Add articles to your saved list and come back to them any time.<\/p>\n
Perth, 2015. Australia is sprinting towards a massive World Cup total against Afghanistan. Glenn Maxwell, 26 years old then, decides to try something against Shapoor Zadran.<\/p>\n
Keeping his feet anchored with his stance slightly open, Maxwell relies on his eyes, his wrists and weight transfer to send a fullish delivery flying onto the WACA Ground hill \u2013 making the most of warm-up drills he has used during the Big Bash League.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
There are similarities in the hitting style of Glenn Maxwell and former Red Sox player Dustin Pedroia.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Stephen Kiprillis<\/cite><\/p>\n Eight years on, Maxwell recalled that shot when trying to explain how he had managed to slam a series of sixes, once more against Afghanistan, despite battling with full-body cramps during an unforgettable innings of 201 in Mumbai.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s when I get into a really nice rhythm, I don\u2019t feel like I need to do a lot of foot and body movement,\u201d Maxwell said.<\/p>\n \u201cI did it against Afghanistan in 2015, I think it was a left-armer and I stood dead still and was able to use my hands to flick one over deep square. I just feel like it doesn\u2019t give away any cues, I don\u2019t have any pre-movements, I\u2019m not moving around too much.\u201d<\/p>\n Maxwell is not the first cricketer to minimise footwork, which is meant to be the cornerstone of batting. Virender Sehwag, the owner of two Test triple centuries, had little regard for it. \u201cWhile his hands and eyes were locked in a wondrous marriage, his feet were usually not invited to this wedding,\u201d Indian journalist Rohit Brijnath wrote in this masthead during the 2003-04 tour of Australia. England\u2019s Harry Brook is another, adopting a power position as the bowler approaches in both Test and white-ball cricket.<\/p>\n Maxwell, in the Twenty20 era, has taken this approach to new levels.<\/p>\n Maxwell\u2019s warm-up drill was drawn from South African great A.B. de Villiers, and Maxwell\u2019s ability to snap through the ball recalls the skills of some of Major League Baseball\u2019s most compact hitters. But even in the age of Twenty20, it remains oddly unorthodox in Australian eyes.<\/p>\n \u201cHe just has an ability to hit the ball so late and transfer weight between both legs,\u201d Trent Woodhill, who coached Maxwell at the Melbourne Stars, told this masthead. \u201cWatching some of the baseballers, the way they\u2019re able to go from front foot to back foot while not even moving, it\u2019s just amazing.<\/p>\n \u201cYou think of the effort other players need to put into the ball to get it over the fence … Other six hitters are tallish guys who use long levers to hit, and there\u2019s not many who snap through the ball at all.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of other guys deal in horizontal and vertical techniques, rather than \u2018Maxi\u2019 just having the one technique, and that\u2019s to snap your body weight through the ball, and that finishes with the hands snapping.\u201d<\/p>\n One baseballer who demonstrated this gift for over a decade was the former Boston Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia. Where Maxwell was handed the moniker of \u201cthe Big Show\u201d early in his Australian days, Pedroia called himself \u201cLaser Show\u201d, in reference to the lights lit up by his home runs.<\/p>\n At 175 centimetres and 77 kilograms, Pedroia\u2019s size was not dissimilar to Maxwell\u2019s 180cm and 73kg, but very much at the lower end for MLB hitters.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are a lot more baseball hitters who look like Kieron Pollard and Marcus Stoinis and company than look like Glenn,\u201d Woodhill said.<\/p>\n \u201cBut someone like Pedroia who is of similar stature to Glenn, that ability to hit long balls consistently where others need perfect conditions, that\u2019s where Glenn has that ability. Pedroia could turn his hip into the ball, and it didn\u2019t matter where the pitch was in the zone, because he was able to adjust so well.\u201d<\/p>\n Dustin \u201cLaser Show\u201d Pedroia.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Getty<\/cite><\/p>\n This is what Maxwell honed in those drills appropriated from de Villiers \u2013 transferring weight through the ball to find power.<\/p>\n \u201cOne of the things I used to work on before every BBL game going back about eight or nine years now, is I used to do no-foot drills,\u201d Maxwell told Adam Gilchrist on the Prairie Fire<\/em> podcast.<\/p>\n \u201cThe first 12 balls I faced I\u2019d stand dead still but try to hit them as far as I could as basically a warm-up, and whatever the length I had to hold my top body for as long as I could to get the right trajectory, which I feel like I could hit a six.<\/p>\n \u201cSo working on that upper-body movement without using your legs is actually a good way of finding out where your ideal hitting point is, and I suppose going back to that, I have to tinker a bit with bowlers being able to not just bowl half volleys outside off stump, but bowling different areas. But just relying on stuff I\u2019d worked on in earlier years and trying to adapt as quickly as I could.\u201d<\/p>\n Other stunning shots, especially a reverse for six when Afghanistan\u2019s seamer Azmatullah Omarzai tried to pitch wide of the off stump, came from years of field manipulation. All contribute to the sense that, if Maxwell is in rhythm, there is actually no safe place to bowl to him.<\/p>\n \u201cOnce I get in I feel if I set myself early enough in my mind and have a good idea of where I\u2019m trying to hit it, I feel like my hands can get me out of trouble if the ball\u2019s not quite in that area,\u201d Maxwell said to Gilchrist.<\/p>\n Glenn Maxwell\u2019s astonishing reverse slap for six during his double century against Afghanistan at the World Cup.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Nine.<\/cite><\/p>\n \u201cI do give myself a few different options for different lengths and those sorts of things. But I use Mujeeb [Ur Rahman] as an example early in my innings \u2013 all I did early was play one reverse sweep to Noor Ahmed to make sure the deep backward point was a little bit finer, and I knew they\u2019d have to have mid-off up at some stage.<\/p>\n \u201cThey couldn\u2019t keep mid-wicket up if he wanted to bowl his leggies and sort of try to challenge me on the inside. With that, I\u2019ve got a gap either side of mid-off, either side of cover, and over the top, so as soon as they get wide outside off, I know I can use my hands to find gaps there, so I set myself up for that every ball.\u201d<\/p>\n This level of calculation, with Maxwell\u2019s degree of skill, is of course freakish. But there is also an opportunity to share some of the Maxwell way more widely, if only other players would consider the possibility of thinking more laterally.<\/p>\n These lessons need not be restricted to white ball cricket alone. Tackling left-arm spin in India remains Australia\u2019s biggest unclimbed summit.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I\u2019m Australian cricket, I\u2019m having a massive focus on the next four to eight years of the Olympics and how do we beat up left-arm spin,\u201d Woodhill said. \u201cAnd you don\u2019t need to look any further than someone like Maxi.<\/p>\n \u201cOn an up and down surface, on a moving surface, on a spinning surface, it just makes more sense that you try and present as much of the blade as possible and turn your body into it, rather than trying to push your body into it with a straight bat.\u201d<\/p>\nThe inspiration<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
What about the reverse slap for six?<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
The next dimension<\/h3>\n