Ashes third Test: Rebuilt Mitchell Marsh adds steel to batting spine

More than his shoulder was reconstructed during Mitchell Marsh’s long injury layoff.

Mitchell Marsh has locked down the No 6 spot in the Australian batting order after his superb innings at the WACA Ground. Picture: AAP

More than his shoulder was reconstructed during Mitchell Marsh’s long injury lay-off.

While he was up on the hoist, his support team tinkered with his technique and had a fiddle upstairs for good measure.

We can rebuild him they said. And so they did. Behold how Australia’s very own Steve Austin ground England into the WACA Ground dust.

Batting coach Scott Meuleman helped Marsh eradicate his penchant for plonking and anchoring his front foot to short balls as well as full ones.

He encouraged Marsh to play more conventionally by using the crease to get more from his cuts and pulls.

The holistic approach to rebuilding Marsh included Western Australia coach Justin Langer teaching him how to switch on and off during innings. And the whole process was finished off by Langer so believing in Marsh that he gave him the WA captaincy.

The sum of all those parts is a maiden Test hundred that grew to 181. In adding 301, Marsh and Steve Smith first batted England out of the match, before setting their minds to batting them out of the series.

“To have to wait this long, it is very sweet,” Marsh said of his first hundred in his 36th Test innings. “It is reward for all the hard work that has gone into the last eight months.”

Marsh called Scott Meuleman, a former WA opening batsman who is the grandson of Test player Ken, on Saturday night to thank him.

“Scott (Meuleman) has been amazing for my game of cricket,” he said. “He has pretty much changed the way I play and the way I defend and think about the game.”

Marsh’s epic hand has done more than lift his average from 21 to almost 27.

It’s ended the interminable debate about his slot in the order. Who’s at No 6? The Six Million Dollar Man, that’s who.

Peter Handscomb and Glenn Maxwell will have to be content playing T20 cricket for the foreseeable future, at least until the Sheffield Shield resumes in February. Their only chance of playing Tests any time soon is if there’s an injury.

Top test scores in the Marsh family

Australia’s top six is now set in stone so Marsh’s renaissance also brings something so precious in cricket — continuity.

Flesh can at last be given to the bare bones of the selectors’ “pick and stick” pronouncements. It’s easy to stand by your man when he’s got an 181 next to his name.

They’re a very happy crowd at present those selectors. First with Tim Paine, then Shaun Marsh and now Mitchell Marsh — they’re nailing their picks this summer.

But in the latter Marsh they have a bonus in that he gives them what they so desperately crave — a fifth bowler.

So Marsh’s mighty innings has the selectors smiling in concert with the adoring WACA faithful.

No more exultant band of cricket lovers have left a ground than they who skipped out of the WACA on Saturday before doing a little jig in Queens Gardens.

They do a good line in parochialism, the Sandgropers, so both Marshes locking away spots in the Test XI is a source of unbridled joy in the west.

That joy has its genesis in Mitchell’s mournful state after rupturing his bowling shoulder in India nine months ago.

“I got back from India, I was in a pretty bad place with my cricket but (Meuleman) got a hold of me and changed my game,” Marsh said.

“I finally worked out after eight years I can’t just plonk onto the front foot.”

Steve Smith said Marsh had done more than jettison his forward press.

“He’s softened his hands a little bit,” the Australia captain said after play Saturday.

“He actually nicked one and it went down and it didn’t carry here at Perth on a wicket that’s been pretty quick.

“So I think that’s something that he’s improved a lot.

“He was defending the good balls, and everything that’s loose he was putting it away.”

Having Smith at the other end on Saturday was the final ingredient in Marsh’s rebirth.

“That’s just batting,” Smith told Marsh in their midwicket conferences. “That’s how you do it.”

That from a counsellor of some credibility.