With Somerset’s Blast quarter-final round the corner, Will Smeed is fit again and will be looking to slot into the opening berth he vacated after a hamstring injury earlier this summer. Having struck the the first century ever scored in The Hundred in 2022, Smeed’s reputation at the top of the order has garnered the interest of franchises around the world. The 22-year-old batter took the time to talk to Sam Dalling.
“I've always said to Somerset, I want to play as long as I enjoy it,” Will Smeed explains. “I think that's fair for me and it's fair for them as well.” Clarity of thought is one of Smeed’s superpowers.
“I don't want to be someone sulking around the changing rooms moaning the whole time because that doesn't have a very good impact on the rest of the group. But I am loving it at the moment, which is a great place to be in.”
Smeed is chatting to Cider Press just after sunrise during the recent Durham Championship game. The coffee is fresh, Goodland Gardens is empty bar a few colleagues and the match officials dipping in for their caffeine hit, and the sun is shining. Smeed’s grin spans the Tone.
“And that's why it was so nice coming back and playing the other day. I was just genuinely buzzing to be able to play a game of cricket again.”
The ‘game’ Smeed references was a 2nd XI Championship fixture against Gloucestershire. Having been hamstrung during the Blast Group stages, his participation was to test his fitness ahead of Thursday’s Blast quarter-final at Northamptonshire. Smeed made 89 wearing a white shirt with his name and number on the back.
Smeed laughs when Cider Press asks whether anything can be read into it. “The shirt was from a couple of years ago! I think it was a couple of sizes too small, but I squeezed into it.
“It was lovely being back out there, to be honest. It's probably the first time in a long time batting in red ball cricket, where I was happy just to bat and didn't feel like I wanted to whack the ball. That was amazing. I think not playing is a good motivator for making you want to do well when you are fit again.”
Smeed famously retired from red-ball cricket before even making his debut. He spoke eloquently about his reasoning at the time, but never shut the door permanently. He has always faced the Dukes ball in the nets. “I think it's a good test of your technique as much as anything,” he explains. “It obviously moves a bit more and opening the batting in T20 the ball does move sometimes. You have to be able to cope with that. I think it's something I did the whole way through. I'd still be facing red balls, and I never said never to playing it again potentially at some point.”
Whether that transpires or not, it is lovely to hear that Smeed is in a good place. His natural game is leg-side dominant, his strike that sails over square-leg is something of a trademark. Of his 1,655 Blast runs, 73.47% have come in boundaries. 35.52% have been sixes.
“It’s not something I’ve massively focussed on but it’s something that has come pretty naturally to me. I got a lot stronger when I was sort of 16, 17. Before that, I didn't hit many balls in the air, which is probably why I was better at red ball cricket!”
But despite having featured in the Hundred, the Pakistan Super League, the Caribbean T20 and the ILT20 before reaching age 23, Smeed is constantly exploring new avenues. Doing so involves where possible, spending a month or two every winter honing his skills. Much of that work is done with 2nd XI coach Greg Kennis in Taunton. “I think he probably knows my game better than anyone now,” Smeed says. “He’s become a sounding board, and I still do a lot of work with him when I can. I think that's been one of the great things with Somerset. Obviously, for now, just doing the white ball stuff, they've been very accommodating in fitting me in for practices and the coaches are still very happy to work with me, which I know isn't the same as some other counties.”
What do they work on together? “Adding some shots in,” Smeed explains. “I'm nearly there with one. It's just getting the confidence to do it in a game.” The follow-up enquiry is so obvious it almost feels premeditated. “The scoops and reverse sweeps. I always did them growing up and then I broke my thumb scooping. Since then, it's just been a bit of a mental battle to convince myself to do it again. I think that's the main thing.
“And then there is some technical stuff. Just chatting to Greg the other day, I think it's apparent that technically I'm a better player than I was two years ago, which is probably why the 2s game went pretty well, considering I've not hit a red ball for a long time.
“I feel in a good place. I feel like I'm still improving. And I think in cricket, it's a weird one, that doesn't always correlate to runs straight away just because of the nature of the game, especially white ball cricket, where it can be a bit hit or miss. But I think you just have to trust that process. If you keep putting in the work, you will get the results eventually.”
At Wantage Road on Thursday, most expect the Smeed – Tom Banton opening pairing to return. The pair complement each other beautifully, Banton and his long, fluid limbs, and Smeed with his short-arm boxer-esque jabs.
