Smith's slump

It is always quite easy to be critical regarding players' form and point out what they do wrong. It is a lot harder to offer solutions to problems.

This is very much the case with Graeme Smith at the moment. Smith is having a difficult time at present. In fact, his one-day form over the last 12 months has been well below par for his high standards. Naturally he is getting a lot of flack at present.

The question is what has gone wrong? Smith has always had an unusual technique. His technique, unusual as it is, has served him well for most of his career. Like any batsman Smith has had form slumps in his long career, but he has always at some point come out of those. He may well do so this time as well.

I would imagine that Gary Kirsten is responsible for the batting coaching in the Proteas squad at present. He is a batting specialist and although he has many other responsibilities one would assume that batting coaching will be one of his priorities. In the past Smith has worked with Jimmy Cook, but having Kirsten present all the time now will probably mean that Kirsten himself will be in control of any advice, technical or otherwise.

Kirsten and Smith will be wise to consider the following issues. Smith’s feet in his stance are a long way apart. When he gets anxious he moves them even further apart. This inhibits foot movement forward and back. It has the effect that, at times, Smith falls across the crease rather than move his left foot to the pitch of the ball. This makes playing straight through the line of the ball difficult.

The second issue surrounds Smith’s back lift. As he starts his back lift he pushes the bat away from his body, which results in little control over the back lift. It is much better to keep the hands close to the body, which enables better control and direction for the 'take back' -- resulting in a straighter bat coming down and meeting the ball with the full face of the blade.

Thirdly, Smith’s bottom hand turns the blade inward on the 'take back' making it difficult to present the full face of the bat when hitting the ball. The end result is that the bat comes across the ball on a regular basis, which will always cause problems against true international bowling.

In the short term Smith’s saving grace can be to play the ball as late as possible. When he does this even with some of the above limitations, the bat does come through fairly straight and he gives himself a chance of occupying the crease for longer periods. That will be the short term goal. Even if this works and Smith plays well and scores heavily on Friday and on Sunday he still needs to address the other issues before the New Zealand tour and the England tour.

On both tours lively wickets are likely to be the order of the day and in England in particular the bowling will be good as well, which will test any top-order batsman in the technique department.

The last important issue to deal with in Smith’s case is speed of footwork. He is by nature a big guy so it will only help him if he gets into top physical condition, sheds some kilograms and speeds up his footwork.

Most players are very sensitive when their way of playing is scrutinised and areas of concern is pointed out. Sometimes it has to be done for the good of the player and the team. In order for changes to work there has to be a buy-in from the player and a real hunger to succeed.

Smith is by no means the only player to have faced these sorts of issues late in a career. Some players have shown a willingness to change and a hunger to succeed -- much like Ricky Ponting recently. It is in Smith’s hands. If he is prepared to give it his all and make a few subtle changes in a bid to recapture his best form there is no reason why he can’t. By batting standards he is still relatively young.

Hopefully between Smith and Kirsten they will find both a short- and long-term solution for his current problems. Should he continue to open the batting for South Africa in the different forms of the game, the Proteas need to get some consistent runs out of him.

The opening spot is one of the most important positions in the team and a crucial one. No one knows this better than Kirsten and Smith. The current situation is a testing one for both coach and player.