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Labuschagne carefully spreads butter on each surface of a slice of white bread. “That’s essential,” he tells the camera as he brings down the lid of his toastie maker. “Perfect. Then you get it toasted on the outside.” He lifts the lid to reveal a perfectly browned of pure toasted goodness, the bubbling cheese happily sizzling within. “And that’s the trick of the trade,” he explains. At which point, he does something unexpected and strange.

Already, you may feel a sense of disinterest is beginning to appear in your eyes. The alarm bells of elaborate writing are blinking intensely. You’re no doubt informed that Labuschagne scored 160 for Queensland Bulls this week and is being eagerly promoted for an return to the Test side before the Ashes series.

You probably want to read more about his performance. But first – you now realise with an anguished sigh – you’re going to have to sit through a section of light-hearted musing about toasties, plus an extra unwanted bonus paragraph of tiresome meta‑deconstruction in the second person. You sigh again.

Labuschagne flips the sandwich on to a dish and moves toward the fridge. “It’s uncommon,” he states, “but I actually like the grilled sandwich chilled. Done, in the fridge. You allow the cheese to set, head to practice, come back. Perfect. Toastie’s ready to go.”

The Cricket Context

Okay, here’s the main point. How about we cover the sports aspect to begin with? Little treat for making it this far. And while there may only be six weeks until the initial match, Labuschagne’s 100 runs against the Tasmanian side – his third in recent months in various games – feels importantly timed.

This is an Australian top order seriously lacking performance and method, revealed against South Africa in the WTC final, highlighted further in the following Caribbean tour. Labuschagne was dropped during that trip, but on one hand you sensed Australia were eager to bring him back at the first opportunity. Now he appears to have given them the right opportunity.

This represents a approach the team should follow. The opener has just one 100 in his past 44 innings. Sam Konstas looks less like a Test match opener and rather like the attractive performer who might play a Test opener in a Indian film. None of the alternatives has shown convincing form. McSweeney looks out of form. Marcus Harris is still oddly present, like moths or damp. Meanwhile their skipper, Pat Cummins, is hurt and suddenly this appears as a weirdly lightweight side, short of strength or equilibrium, the kind of effortless self-assurance that has often put Australia 2-0 up before a match begins.

The Batsman’s Revival

Step forward Marnus: a top-ranked Test batsman as recently as 2023, freshly dropped from the ODI side, the right person to restore order to a shaky team. And we are informed this is a calmer and more meditative Labuschagne now: a streamlined, back-to-basics Labuschagne, not as maniacally obsessed with small details. “I believe I have really simplified things,” he said after his hundred. “Less focused on technique, just what I need to make runs.”

Clearly, nobody truly believes this. Most likely this is a new approach that exists only in Labuschagne’s mind: still furiously stripping down that method from dawn to dusk, going more back to basics than anyone else would try. Prefer simplicity? Marnus will devote weeks in the practice sessions with advisors and replays, exhaustively remoulding himself into the least technical batter that has ever played. That’s the trait of the obsessed, and the quality that has long made Labuschagne one of the most wildly absorbing cricketers in the sport.

The Broader Picture

Maybe before this highly uncertain Ashes series, there is even a type of appealing difference to Labuschagne’s constant dedication. For England we have a team for whom any kind of analysis, especially personal critique, is a risky subject. Go with instinct. Stay in the moment. Smell the now.

On the opposite side you have a player such as Labuschagne, a player terminally obsessed with the sport and totally indifferent by public perception, who observes cricket even in the gaps in the game, who handles this unusual pursuit with exactly the level of quirky respect it deserves.

And it worked. During his intense period – from the instant he appeared to replace a concussed the senior batsman at Lord’s Cricket Ground in 2019 to around the end of 2022 – Labuschagne found a way to see the game with greater insight. To access it – through pure determination – on a different, unusual, intense plane. During his stint in English county cricket, fellow players saw him on the day of a match sitting on a park bench in a trance-like state, mentally rehearsing each delivery of his innings. Per the analytics firm, during the first few years of his career a unusually large number of chances were spilled from his batting. Somehow Labuschagne had predicted events before anyone had a chance to change it.

Form Issues

Maybe this was why his form started to decline the point he became number one. There were no further goals to picture, just a boundless, uncharted void before his eyes. Furthermore – he stopped trusting his signature shot, got stuck in his crease and seemed to forget where his off-stump was. But it’s connected really. Meanwhile his mentor, his coach, thinks a emphasis on limited-overs started to erode confidence in his technique. Encouragingly: he’s recently omitted from the one-day team.

Certainly it’s relevant, too, that Labuschagne is a devoutly religious individual, an evangelical Christian who holds that this is all predetermined, who thus sees his job as one of achieving this peak performance, despite being puzzling it may look to the ordinary people.

This mindset, to my mind, has long been the main point of difference between him and Steve Smith, a instinctive player