Steve Smith impresses all with his helicopter shot in Australian T20 tournament

Class is permanent and it shows whenever a plays, irrespective of the stage of performance. Australian batsman Steve Smith is one such player who, despite serving a year-long ban because of his involvement in a ball-tampering episode in South Africa earlier this, has continued to impress the fans whenever he has got a chance to bat.

The 29-year-old, who also bowls leg-break, recently turned out with the willow for Sutherland against the Manly-Warringah in the NSW T20 Premier Cricket tournament, and he hit some extraordinary shots during the game. One of his hits that enthralled the audience was the helicopter shot which reminded one of legendary Mahendra Singh Dhoni, India’s legendary wicketkeeper-batsman who is known to be its inventor.

The world hasn’t witnessed much of the shot in recent times since 37-year-old Dhoni’s batting form has taken a sharp dig. Smith hit 40 off 21 deliveries in the game before falling to an excellent catch by the Manly wicketkeeper.

Here is the video of Smith’s knock:

Call to reduce the ban has grown stronger of late

Smith, who is from New South Wales and has been playing franchise-based cricket across the globe, has represented Australia in 64 Tests, 108 ODIs and 30 T20Is since his international debut in 2010. He has scored over 10,000 runs internationally with 31 hundreds with a special track record in the longer format in which he averages over 61.37, which is more than Virat Kohli (54.57) – the Indian captain who replaced him as the No.1 batsman in Tests recently. The reason being Smith’s prolonged absence from international cricket.

Smith was the captain of Australia when he was slapped with the ban, along with his deputy David Warner. Newcomer Cameron Bancroft is the third Australian to face the punishment though his period of ban is nine months. The scandal broke out after the three players conspired to use sandpaper to illegally change the ball’s shape in the third Test match of the series in Cape Town. Australia’s the then coach Darren Lehmann also stood down following the scandal.

Call to reduce the ban has grown stronger of late

Of late, the clamour has been growing to reduce the ban of Smith and Warner as Australia have struggled to keep their international performance high. They lost their recent series against Pakistan – 0-1 in Test and 0-3 in T20Is – recently. On Sunday, Australia lost the first game of the three-ODI series against South Africa at home, taking their winless streak in the 50-overs format to seven matches.

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