labuschagne’s hundred against the Tasmanian side – his third this season in various games – feels quietly decisive.

We have an Australia top three seriously lacking consistency and technique, exposed by the Proteas in the World Test Championship final, exposed again in the Caribbean afterwards. Labuschagne was left out during that tour, but on one hand you felt Australia were desperate to rehabilitate him at the earliest chance. Now he looks to have given them the perfect excuse.

This represents a plan that Australia need to work. Khawaja has one century in his last 44 knocks. Konstas looks less like a first-innings batsman and rather like the attractive performer who might act as a batsman in a Indian film. Other candidates has made a cogent case. One contender looks out of form. Marcus Harris is still inexplicably hanging around, like moths or damp. Meanwhile their leader, Cummins, is unfit and suddenly this seems like a surprisingly weak team, short of command or stability, the kind of effortless self-assurance that has often helped Australia dominate before a match begins.

Marnus’s Comeback

Step forward Marnus: a world No 1 Test batter as in the recent past, just left out from the 50-over squad, the perfect character to bring stability to a brittle empire. And we are advised this is a calmer and more meditative Labuschagne now: a simplified, back-to-basics Labuschagne, less intensely fixated with technical minutiae. “I feel like I’ve really simplified things,” he said after his century. “Less focused on technique, just what I need to score runs.”

Of course, this is doubted. In all likelihood this is a rebrand that exists just in Labuschagne’s mind: still furiously stripping down that method from dawn to dusk, going more back to basics than anyone else would try. You want less technical? Marnus will take time in the training with advisors and replays, completely transforming into the least technical batter that has ever played. This is just the nature of the addict, and the trait that has always made Labuschagne one of the deeply fascinating cricketers in the game.

Wider Context

Maybe before this very open Ashes series, there is even a type of interesting contrast to Labuschagne’s constant dedication. On England’s side we have a side for whom technical study, let alone self-analysis, is a kind of dangerous taboo. Trust your gut. Focus on the present. Smell the now.

On the opposite side you have a player such as Labuschagne, a man utterly absorbed with cricket and wonderfully unconcerned by public perception, who observes cricket even in the gaps in the game, who approaches this quirky game with just the right measure of absurd reverence it requires.

And it worked. During his shamanic phase – from the instant he appeared to substitute for an injured Steve Smith at Lord’s in 2019 to around the end of 2022 – Labuschagne somehow managed to see the game on another level. To access it – through absolute focus – on a different, unusual, intense plane. During his stint in club cricket, teammates would find him on the morning of a game resting on a bench in a focused mindset, literally visualising every single ball of his time at the crease. Per cricket statisticians, during the initial period of his career a surprisingly high number of chances were missed when he batted. Remarkably Labuschagne had intuited what would happen before fielders could respond to affect it.

Form Issues

It’s possible this was why his form started to decline the time he achieved top ranking. There were no new heights to imagine, just a boundless, uncharted void before his eyes. Additionally – he stopped trusting his signature shot, got unable to move forward and seemed to forget where his off-stump was. But it’s all the same thing. Meanwhile his coach, Neil D’Costa, believes a emphasis on limited-overs started to erode confidence in his technique. Positive development: he’s now excluded from the ODI side.

Surely it matters, too, that Labuschagne is a devoutly religious individual, an committed Christian who believes that this is all predetermined, who thus sees his role as one of reaching this optimal zone, however enigmatic and inexplicable it may seem to the rest of us.

This mindset, to my mind, has consistently been the main point of difference between him and Smith, a inherently talented player