Even then - what is techniqiue - ABdV thinks it is overrated and Steve Smith (and Chanderpaul before him) in tests has made a total and utter mockery of it. Viv used to be the best batsman in the world - constantly swinging accross the line to the leg side in both tests and limited overs.
Must be a gremlin in this thread. Some lines came up and deleted all my post?
I wrote that Smith and Chanders may have ungainly unorthodox techniques but both are as solid as a bank when hitting the ball. Take the Smith trigger movement. Note how after it how still and poised he is when he addresses the ball. That shows solid technical training. ABdV has a good technique for red ball cricket. Catch some footage of his in recent Sth Africa series. Richards had an eye like a dead fish.
Oh I don't doubt that all these batsmen are head's still and set in the crease, for ABdV I am referring to his comments on footwork and foot movement to get to the pitch of the ball as being overrated, and as such his use of hand eye to hit the ball wide of him.
Smith is a master tactician who will continually move further to the off to clip to the leg side (balls sometimes wider than off stump - in test cricket, repeatedly). It is a genius move by him that has yielded tonnes of big scores, but that is not orthodox in the least. And he still hasn't been troubled by left armers "playing all round it" despite this technique of his according to the classical technique theory being described as a weakness across the line of the ball. He just keeps getting bat on ball and not getting out when doing this.
I have seen Steve Smith literally make the bowlers start bowling to about 4th off stump. He is taking his stumps and lbw dismassals out of the equation when the bowlers do this because they don't want to be clipped to leg again or they are searching for an edge. Even then I bet at least one of them was clipped to leg again.
