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Marnus evenly coats butter on each surface of a slice of white bread. “That’s the secret,” he explains as he closes the lid of his sandwich grill. “Boom. Then you get it toasted on both sides.” He lifts the lid to reveal a golden square of delicious perfection, the melted cheese happily sizzling within. “And that’s the key technique,” he explains. At which point, he does something shocking and odd.

By now, you may feel a layer of boredom is beginning to appear in your eyes. The warning signs of elaborate writing are flashing wildly. You’re probably aware that Labuschagne scored 160 for his state team this week and is being feverishly talked up for an return to the Test side before the Ashes.

You probably want to read more about that. But first – you now grasp with irritation – you’re going to have to sit through a section of light-hearted musing about toasted sandwiches, plus an further tangential section of tiresome meta‑deconstruction in the “you” perspective. You feel resigned.

He turns the sandwich on to a serving plate and walks across the fridge. “Few try this,” he announces, “but I genuinely enjoy the cold toastie. Done, in the fridge. You let the cheese firm up, go bat, come back. Boom. Toastie’s ready to go.”

Back to Cricket

Look, let’s try it like this. Shall we get the sports aspect initially? Quick update for making it this far. And while there may only be six weeks until the first Test, Labuschagne’s hundred against the Tasmanian side – his third of the summer in all formats – feels significantly impactful.

We have an Australian top order seriously lacking form and structure, revealed against South Africa in the WTC final, shown up once more in the Caribbean afterwards. Labuschagne was dropped during that trip, but on a certain level you gathered Australia were desperate to rehabilitate him at the earliest chance. Now he appears to have given them the ideal reason.

Here is a plan that Australia need to work. Usman Khawaja has one century in his last 44 knocks. Konstas looks hardly a Test opener and more like the handsome actor who might play a Test opener in a Indian film. None of the alternatives has presented a strong argument. One contender looks cooked. Another option is still surprisingly included, like moths or damp. Meanwhile their leader, the pace bowler, is unfit and suddenly this seems like a weirdly lightweight side, missing strength or equilibrium, the kind of effortless self-assurance that has often helped Australia dominate before a match begins.

Marnus’s Comeback

Enter Marnus: a top-ranked Test batsman as recently as 2023, freshly dropped from the 50-over squad, the ideal candidate to return structure to a shaky team. And we are informed this is a more relaxed and thoughtful Labuschagne these days: a simplified, back-to-basics Labuschagne, less extremely focused with small details. “It seems I’ve really cut out extras,” he said after his century. “Not overthinking, just what I should score runs.”

Clearly, this is doubted. Probably this is a fresh image that exists only in Labuschagne’s mind: still endlessly adjusting that approach from dawn to dusk, going further toward simplicity than any player has attempted. Like basic approach? Marnus will spend months in the nets with coaches and video clips, thoroughly reshaping his game into the most basic batsman that has ever existed. This is just the quality of the focused, and the characteristic that has always made Labuschagne one of the deeply fascinating cricketers in the sport.

Bigger Scene

Maybe before this highly uncertain historic rivalry, there is even a kind of appealing difference to Labuschagne’s unquenchable obsession. On England’s side we have a squad for whom technical study, especially personal critique, is a risky subject. Trust your gut. Focus on the present. Smell the now.

On the opposite side you have a individual like Labuschagne, a individual terminally obsessed with cricket and totally indifferent by public perception, who sees cricket even in the gaps in the game, who treats this absurd sport with just the right measure of odd devotion it demands.

And it worked. During his focused era – from the time he walked out to come in for a hurt Steve Smith at the famous ground in 2019 to through 2022 – Labuschagne found a way to see the game with greater insight. To reach it – through pure determination – on a higher, weirder, more frenzied level. During his time with English county cricket, fellow players saw him on the day of a match positioned on a seat in a trance-like state, literally visualising all balls of his time at the crease. As per Cricviz, during the early stages of his career a unusually large number of chances were missed when he batted. Remarkably Labuschagne had anticipated outcomes before others could react to affect it.

Form Issues

Perhaps this was why his performance dipped the moment he reached the summit. There were no new heights to imagine, just a empty space before his eyes. Also – to be fair – he began doubting his cover drive, got unable to move forward and seemed to forget where his off-stump was. But it’s connected really. Meanwhile his coach, Neil D’Costa, believes a emphasis on limited-overs started to erode confidence in his technique. Good news: he’s now excluded from the 50-over squad.

Surely it matters, too, that Labuschagne is a devoutly religious individual, an committed Christian who believes that this is all basically written out in advance, who thus sees his role as one of accessing this state of flow, despite being puzzling it may seem to the ordinary people.

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