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Labuschagne methodically applies butter on each surface of a slice of plain bread. “That’s the secret,” he explains as he lowers the lid of his toastie maker. “There you go. Then you get it crisp on the outside.” He lifts the lid to reveal a perfectly browned of pure toasted goodness, the bubbling cheese happily melting inside. “So this is the trick of the trade,” he explains. At which point, he does something shocking and odd.

At this stage, I sense a sense of disinterest is beginning to appear in your eyes. The alarm bells of sportswriting pretension are going off. You’re likely conscious that Labuschagne hit 160 for Queensland Bulls this week and is being feverishly talked up for an Australian Test recall before the England-Australia contest.

You probably want to read more about that. But first – you now realise with an anguished sigh – you’re going to have to sit through a section of playful digression about toasties, plus an additional unnecessary part of tiresome meta‑deconstruction in the “you” perspective. You sigh again.

He turns the sandwich on to a plate and heads over the fridge. “Not many people do this,” he states, “but I actually like the toastie cold. Boom, in the fridge. You allow the cheese to set, go bat, come back. Perfect. Toastie’s ready to go.”

On-Field Matters

Okay, let’s try it like this. Shall we get the sports aspect to begin with? Small reward for reading until now. And while there may only be six weeks until the first Test, Labuschagne’s century against the Tasmanian side – his third in recent months in various games – feels significantly impactful.

This is an Australia top three clearly missing consistency and technique, exposed by the Proteas in the WTC final, highlighted further 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 ideal reason.

This represents a plan that Australia need to work. Usman Khawaja has one century in his recent 44 batting efforts. The young batsman looks less like a first-innings batsman and closer to the attractive performer who might portray a cricketer in a Bollywood movie. Other candidates has presented a strong argument. Nathan McSweeney looks out of form. Harris is still oddly present, like unwanted guests. Meanwhile their captain, Cummins, is hurt and suddenly this seems like a unusually thin squad, short of authority or balance, the kind of natural confidence that has often given Australia a lead before a match begins.

The Batsman’s Revival

Enter Marnus: a world No 1 Test batter as recently as 2023, just left out from the ODI side, the ideal candidate to restore order to a shaky team. And we are informed this is a calmer and more meditative Labuschagne currently: a simplified, back-to-basics Labuschagne, less extremely focused with technical minutiae. “I feel like I’ve really stripped it back,” he said after his hundred. “Less focused on technique, just what I should score runs.”

Naturally, few accept this. Most likely this is a fresh image that exists just in Labuschagne’s personal view: still constantly refining that method from morning to night, going further toward simplicity than anyone has ever dared. You want less technical? Marnus will spend months in the practice sessions with advisors and replays, thoroughly reshaping his game into the simplest player that has ever existed. That’s the trait of the obsessed, and the trait that has always made Labuschagne one of the most wildly absorbing cricketers in the cricket.

Wider Context

Maybe before this very open England-Australia contest, there is even a type of pleasing dissonance to Labuschagne’s unquenchable obsession. In England we have a squad for whom technical study, not to mention self-review, is a forbidden topic. Go with instinct. Focus on the present. Embrace the current.

For Australia you have a player such as Labuschagne, a individual terminally obsessed with the game and wonderfully unconcerned by public perception, who observes cricket even in the spaces between the cricket, who approaches this quirky game with exactly the level of quirky respect it deserves.

And it worked. During his intense period – from the time he walked out to substitute for an injured the senior batsman at Lord’s in 2019 to around the end of 2022 – Labuschagne was able to see the game with greater insight. To access it – through absolute focus – on a higher, weirder, more frenzied level. During his stint in Kent league cricket, colleagues noticed him on the morning of a game sitting on a park bench in a meditative condition, literally visualising all balls of his time at the crease. Per the analytics firm, during the first few years of his career a unusually large catches were missed when he batted. Remarkably Labuschagne had anticipated outcomes before fielders could respond to affect it.

Recent Challenges

It’s possible this was why his form started to decline the point he became number one. There were no worlds left to visualise, just a unknown territory before his eyes. Furthermore – he stopped trusting his cover drive, got trapped on the crease and seemed to forget where his off-stump was. But it’s connected really. Meanwhile his trainer, his coach, thinks a focus on white-ball cricket started to undermine belief in his technique. Good news: he’s recently omitted from the one-day team.

No doubt it’s important, too, that Labuschagne is a man of deep religious faith, an committed Christian who thinks that this is all preordained, who thus sees his role as one of reaching this optimal zone, despite being puzzling it may seem to the rest of us.

This mindset, to my mind, has always been the primary contrast between him and the other batsman, a inherently talented player