Smith's Show Of Bravery Should Act As Wake-up Call

Peter Hayter argues it is high time cricket looked to appoint independent experts to make key player welfare calls, regardless of the player’s opinion

- Peter Hayter

There was no mistaking what Steve Smith thought about having to miss the third Ashes Test at Headingley. The long eye of the TV lens had spotted him idly twirling a ball behind the glass of the Aussie dressing room window before start of play on day one and you didn’t need a degree in mind-reading to figure out how much he was loving his enforced absence from the fray.

You shared his frustration, of course. Remember what it was like to be told you have to stay indoors while your mates are outside having the time of their lives.

And even though Joe Root might have been wondering, and maybe secretly hoping, that the ball Jofra Archer crashed into the back of Smith’s neck at Lord’s five days previously would turn out to be his Glenn McGrath moment, the disappointment the England captain had earlier voiced that the batsman who had made the difference between the sides thus far would not be there to challenge his bowlers again, sounded touchingly genuine.

Yet, no matter what Smith felt about the protocols that had been used to stop him playing, no matter how much missing out would have meant to him, no matter how much he himself felt able to perform, not only was it absolutely the correct decision to prevent him from doing so, it was absolutely the wrong decision to permit him to resume his innings.

Fair play to the Australian medical team for demanding he leave the field as soon as he was able, even though that was clearly against his wishes.

But what happened next suggests the time has come to take such matters out of their hands, of Smith’s and all other interested parties and place the responsibility for this sort of decision in the hands of independent experts.