Australia batter Marnus Labuschagne has said that he holds himself to a much higher standard after his struggle in the Ashes opener as he has been studying where things went wrong for him in Edgbaston.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Labuschagne will make a return to Lord's for the second Test, which holds significance as it was the venue where his career gained momentum in 2019 when he replaced Smith as a concussion substitute. Since then, he has showcased remarkable consistency, accumulating 10 Test centuries and occasionally maintaining an average above 60.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
But he is currently experiencing a relatively less productive phase, having scored two half-centuries and maintaining an average of 33.14 in his previous 17 innings.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
The 29-year-old failed to perform in the Ashes opener as the batter got out for a duck in the first innings and followed it up with a score of 13 in the second innings. As a result, he lost his place at the top of the world Test rankings to England’s Joe Root.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
"They were very uncharacteristic dismissals to how I've usually played. That's why I was pretty frustrated with myself to get out that way and asked myself the question, 'why did I play at those deliveries?," Labuschagne said of his dismissals at Edgbaston, confirming that he's backing himself to find the answer, as quoted by Cricket,com.au.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
"I've come up with my own summation of what that is. Now it's if there's anything I can do tactically or technically to make sure it doesn't happen again. It's a rarity that I'd play at those balls, so it's not something I'm going to overthink, but I hold myself to a much higher standard than those dismissals," he added.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
However, former Australian skipper Ricky Ponting expressed his support for Labuschagne's resurgence to peak performance and had offered some technical advice to the no.3 batter.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
"I think he's over-complicating things a little bit. I think he has to trust and believe in what's made him the number two-ranked Test batsman in the world for the last couple of years and go back to trusting that.<\/p>\r\n\r\n