“I don’t have that self-belief…. The more success that I got on the field then I started to believe a bit more in myself but it was very very difficult because I’m not naturally a confident bloke….I was very lucky because I had some wonderful mentors who really pumped my tyres up. They really gave me all the encouragement”

Welcome to this episode with arguably one of England’s finest ever batsman, Robin Smith. Robin, or Judgie as he goes by, had a fantastic career that included scoring over 26,000 First class runs across a huge 426 First-class matches. [To put that into context, as of this interview in June 2018, Steve Smith has played 118 First-class matches, Virat Kohli has played 98 & Joe Root has played 125 matches. That’s more First-Class matches than the three modern great combined…That’s A LOT of cricket!]

Judgie also played 62 Test matches and 71 One Day Internationals and combined scored 6,655 runs with 13 centuries. Before Alex Hales scored 171 against Pakistan 2 years ago, Judgie’s 167 at Edgbaston against Australia in 1993 was the Highest ever ODI score by an English batsmen, a record that stood for 26 years.

After finishing his playing days in England, Judgie moved to Perth where he and his children now reside. He’s in the process of writing an autobiography, is studying a psychology degree, working full time and coaching junior cricketers so he’s certainly busy and active and is loving giving back to the game.

His passion and love for the game and his mates comes through in this interview which I’m sure you’re going to love.

In this episode we discussed: 

• How his dad would get him out of bed at 5am every morning to practice
• How he and his older brother Chris had a net in their garden which other International players like Barry Richards and Mike Proctor would come and use to practice.
• How he transitioned from playing First Class cricket in South Africa to being a local player for Hampshire.
• The one thing his mentor said to him before his Test debut and how that always stuck with him and how a stern word from his good mate Allan Lamb allowed him to play his natural game in his Test debut.
• What his technical fundamentals are for any batter.
• How he taught Matthew Hayden to visualise before every match.

Plus a whole lot more.