Australian star cricketer, Steve Smith scored back-to-back Centuries in the ongoing Big Bash League.
Steve Smith has given credit to the sport of Tennis to improve his game play in cricket.
Western grip to Continental grip: How Steve Smith is modifying his batting dynamics
“I was probably actually holding the bat how I hold my tennis racket before”, the 33-year-old said at the SCG. The right-handed batter went on to elaborate and elucidate in detail, how he has thoroughly gotten into changing the grips of his fists around the handle of the bat, from a more top-spinning ‘western’ grip to a more liberal ‘eastern’ or ‘continental’ grip. These are terms which are associated primarily with the game of Tennis.
“I don’t know what it’s called, the western grip maybe with my right hand. But I’ve opened that up to what’s called a continental grip maybe … a bit more open, just allowing me to slice the ball and hit gaps and hit the ball further. It just opens my bat face a bit. If you look at some of my footage from 12 months ago … four or five years probably, during that period I was quite closed with my face, which probably didn’t enable me to hit the ball as big”, Smudge added.
“I was probably top spinning it, as opposed to back spinning it and letting the ball go up and away further. I thought I back spun a couple of nice ones tonight. The ball just travels a lot better when you do that. It’s been a nice adjustment for me, I feel like I’m batting well in all forms of the game. Hopefully I can continue scoring some runs and helping firstly the Sixers and then the Aussies after that”, Smith concluded.
