Former England ODI Captain Adam Hollioake, an assistant coach at Queensland whose time with the state side coincided with Marnus Labuschagne’s rise as a batsman, has talked to The Grade Cricketer podcast about working with the man who is currently ranked third in the ICC Test batting rankings.
In the season before Hollioake joined the Bulls, Marnus Labuschagne had been Queensland’s top scorer in the 2017/18 Sheffield Shield, before making his Test debut against Pakistan in the UAE in October 2018.
Labuschagne has become known for his insatiable appetite for the game, and his drive to always improve. During Hollioake’s recent appearance on The Grade Cricketer podcast, the former Surrey skipper was asked to give his view on why the quirky Australian has been such a success in the Test match arena, particularly after averaging in the low-30s in first-class cricket at the time of his Test debut.
“[It started] when I joined as a batting coach at Queensland I think,” Hollioake initially joked, before then going into more detail.
“There a number of factors which have [caused his improvement],” he said. “He always had that enthusiasm. I said the best thing you can have as a batsman is an obsession, [and] that guy’s obsessed’.
This is not the first time Labuschagne’s obsessive cricketing brain has been remarked on or witnessed in public. The Test, a documentary following the Australian side, showed Labuschagne fanatically idolising Steve Smith and obsessing over his own technique and that he simply wants to talk about cricket with anyone.
“Sometimes he just follows [me] around just wanting to talk about cricket,” Hollioake commented.
Labuschagne’s remarkable success since 2019, a period which has included a run of four centuries in five homes Tests against Pakistan and New Zealand in the 2019/20 winter, has not reduced his enthusiasm to discuss ways to improve.
“He used to follow me around, asking, talking,” Hollioake recalled. “Not for advice, just discussing problem solving for batting.”
“After a couple of good series, he walks around [and asks] me to walk with him so we can have discussion on it. So the hierarchy has changed.”
The Queenslander’s obsession with scoring runs was on show again this week, as he struck 276 off 268 balls for Glamorgan XI against a teenage Northamptonshire attack. This latest mammoth score, against such helpless opposition, illustrates the ruthless side to Labuschagne’s character, something that is often hidden by the quirky, idiosyncratic exterior.
