The remarkable secret to Smith's Ashes bowling success: not bowling. Source: Gareth Copley / Getty Images
THE secret to Steve Smith's success as a bowler appears to be a lack of bowling.
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The occasional leg-spinner revealed he had not bowled in the nets for a week and a half leading into the second Test at Lord's because of a quad muscle injury.
Yet Smith, 24, changed the game late on day one by claiming three wickets, dragging Australia back into a match that was rapidly getting away.
"I was nice and fresh and it came out naturally. It worked for me," Smith said before play on the second day.
"I was actually really keen to have a bowl yesterday. I was actually warming up an hour before hand but he (captain Michael Clarke) wasn't watching," Smith joked.
"I was happy to have a bowl. It was probably that sort of period where we had to try something different. I guess it paid off in the end."
Smith debuted as Australia's spinner at Lord's three year's ago in Australia's long-forgotten two-Test series against Pakistan, batting at number eight.
However he has always considered himself a batsman who bowls.
"I probably wasn't ever an actual spinner. I was lucky to get that role at that time," Smith said.
"I've always seen myself as more of a batter than a bowler so I'm obviously grateful to have played out here as a spinner and taking a few wickets at the same time."
Playing his ninth Test, Smith now had seven wickets at an average of 43 but six of them have come during his two Tests at Lord's at an average of just 11.5.
He has deliberately reduced the emphasis on his bowling recently to concentrate on his batting and it has paid dividends.
After two good Tests at the end of a generally disastrous tour of India earlier this year and a half-century in the first Test at Edgbaston, Smith is becoming an increasingly permanent member of a fluid Australian batting line-up.
"I'm batting in the top six and I feel like I'm batting pretty well. Hopefully a big score is just around the corner," Smith said.
"I've changed a few things in my batting. I've tightened up my technique a bit, I feel as if I'm heading in the right direction."
New coach Darren Lehmann has been encouraging Smith to bowl more.
"Every time he walks past me he says keep bowling at the stumps. That's a pretty simple plan for a spinner. Just try and hit the stumps and let natural variation play its part," said Smith.
"You obviously have to keep working at it and if required like that hopefully I can come up with similar figures when it's needed."
The ball that Smith bowled to dismiss centurion Ian Bell was a beauty, spinning across the fight hander and taking the edge to finish with Clarke at slip.
"That's probably the best ball you can bowl as a leg-spinner, that little nick to slip," said Smith. "It would be nice to replicate that a few times."
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