Border-Gavaskar Trophy: Can Virat Kohli, Steve Smith rule again?

The two top batters of their generation have shown encouraging signs of regaining form -- Kohli with a calm mindset and Smith with a tweak in his technique

The 2023 Border-Gavaskar series comes at an interesting time in the careers of Virat Kohli and Steve Smith, with both trying to rediscover the strengths which made them the premier batters of world cricket.

Virat Kohli and Steve Smith

Their scripts have been similar -- captains when Australia last toured India in 2017, they were the focus of all attention, players who were at the peak of their powers. Lately, the discussions have centered around whether they are looking like their old confident selves, players who were run-machines or good batters with slowing reflexes and waning skills.

As India and Australia renew their famed rivalry, the two have a point to prove after a dip in their outputs compared to their lofty standards. Smith has a score to settle against R Ashwin & Co after he was kept in check in their last series in 2020-21 at home, restricting him to a single hundred to help India take the series. Kohli is under even more pressure after a long lean period with no Test hundreds since 2019.

The positive news is the two legends have exhibited encouraging signs of a return to form, raising expectations of their followers ahead of the series.

For the India star, it's a case of clearing the clutter in his head. For Smith, it’s always about finding the right formula.

Interestingly, white-ball cricket is helping both gain confidence and find their best rhythm. Kohli rattled a series of hundreds in ODIs and Smith lit up the T20 circuit with his century-spree in the Big Bash.

SMITH’S NEW STYLE

For those who get high on the technical side of things, Smith is an intriguing case study. In his quest for excellence, he is almost perennially tweaking his technique. As a result, the Indian audience will get to witness a new version of the Sydney player than the one who played against them the last time.

When India toured Down Under in 2020-21, the talk was about how to stop Smith from getting under the bowler’s skin with his exaggerated shuffle to the off-side. The change has been forced by how well India’s bowlers, led by R Ashwin, targeted him by attacking his stumps, limiting his impact on the series.

His big shuffle, though helped his play against the moving ball in the channel, came at the cost of power behind his strokes. Even his Twenty20 game suffered as he couldn’t up the strike rate. Losing his place in Australia’s playing XI during the last T20 World Cup held at home must have hurt. Then he went unsold in the IPL auction.

So, he looked at his playing style... again, and on evidence of his run-scoring in 50-over and T20 cricket, it has worked.

He will be going against India’s bowlers in a more side-on position. Smith told the reporters after a one-day game against England two months ago, in November: "The start of last summer, I tried to get my hands back to where they were in 2015. I feel like I'm staying a bit more side-on now and I've got my feet and hands in sync together."

In fact, his new style of play is closer to the original Steve Smith who was a dasher, a contrast to the grafter he transformed himself into post-2013.

His bottom-hand grip dominated then but it limited his off-side play as well. In Test cricket, most bowling attacks look to bowl in the 'outside the off-stump' channel, and Smith improvised. For the bowlers who looked to target him with the moving ball, he started to shuffle across the wicket which gave him the advantage of knowing where his off-stump is.

In his original version, Smith is dead still. He only moved across after the ball is bowled when he wanted to target the cow corner or his back leg stayed anchored.

He says he has changed his right-hand grip too to ensure he meets the ball with an open bat face. “I was probably actually holding the bat how I hold my tennis racquet before. I don’t know what it’s called, the western grip maybe with my right hand. But I’ve opened that up to what’s called a continental grip maybe... a bit more open, just allowing me to slice the ball and hit gaps and hit the ball further. It just opens my bat face a bit,” Smith said in January.

KOHLI GETS CLARITY

Since September 2022, Kohli has smashed four international hundreds. Still, the best indicator that he could be back to his best came in the third ODI versus Sri Lanka on January 10 – an unbeaten 166 during which he smashed eight sixes.

"The one thing I learnt was desperation doesn't get you anywhere," Kohli said after the game on January 10. "The game still remains very simple. It's when we start complicating things with our own attachments, our own desires, our own attachment to who we become from people's point of view, not who we were when we picked up the bat or the ball when we started playing. I think when that perspective goes off, you start putting yourself in a space where everything just keeps spiralling downwards.

"And it's only that detachment, in the real sense, (that helps), where you go out there playing without any fear, and you go out there playing for the right reasons, almost playing every game like it's your last game and being happy about it, not being sad about it."

SPIN ISSUE

Kohli’s recent struggles in Test cricket include getting out to spin frequently in the subcontinent. In the last series against Bangladesh, in December, he fell twice to spin in three times he was dismissed. It was a similar pattern in the two Tests at home against Sri Lanka (in March, 2022), when he fell cheaply in all three innings against spin. To add to the narrative, he struggled against the New Zealand series in the just concluded one-day series as well.

But, whether that amounts to a weakness against spinners, is challenging to say. Nathan Lyon has dismissed him most number of times -- seven, but Kohli has an average of 50.42 against him. While Moeen Ali has also taken his wicket six times, Kohli averages 59.83 against the off-spinner. Adil Rashid has claimed his scalp four times, and Kohli averages 91.75 against the leg-spinner.

It's pretty simple: when he is moving well, the spinners hold no threat as he gets to the pitch of the ball or right behind it.

BEST BATTER TAG

Beyond this narrative, there’s the tag of the best batters of their era the two have been contenders for a long time now. Smith is ahead at this stage, with 30 hundreds and an average of 60-plus. After the three-year slip, Kohli has some catching up to do. His average has fallen below 50 and is stuck at 27 hundreds.

Many would argue that the India-Australia series is the perfect stage to settle the argument or at least get stuck in. Smith and Kohli don't need to prove a point to anyone but perhaps they'd like to prove one to themselves and raise what is already an intriguing series into an even better space.