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The Australian batsman carefully spreads butter on each surface of a slice of soft bread. “That’s the key,” he explains as he lowers the lid of his toastie maker. “Perfect. Then you get it toasted on the outside.” He lifts the lid to reveal a toasted delight of ideal crispiness, the gooey cheese happily sizzling within. “Here’s the key technique,” he explains. At which point, he does something unexpected and strange.

By now, it’s clear a glaze of ennui is beginning to appear in your eyes. The alarm bells of overly fancy prose are going off. You’re probably aware that Labuschagne hit 160 for his state team this week and is being eagerly promoted for an return to the Test side before the England-Australia contest.

You likely wish to read more about that. But first – you now understand with frustration – you’re going to have to endure three paragraphs of wobbling whimsy about toasties, plus an extra unwanted bonus paragraph of overly analytical commentary in the second person. You sigh again.

He turns the sandwich on to a dish and moves toward the fridge. “Few try this,” he remarks, “but I personally prefer the toastie cold. There, in the fridge. You let the cheese firm up, head to practice, come back. Perfect. Sandwich is perfect.”

On-Field Matters

Alright, here’s the main point. Let’s address the cricket bit to begin with? Small reward for your patience. And while there may still be six weeks until the series opener, Labuschagne’s 100 runs against the Tasmanian side – his third this season in all formats – feels quietly decisive.

This is an Aussie opening batsmen badly short of form and structure, shown up by South Africa in the World Test Championship final, exposed again in the following Caribbean tour. Labuschagne was left out during that series, but on some level you felt Australia were keen to restore him at the first opportunity. Now he looks to have given them the right opportunity.

Here is a approach the team should follow. Khawaja has just one 100 in his last 44 knocks. The young batsman looks not quite a Test match opener and closer to the handsome actor who might act as a batsman in a Bollywood epic. No other options has shown convincing form. Nathan McSweeney looks out of form. Harris is still oddly present, like dust or mold. Meanwhile their captain, Cummins, is unfit and suddenly this feels like a surprisingly weak team, short of command or stability, 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, just left out from the ODI side, the ideal candidate to restore order to a shaky team. And we are advised this is a composed and reflective Labuschagne currently: a simplified, back-to-basics Labuschagne, no longer as maniacally obsessed with small details. “I believe I have really stripped it back,” he said after his century. “Less focused on technique, just what I must score runs.”

Of course, nobody truly believes this. Most likely this is a fresh image that exists only in Labuschagne’s mind: still furiously stripping down that method from all day, going deeper into fundamentals than anyone else would try. You want less technical? Marnus will take time in the practice sessions with coaches and video clips, exhaustively remoulding himself into the least technical batter that has ever existed. This is simply the trait of the obsessed, and the quality that has long made Labuschagne one of the highly engaging cricketers in the cricket.

The Broader Picture

Maybe before this very open Ashes series, there is even a kind of appealing difference to Labuschagne’s unquenchable obsession. On England’s side we have a squad for whom any kind of analysis, let alone self-analysis, is a risky subject. Trust your gut. Focus on the present. Smell the now.

On the opposite side you have a batsman like Labuschagne, a man terminally obsessed with cricket and wonderfully unconcerned by who knows about it, who finds cricket even in the gaps in the game, who handles this unusual pursuit with exactly the level of absurd reverence it deserves.

This approach succeeded. During his focused era – from the instant he appeared to replace a concussed Steve Smith 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 sheer intensity of will – on a elevated, strange, passionate tier. During his time with Kent league cricket, colleagues noticed him on the game day resting on a bench in a focused mindset, literally visualising each delivery of his innings. According to Cricviz, during the initial period of his career a unusually large number of chances were dropped off his bat. In some way Labuschagne had anticipated outcomes before fielders could respond to influence it.

Form Issues

Perhaps this was why his career began to disintegrate the point he became number one. There were no worlds left to visualise, just a boundless, uncharted void before his eyes. Also – to be fair – he lost faith in his signature shot, got stuck in his crease and seemed to lose awareness of his stumps. But it’s connected really. Meanwhile his mentor, his coach, thinks a attention to shorter formats started to erode confidence in his technique. Good news: he’s now excluded from the one-day team.

Surely it matters, too, that Labuschagne is a man of deep religious faith, an evangelical Christian who holds that this is all predetermined, who thus sees his role as one of achieving this peak performance, no matter how mysterious it may seem to the ordinary people.

This, to my mind, has always been the key distinction between him and the other batsman, a more naturally gifted player