To provide a full and proper appraisal of Sam Konstas’ first two Test matches for Australia, it’s worth going back and remembering why he was picked in the first place.
“We wanted to throw a new challenge at India,” said coach Andrew McDonald about the decision to replace Nathan McSweeney with Konstas for the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne.
“What he’s shown is an array of shots and an ability to put pressure back on his opponents. Whether it works or not, time will tell.”
Time has told. It worked.
If McSweeney was a little too timid in his first three Tests against India, then Konstas, the 19-year-old tyro from Sydney’s south, went the other way. And that is surely what he was asked to do: put pressure back on Australia’s opponents and create space for runs to be made.
History will record that Konstas played a vital hand in ensuring the Border-Gavaskar Trophy was won by Australia for the first time in a decade. His convention-dismantling 60 on debut at the MCG changed the course of the series. He got into India’s heads. He unsettled Jasprit Bumrah, their most lethal bowling weapon. He rattled Virat Kohli so much he embarrassed himself.
Sam Konstas has split opinion very quickly.Credit: Steven Siewert
In Sydney, Konstas continued to fulfil the role required of him. In the second innings, with Bumrah unable to bowl due to injury, he helped Australia get off to a rapid start. In hindsight, he set the tone for the victory mission wonderfully well. When Mohammed Siraj bowled five wides with the third ball of an innings in which his team was trying to defend a target of 162, Konstas correctly read the situation, sensed their psychological frailty and started swinging for the fences to take full advantage – again, something he was no doubt asked to do.
Once he’d done the early damage, the opportunity was there for Konstas to lock in and build. Yes, he got a little too excited with the shot that cost him his wicket. But for a 19-year-old playing in just his second Test, in his home city, in front of friends and family, a few days after rocketing to international fame, as a series win over India beckoned … is that not maybe just a little bit understandable?
You’d think so, but some of the reactions to Konstas-mania have been patently absurd, reflecting once again how a worryingly large chunk of Australian sport doesn’t know how to act when they see something that challenges their delicate sensibilities. It has further exposed a sort of generational divide between younger fans fascinated by self-assured mould-breakers like Konstas, and risk-averse old-school types who see him as a reflection of everything that’s wrong with the modern world.
It doesn’t matter that most clued-up cricketing observers have pointed out the fact Konstas is usually much more circumspect with the bat. The moment he played his first ramp shot on Boxing Day, the narrative arc was set. Media, both social and traditional, is littered with people writing him off, rubbishing his credentials as a Test batsman and proclaiming he never will be unless he curbs his enthusiasm and starts respecting the game. That he is somehow lost and needs to find himself. That the way he bats points to some kind of personality flaw. That he has an ego, is arrogant, a problem child.
Sam Konstas walks out to bat at the SCG.Credit: Steven Siewert
Nobody even knows what was actually said between Konstas and Kohli (or Bumrah), but many have assumed the worst and formed views accordingly. Already. About a guy they’d probably not even heard of a few months ago, and have heard speak publicly maybe a handful of times.
Some of this is to be expected. After all, Test cricket is hardly known for progressivism – and that very much applies here in Australia, the land of the tall poppy. A kid with a Greek surname in the team is unusual enough. But one who wears green Adidas Sambas to functions at Kirribilli House, death-stares Kohli, mouths off at Bumrah, and then hams it up for the crowd after going the slog? On debut?
We call ourselves a nation of larrikins. We say we want authenticity. We think we want different. But when presented with an athlete who doesn’t conform to the usual parameters, who dares to express themselves – and there are many such cases – we immediately seek to change them, to shove them into a box. We love them when they’re winning, then we tut-tut when they fail. We can’t accept them as they are, flaws and all; they must be perfect.
You can follow sport and barrack whichever way you want, but I find it’s much easier, fairer and better to just chill out and let things happen, rather than rushing straight to judgment. Sit back and enjoy the show sometimes instead of skipping ahead and predicting how it will end. Let youngsters make mistakes and give them the chance to learn from them, instead of getting angry, jumping on their backs and talking down to them.
Konstas has made a good start to his Test career, all things considered. We will see more sides to his game. He will improve. He will mature. Of course he bloody will. He’s 19! That’s how it works. Give him a break, and it might even happen quicker.
As Pat Cummins said after stumps on Sunday, it’s not illegal to puff your chest out and play a few cricket shots – but when faced with a teenager who does exactly those things, and in a way that suggests he is confident about who he is and what he brings, the reflex is to put him back in his place.
He was talking mainly about India, but Aussies are as guilty of this as anyone.
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