“I think it probably does make it a bit harder to bowl at us in that we hit different lengths. I think Bants is very, very strong if you miss full - he'll smack you everywhere. Whereas I camp on the back foot a little bit and look for that hard length and try and pick it up.”
Key to their successful partnership is a great friendship off the field. “We enjoy spending time together. We enjoy playing together. He's obviously had an amazing year this year, which has been really good to see.
“I think he's getting back to the ridiculous player that we know he is, playing those stupid shots and making a lot of bowlers look not very good. We're really good mates. We know each other's games pretty well by now. I think conversations in the middle, if they're happening, are trying to help each other out and get through potentially tough periods or easy periods, who to target.”
Smeed first appeared on the radar of most Somerset fans when, as a 16-year-old, he and Marcus Trescothick, 26 years his senior, scored 2nd XI centuries on the same day. The pair even combined for a 91-partnership.
“To be honest, I think that summer I was just so overwhelmed with exams and cricket - I wasn't loving it as much as I probably should have. But that was obviously a very cool experience. I think, for some reason, cricket seemed quite easy when I was 16 and then the older you get, it gets harder. But that was cool. He was a legend of the game.”
Smeed sat his GCSEs that summer and went on to take A-Levels in Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Chemistry. He is nearing the end of an Open University degree in Maths and Economics, and has also spent part of his winters gaining work experience “just dipping my toes in different things to see potentially what I'd want to do after cricket. I quite enjoy learning. It gives me something to do outside of cricket, which I think is important because it can become a bit all-consuming if you don't have an outlet.”
By the Covid-hit summer of 2020, Smeed debuting in the 1st XI. His second professional game included a knocked of 82 from just 49 balls in the Blast against Gloucestershire. A lack of crowds meant there was less adrenaline but Smeed “wouldn't say it helped because I reckon I and a lot of players feed off that sometimes. I think it didn't make the occasion overwhelming is probably a better way of putting it. It just felt like another game of cricket, to be honest. It was a weird time. I was probably just happy I wasn't having to do my A-levels, to be honest, at that point!”
Listen to the whole interview with Will Smeed…
By the following year, Smeed was drafted into the Hundred, becoming the tournament’s youngest ever player. His team, Birmingham Phoenix, would lose in the Final. Somerset would later finish runners-up in the Blast, too.
“I think I didn't really appreciate what it was to get to a final,” Smeed explains. “I thought, ‘oh, this is normal, we're always in finals.’ But that was obviously a shame.”
A year later he suffered similar disappointment when Somerset lost to a Nathan Ellis led Hampshire in the Blast semi-final. “I just felt like we didn't show up, having been very good throughout that whole comp. So that was frustrating.”
In that year’s Blast, Smeed made 98 against Surrey and an unbeaten 94 from 41 balls against Glamorgan. He also fell in the 90s for Quetta Gladiators during early 2022, before eventually becoming the Hundred’s first ever centurion.
Presumably reaching three figures, from just 49 deliveries, for the Phoenix is his favourite innings? “It was probably just a bit of a relief, to be honest,” Smeed admits. “I think relief is the word. It was obviously a cool day. It was nice to score some runs.
“But I always say still the best feeling I've had was being not out at the end against Glamorgan in that chase. I got 90 something not out and I think that was the only time I'd felt like I'd done everything I could, if that makes sense? That was the best feeling. Because that's where you feel like you've won the game for your team. You're there at the end, you've done your job.”
Somerset finally got the job done at Edgbaston in 2023, Tom Kohler-Cadmore holding a catch that will forever be replayed in the minds of those present and watching on from afar. “It came up on TV the other day and a few of us were watching the highlights,” Smeed says. “We were all saying we don’t remember it being that close. It was probably only [Daniel] Sams who kept them in the game in the end but if that one nicked for four and it had gone down to 11 to win off quite a few balls…thank God it didn’t go for four!”
Banton had called the victory in the dressing room after the 2022 defeat to Hampshire. “He might have said that more out of hope than anything, but he did call it,” Smeed admits. “I think we know if we play well, we can beat anyone which is obviously a great place to be in. We know everyone throughout the whole team can win a game on their own which as well is a nice place to be. Teams coming up against us have probably got quite a lot to think about.”
Hopefully, on Thursday, it is too much for Northamptonshire to wrap their heads around.