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Aaron Finch
Australia captain Aaron Finch makes the long walk back to the pavilion after being run out against India. Photograph: Aijaz Rahi/AP
Australia captain Aaron Finch makes the long walk back to the pavilion after being run out against India. Photograph: Aijaz Rahi/AP

Yes, no, bugger! The curious case of the Aaron Finch-Steve Smith run-out

This article is more than 4 years old

The comical mix-up in Bengaluru not only cruelled Australia’s chances in the deciding ODI against India, it also underlined how much cricket is played between the ears

The Chuckle Brothers would have been proud of Steve Smith and Aaron Finch in Bangalore. Although they probably would have blanched at the reworking of their “to me, to you” catchphrase into “yes, no, bugger!”

Run-outs are rarely so slapstick. While not on the scale of the peerless Alan Donald and Lance Klusener debacle, that the mix-up in the deciding ODI of a brief tour of India featured two masters of their craft, and at such an innocuous juncture in the contest, made it notably jarring. The maxim of controlling the controllables that governs so much of modern professional sport was momentarily shattered. We saw the glitch in the Matrix.

“Arguably the biggest challenge to a cricketer is not the learning of the skills - most players have reasonable techniques,” argue Jamie Barker and Matt Slater, sports psychologists who have both spent time on staff in professional cricket environments. “Instead, the biggest challenge is being able to deal with the many psychological factors that can affect thinking and, ultimately, performance during a game.” Momentarily, Smith and Finch failed that challenge.

But in the process the run-out highlighted how infrequently such egregious breakdowns in decision making occur at the highest level. Considering the volume of cricket played, incidents like this are infrequent. The training and repetition behind the scenes, that dedication to finding a near-robotic state where the thinking brain is bypassed, works. In Spanish football it’s called automatismo. It’s easy to underestimate, until something goes wrong.

Of the two, Smith was the more culpable. Taking strike to Mohammed Shami in the ninth over, he dabbed the ball into the off-side. Finch called him through for a single. It was his call to make, just. Smith had diverted his shot a fraction behind square, meaning responsibility for the run was the non-striker’s. But the ball had not traveled on an angle so acute that Smith would instinctively absolve himself of any input into the negotiation.

Reflexively he set off, as most batters do when the ball ricochets off their blade towards run-scoring territory. But Smith has a habit of lurching forward in such a manner then stopping almost instantly. He does this with his bat outstretched towards his teammate. Lots of signals, lots of noise.

Finch continued undeterred towards halfway - he was, after all, running to the supposed danger end. The risk was his. But Smith was following the ball and did not have time to decipher his partner’s assured body language.

While he was following the ball, Smith clocked that it was being hunted down by Ravindra Jadeja, India’s best fielder. He also processed it was on Jadeja’s left-hand side, closest to his throwing arm. To him, the risk was now too great for the reward of just a single so early in the innings.

Virat Kohli (right) shows his delight after the comical mix-up cost Aaron Finch his wicket. Photograph: Aijaz Rahi/AP

Catastrophically, Finch stuttered mid-pitch, a cue for Smith to check his progress, for which he required little invitation. Finch then took an eternity to size up the changing scene, continuing his 22-yard green mile as if trapped on a broken travelator.

There was still time to abort the mission but Finch’s closing strides seemed almost indignant, as if to prove a point that he was in the right. If that meant losing his wicket in the process, then so be it.

If that was the case, the folly of such an approach was reinforced when Jadeja’s throw to the danger end missed (for all the advancement in fielding technique, direct run-outs remain a rarity). An extra few precious seconds were offered to any scrambling batsman eager to retrace his steps. But Finch was now in purgatory, allowing the fielder backing up, Shreyas Iyer, ample opportunity to lob the ball calmly back to Shami to complete the dismissal.

It was not an amicable end to the partnership, it was an annulment. Finch’s fury was obvious as he incanted invective behind his grille on his stomp back to the pavilion, his natural disappointment magnified by his anger at the breakdown in process.

“Cricket is strange in that it’s a team game with 11 individual performances,” writes former England batsman Robin Smith in his recently published autobiography. The Judge does so in the context of explaining how his four ODI centuries all occurred in matches in which he ended up on the losing side. After safeguarding his presence at the crease, Smith went on to strike 131 in a lost cause.

The thrilling trailer for a new official behind-the-scenes documentary reveals how utterly distraught Smith was on losing his wicket at Lord’s during the 2019 Ashes, despite his heroic attempts to advance his side’s cause. It seems unlikely it would have taken him long to make amends to his captain.

Finch, an inveterate gum-chewer closer to the larrikin tradition of Australian cricketing lore, suggested they would resolve any differences over a drink. After such a fraught contest, the response from both men to the offer of a beer must have been two resounding yeses. If only they were in such furious agreement a few hours earlier.

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