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

At this stage, I sense a sense of disinterest is beginning to appear in your eyes. The red lights of overly fancy prose 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 Ashes.

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 light-hearted musing about grilled cheese, plus an further tangential section of self-referential analysis in the direct address. You feel resigned.

Labuschagne flips the sandwich on to a plate and walks across the fridge. “Few try this,” he remarks, “but I genuinely enjoy the cold toastie. Done, in the fridge. You let the cheese firm up, head to practice, come back. Alright. Toastie’s ready to go.”

Back to Cricket

Look, here’s the main point. How about we cover the cricket bit initially? Little treat for your patience. And while there may be just six weeks until the first Test, Labuschagne’s hundred against the Tasmanian side – his third this season in all formats – feels significantly impactful.

This is an Aussie opening batsmen clearly missing consistency and technique, shown up by the South African team in the Test championship decider, shown up once more in the Caribbean afterwards. Labuschagne was omitted during that tour, but on a certain level you gathered Australia were keen to restore him at the soonest moment. Now he appears to have given them the right opportunity.

This represents a plan that Australia need to work. The opener has just one 100 in his recent 44 batting efforts. Konstas looks less like a Test opener and closer to the attractive performer who might portray a cricketer in a Indian film. None of the alternatives has presented a strong argument. McSweeney looks out of form. Marcus Harris is still surprisingly included, like dust or mold. Meanwhile their leader, Cummins, is injured and suddenly this seems like a surprisingly weak team, short of authority or balance, the kind of built-in belief that has often given Australia a lead before a game starts.

The Batsman’s Revival

Enter Marnus: a leading Test player as in the recent past, freshly dropped from the one-day team, the perfect character to return structure to a shaky team. And we are told this is a calmer and more meditative Labuschagne currently: a streamlined, back-to-basics Labuschagne, not as maniacally obsessed with technical minutiae. “I believe I have really stripped it back,” he said after his century. “Less focused on technique, just what I must bat effectively.”

Of course, few accept this. Most likely this is a rebrand that exists entirely in Labuschagne’s mind: still endlessly adjusting that approach from all day, going further toward simplicity than any player has attempted. Like basic approach? Marnus will spend months in the training with advisors and replays, exhaustively remoulding himself into the least technical batter that has ever played. This is simply the quality of the focused, and the quality that has consistently made Labuschagne one of the most wildly absorbing cricketers in the cricket.

Bigger Scene

It could be before this highly uncertain Ashes series, there is even a type of interesting contrast to Labuschagne’s unquenchable obsession. In England we have a side for whom detailed examination, not to mention self-review, is a risky subject. Trust your gut. Stay in the moment. Embrace the current.

For Australia you have a batsman like Labuschagne, a man terminally obsessed with cricket and totally indifferent by who knows about it, who sees cricket even in the gaps in the game, who approaches this quirky game with exactly the level of absurd reverence it demands.

His method paid off. During his focused era – from the instant he appeared to replace a concussed Steve Smith at Lord’s Cricket Ground in 2019 to until late 2022 – Labuschagne somehow managed to see the game with greater insight. To access it – through sheer intensity of will – on a higher, weirder, more frenzied level. During his stint in English county cricket, fellow players saw him on the game day resting on a bench in a meditative condition, mentally rehearsing all balls of his time at the crease. 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 intuited what would happen before anyone had a chance to influence it.

Form Issues

Perhaps this was why his form started to decline the moment he reached the summit. There were no worlds left to visualise, just a unknown territory before his eyes. Furthermore – he stopped trusting his cover drive, got unable to move forward and seemed to lose awareness of his stumps. But it’s connected really. Meanwhile his coach, his coach, reckons a emphasis on limited-overs started to undermine belief in his technique. Encouragingly: he’s now excluded from the ODI side.

Certainly it’s relevant, too, that Labuschagne is a man of deep religious faith, an evangelical Christian who thinks that this is all predetermined, who thus sees his role as one of achieving this peak performance, no matter how mysterious it may appear to the mortal of us.

This approach, to my mind, has consistently been the key distinction between him and Smith, a more naturally gifted player