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Labuschagne methodically applies butter on the top and bottom 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 golden on the outside.” He opens the grill to reveal a golden square of pure toasted goodness, the melted cheese happily sizzling within. “Here’s the secret method,” he declares. At which point, he does something unexpected and strange.

Already, you may feel a glaze of ennui is beginning to appear in your eyes. The warning signs of elaborate writing are flashing wildly. You’re no doubt informed that Labuschagne hit 160 for Queensland Bulls this week and is being eagerly promoted for an return to the Test side before the Ashes series.

You likely wish to read more about cricket matters. But first – you now understand with frustration – you’re going to have to get through a section of playful digression about toasted sandwiches, plus an extra unwanted bonus paragraph of self-referential analysis in the second person. You groan once more.

Marnus transfers the sandwich on to a serving plate and heads over the fridge. “It’s uncommon,” he announces, “but I actually like the grilled sandwich chilled. Done, in the fridge. You let the cheese firm up, go bat, come back. Alright. Toastie’s ready to go.”

Back to Cricket

Look, to cut to the chase. Let’s address the cricket bit out of the way first? Little treat for making it this far. And while there may only be six weeks until the first Test, Labuschagne’s 100 runs against Tasmania – his third this season in all cricket – feels importantly timed.

This is an Australia top three badly short of form and structure, revealed against the South African team in the Test championship decider, highlighted further in the following Caribbean tour. Labuschagne was left out during that tour, but on some level you gathered Australia were eager to bring him back at the first opportunity. Now he seems to have given them the ideal reason.

And this is a strategy Australia must implement. Usman Khawaja has one century in his past 44 innings. The young batsman looks less like a first-innings batsman and closer to the attractive performer who might act as a batsman in a Indian film. No other options has shown convincing form. Nathan McSweeney looks cooked. Another option is still inexplicably hanging around, like unwanted guests. Meanwhile their skipper, Pat Cummins, is unfit and suddenly this seems like a surprisingly weak team, short of command or stability, the kind of effortless self-assurance that has often put Australia 2-0 up before a ball is bowled.

Marnus’s Comeback

Here comes Labuschagne: a leading Test player as in the recent past, just left out from the one-day team, the perfect character to restore order to a brittle empire. And we are advised this is a more relaxed and thoughtful Labuschagne currently: a pared-down, no-frills Labuschagne, not as maniacally obsessed with technical minutiae. “I feel like I’ve really stripped it back,” he said after his century. “Less focused on technique, just what I should make runs.”

Naturally, few accept this. In all likelihood this is a rebrand that exists entirely in Labuschagne’s own head: still constantly refining that technique from dawn to dusk, going more back to basics than anyone else would try. Prefer simplicity? Marnus will take time in the nets with trainers and footage, exhaustively remoulding himself into the least technical batter that has ever played. This is just the quality of the focused, and the quality that has consistently made Labuschagne one of the most wildly absorbing players in the cricket.

Bigger Scene

Perhaps before this very open England-Australia contest, there is even a sort of appealing difference to Labuschagne’s unquenchable obsession. In England we have a side for whom technical study, let alone self-analysis, is a forbidden topic. Go with instinct. Be where the ball is. Live in the instant.

On the opposite side you have a player such as Labuschagne, a man utterly absorbed with the sport and magnificently unbothered by who knows about it, who finds cricket even in the gaps in the game, who handles this unusual pursuit with precisely the amount of quirky respect it requires.

And it worked. During his focused era – from the instant he appeared to come in for a hurt Smith at the famous ground in 2019 to until late 2022 – Labuschagne somehow managed to see the game with greater insight. To access it – through absolute focus – on a higher, weirder, more frenzied level. During his days playing Kent league cricket, colleagues noticed him on the morning of a game positioned on a seat in a trance-like state, literally visualising each delivery of his time at the crease. According to the analytics firm, during the initial period of his career a surprisingly high number of chances were spilled from his batting. In some way Labuschagne had predicted events before others could react to influence it.

Form Issues

Maybe this was why his form started to decline the point he became number one. There were no new heights to imagine, just a empty space before his eyes. Also – to be fair – he stopped trusting his signature shot, got stuck in his crease and seemed to forget where his off-stump was. But it’s all the same thing. Meanwhile his trainer, D’Costa, reckons a focus on white-ball cricket started to weaken assurance in his alignment. Encouragingly: he’s now excluded from the 50-over squad.

Certainly it’s relevant, 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 job as one of reaching this optimal zone, no matter how mysterious it may seem to the ordinary people.

This mindset, to my mind, has consistently been the main point of difference between him and Steve Smith, a more naturally gifted player