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Labuschagne evenly coats butter on the top and bottom of a slice of soft bread. “That’s the secret,” he tells the camera as he lowers the lid of his grilled cheese press. “Boom. Then you get it toasted on both sides.” He lifts the lid to reveal a golden square of pure toasted goodness, the bubbling cheese happily sizzling within. “Here’s the secret method,” he declares. At which point, he does something shocking and odd.

At this stage, it’s clear a glaze of ennui is beginning to cover your eyes. The warning signs of sportswriting pretension are blinking intensely. You’re likely conscious that Labuschagne scored 160 for Queensland this week and is being widely discussed for an return to the Test side before the Ashes.

No doubt you’d prefer to read more about his performance. But first – you now realise with an anguished sigh – you’re going to have to sit through a section of playful digression about grilled cheese, plus an further tangential section of overly analytical commentary in the second person. You groan once more.

Marnus transfers the sandwich on to a dish and moves toward the fridge. “It’s uncommon,” he announces, “but I genuinely enjoy the cold toastie. Boom, in the fridge. You allow the cheese to set, go for a hit, come back. Boom. Toastie’s ready to go.”

On-Field Matters

Okay, here’s the main point. How about we cover the match details to begin with? Small reward for making it this far. And while there may still be six weeks until the first Test, Labuschagne’s hundred against Tasmania – his third of the summer in various games – feels quietly decisive.

We have an Australia top three clearly missing form and structure, shown up by the Proteas in the WTC final, highlighted further in the Caribbean afterwards. Labuschagne was omitted during that series, but on one hand you gathered Australia were eager to bring him back at the first opportunity. Now he seems to have given them the right opportunity.

Here is a plan that Australia need to work. Khawaja has just one 100 in his recent 44 batting efforts. Sam Konstas looks less like a Test opener and more like the good-looking star who might play a Test opener in a Bollywood epic. Other candidates has made a cogent case. McSweeney looks cooked. Marcus Harris is still oddly present, like dust or mold. Meanwhile their captain, Pat Cummins, is unfit and suddenly this feels like a weirdly lightweight side, 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

Step forward Marnus: a leading Test player as just two years ago, recently omitted from the 50-over squad, the perfect character to bring stability to a fragile lineup. And we are informed this is a calmer and more meditative Labuschagne now: a pared-down, no-frills Labuschagne, not as maniacally obsessed with technical minutiae. “I feel like I’ve really simplified things,” he said after his ton. “Less focused on technique, just what I need to score runs.”

Clearly, nobody truly believes this. In all likelihood this is a fresh image that exists only in Labuschagne’s personal view: still constantly refining that approach from dawn to dusk, going deeper into fundamentals than anyone has ever dared. Like basic approach? Marnus will take time in the nets with advisors and replays, exhaustively remoulding himself into the simplest player that has ever existed. This is simply the trait of the obsessed, and the characteristic that has consistently made Labuschagne one of the most wildly absorbing players in the cricket.

Wider Context

Maybe before this inscrutably unpredictable historic rivalry, there is even a kind of pleasing dissonance to Labuschagne’s unquenchable obsession. On England’s side we have a squad for whom technical study, let alone self-analysis, is a forbidden topic. Trust your gut. Stay in the moment. Smell the now.

On the opposite side you have a batsman like Labuschagne, a man utterly absorbed with cricket and totally indifferent by public perception, who sees cricket even in the moments outside play, who handles this unusual pursuit with just the right measure of absurd reverence it deserves.

And it worked. During his focused era – from the time he walked out to come in for a hurt Smith at the famous ground in 2019 to until late 2022 – Labuschagne was able to see the game with greater insight. To access it – through absolute focus – on a different, unusual, intense plane. During his time with Kent league cricket, teammates would find him on the morning of a game sitting on a park bench in a meditative condition, actually imagining every single ball of his time at the crease. Per cricket statisticians, during the first few years of his career a unusually large proportion of catches were spilled from his batting. Remarkably Labuschagne had intuited what would happen before others could react to affect it.

Form Issues

Maybe this was why his form started to decline the moment he reached the summit. There were no new heights to imagine, just a boundless, uncharted void before his eyes. Additionally – he began doubting his signature shot, got unable to move forward and seemed to misjudge his positioning. But it’s part of the same issue. Meanwhile his coach, D’Costa, believes a emphasis on limited-overs started to erode confidence in his positioning. Encouragingly: he’s now excluded from the ODI side.

Surely it matters, too, that Labuschagne is a man of deep religious faith, an religious believer who holds that this is all basically written out in advance, who thus sees his job as one of reaching this optimal zone, however enigmatic and inexplicable it may look to the ordinary people.

This approach, to my mind, has long been the main point of difference between him and Steve Smith, a instinctive player