Is Marnus Labuschagne's back-foot weakness as old as people say?

Marnus Labuschagne kept his place for the decider at Newlands and made 0, caught off Simon Harmer, and 4, lbw to Kagiso Rabada. South Africa won by 176 runs and took the series 2-1. The talk around his place has turned to his batting off the back foot, and to how long the flaw has been there.

The weakness is real, and it began in the summer of 2023. Set against every other top-order Test batter in the same matches, he averaged 67.9 off the back foot from his debut to Lord's 2023, against 45.8 for everyone else. Since Old Trafford 2023 that has fallen to 23.1, against 40.2.

Our Opinion piece of 21 October, 'Marnus Labuschagne's golden years and the gap in the cordon', found that he now edges, misses or mistimes 16.9% of balls, up from 12.6% in 2019-22. The fall in his average and most of his recent dismissals trace back to one delivery: a good-length ball from a seamer that he meets on the back foot.

Was Labuschagne always weak off the back foot?

No. Up to Lord's 2023 the back foot was where he did his best work. Ricky Ponting has said Labuschagne scored off both feet three or four years ago, and his numbers back that memory. His front-foot average over those years was 65.0, barely different from his back-foot figure.

He was always a batter who went back. Before mid-2023 he went back to 36% of good-length balls from the seamers, against 25% for everyone else, and for years the habit cost him nothing. His front-foot average has slipped since Old Trafford 2023, to 41.0, which still leaves him a sound Test batter when he comes forward. What changed in the summer of 2023 is that he started getting out going back.

The good-length ball that gets him out

Michael Clarke has said Labuschagne squares up when he defends off the back foot. Since Old Trafford 2023 he has been out 19 times off the back foot, and 13 of those wickets came from good-length balls, most of them outside off stump and most of them caught.

Before mid-2023 that ball barely troubled him when he went back to it. Since then he has been out once every 31 balls going back to a good-length seamer, against once every 56 for everyone else in those Tests. A ball on that length outside off asks a batter to come forward and smother any movement, and going back gives it more time to move before he plays at it.

If you are opening the bowling against him, the plan is simple. Hold a length just outside off, wait for him to rock back, and keep the slips in.

Is the short ball the problem in Tests?

No. Off the back foot against short and back-of-length pace, he did slightly better than everyone else before mid-2023. Since then he has been only a little below the field.

The pattern of his dismissals has turned over. Before mid-2023, 11 of his 19 back-foot dismissals came from short or back-of-length balls, which is the price a batter pays for pulling and cutting. Now it is the good length that does for him, and bowlers who keep banging it in are bowling to the old Labuschagne.

What did the Sheffield Shield see?

In the Shield the decline follows the same timeline. From 2019/20 to 2022/23 he took short and back-of-length pace apart, averaging far above everyone else in those matches. From 2023/24 he has averaged 23.1 against it, well below the rest of the field.

Across those four Shield seasons from 2019/20, anyone watching saw a batter in charge of the short ball. The trouble arrived in 2023/24, the first home summer after the Tests turned on him in England. The claim that the Shield had been showing a back-foot weakness for years finds no support in those seasons.

Verdict on Labuschagne's back-foot weakness

Labuschagne has to change how he meets the good-length ball from the seamers. His instinct to rock back served him for years and now hands bowlers his wicket, so he must get forward and smother that ball, or stop going back to it so often.

Australia kept him at Newlands with his run at 47 Test innings without a hundred. Until his footwork against that good length changes, every new-ball attack he faces will know where to bowl, and his wait for a first Test hundred since July 2023 will go on.