Melbourne, Dec 27 Australia batter Steve Smith, who had entered the Border-Gavaskar Trophy on the back of an 18-month century drought, has pointed out the difference between being ‘out of form and out of runs’ after scoring a brilliant century on Day 2 of the fourth Test.
After resuming on an overnight score of 68 not out, Smith went to score a brilliant 140 off 197. His innings was laced with 13 boundaries and three sixes as he moved level with greats Sunil Gavaskar and Brian Lara in the list of most Test centuries with his 34th ton.
The 35-year-old Aussie is now tied for seventh place on the all-time list of century-makers, which is led by India's Sachin Tendulkar with 51 hundreds. Smith's effort at the MCG was his second century on the trot, following his innings of 101 against India during the third Test of this series at the Gabba.
"Sometimes you can be hitting the ball really nicely, which I think I said to all you guys when I wasn’t scoring the runs. I actually felt like I was batting pretty well. And there’s a difference between being out of form and out of runs. I thought I was hitting the ball nicely," Smith was quoted as saying at the day-end press conference.
"I mean, you’ve got to have faith. You’ve got to have a bit of trust in what you’re trying to do. I’ve played the game for long enough now to know that you can have your ups and downs. Having some faith and confidence. There wasn’t a real plan. It was just go out and play and see what’s going on," he said.
Smith, with valuable support from Pat Cummins (49) and Mitchell Starc (15) stitched stands of 112 and 44, respectively, and helped the hosts’ take a formidable lead of 474 in the first innings.
"I thought Patty (Cummins) played really nicely. Really good, positive intent. We were able to get a nice partnership together and take a bit of the momentum of the game from that point, I suppose," Smith added.
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