In the eras before the Twenty20 size no one hit a cricket ball harder than Robin Smith. Muscular as a prize fighter, but with quick feet inherited from his ballet dancer mother, he produced blows, especially the square cut, with a power that left dents in the boundary boards and in the ambitions of his opponents. His wicket was highly sought after as teams knew they were in for a hand-wringing experience, by all accounts, should he spend any time at the crease.
But Smith, who has died aged 62 after a long period of ill health, was a mass of contradictions. On the surface he was a courageous, attacking batsman famous for his thrilling encounters with fast bowlers, but behind the bravado was a deeply insecure individual who constantly questioned his worth. After keeping this well hidden during his playing days, he later suffered from alcoholism and depression.
Smith’s courage against the swift animals could not be imitated. How much was daring, though, and how much was thrill-seeking necessity was questionable, as he was a self-confessed adrenaline junkie.
His courage led many close to him to wonder if he was wired differently than most, craving the masochistic experience of dealing with a fast pace with the twin demands of lightning reflexes and a high pain threshold – qualities perfectly encapsulated in the he made an unbeaten 148 against the West Indies at Lord’s in 1991, a Test innings that many consider his best for England, despite the match ending in a draw.
Curtly Ambrose and Malcolm Marshall, two of cricket’s greatest fast bowlers, were wide-open in that innings and in tricky conditions. While others withered, Smith rose to the challenge, his eyes sparkling with joy as he and the bowlers exchanged body blows and boundaries. He later admitted that the experience left him with “tingling sensations”, a feeling that had intensified to pain at Old Trafford four years later, when a similar strike from much the same bowling attack left him with a badly broken cheekbone.
Playing mainly in the middle order, Smith played 62 Tests and 71 one-day internationals for England during an international career that ran from 1988 to 1996. In that time he scored 4,236 Test runs with nine hundreds, with an average of 43.67, and 2,419 one-day runs with an average of just under 40. In 1993, at Edgbaston, 167 of those one-day runs came against Australia inside one of the most brutal innings ever seenin which he was personally congratulated by the Prime Minister, John Major. Yet he failed to finish on the winning side, in a pattern that would haunt many of his personal highlights for England.
Nicknamed the Judge, after an early hairstyle that resembled a judge’s wig, his Test batting average, in an era when England lost twice as many matches as they won, was impressive. Many felt he was passed over too quickly by the selectors when he was dropped after a difficult tour of South Africa in 1995-96. However, critics pointed out that his game never evolved and his vulnerability to spin has been a constant throughout his career.
He was unfailingly loyal to the team and his friends and had a hard time taking any form of rejection – to the point where he often saw it as betrayal. In his haunting autobiography, The Judge (2020), he admitted he was two people at once: the Judge was a tough, arrogant competitor bent on humiliating bowlers and who thrived on conflict, while Robin Smith was a gentle, emotional character. Each oppressed the other to some extent.
Smith managed to fall out with key figures, including England coach Keith Fletcher, who did not take kindly to Smith asking him to employ the services of a sports psychologist. At a time when the difference between a psychologist and a psychiatrist was perhaps not as clear in cricket circles as it was on the California benches, Fletcher’s view was that “if you need a psychiatrist you shouldn’t be playing for England”.
On one occasion his unwavering loyalty cost him playing time after standing up for Marshall, a Hampshire teammate from Barbados. The pair were sitting at the bar at the team hotel in Leicester when three men started using racial slurs at Marshall. Smith asked them to stop, but when they persisted, he knocked the ring leader down with a single punch. The blow broke his hand, leading to a six-week absence from cricket, although he escaped any formal punishment.
Smith played before central contracts protected leading players from burnout, a situation that convinced many England stars to shift their priorities from country to country, but not him. He played for Hampshire from 1982 to 2003, with five seasons as captain from 1998, and scored 18,984 first-class runs for the county at an average of 42.02, with 49 hundreds. His desire for a challenge often made him give his best before big matches or dire situations. Mark Nicholas, the county captain for the first half of Smith’s career, considered him Hampshire’s best ever player.
Born in Durban, South Africa, Robin was the second son of John Smith, a leather merchant, and Joy (née Shearer), a ballerina and dance teacher. He attended Northlands boys’ secondary school, which he left just before his 17th birthday.
The family lived in the Durban suburb of La Lucia, where a cricket net was installed so Robin and his older brother Chris could hone their game. Most days the boys would be woken by their father at five in the morning and the bowling machine, along with David the gardener, would spring into action for the next two hours. A hearty breakfast prepared by the family’s African maid, Florence, would follow, and then school. It was undeniably a life of white privilege, even during apartheid South Africa.
Both he and Chris played first-class cricket for Natal in the Currie Cup, Robin as a teenager. When Chris joined Hampshire in 1980, Robin followed shortly afterwards. Initially the pair joined as foreign players before becoming English qualified due to their parents being born in Britain.
Chris was picked first for England and played eight Tests and four one-day internationals in 1983-84. There was no cricketing rivalry between the two of them, although they did argue over who had the best Porsche. For those who knew them both, Chris had the steel and Robin had the talent, something they knew too.
In a team game like cricket, you still have to overcome an obstacle even after you pass it; a second life on the civilian street, away from the team that enveloped you and treated you like family. For Robin, that big change came in 2003, when Hampshire, a month before his 40th birthday, told him they would not be renewing his contract.
A realist would have seen it coming, but Smith had never been one of them, and it hit hard. During his playing days he had already set up several companies; Judge Tours, a tour company; Chase Sports, a bat manufacturer; Masuri helmets; and now with the help of outside investors he added another, a wine bar with his name in Romsey.
Wins and losses didn’t get the adrenaline going like cricket, and he lost control of both. A man who had always partied as hard as he played, he took to drinking. Ultimately, a failed property deal, which left him in serious debt, prompted him to emigrate to Australia.
His 1988 marriage to Kath James also came under strain, not least because of his affairs. Moving to Perth in 2007 with their two children, Harrison and Margaux, did not solve their problems, and a divorce followed in 2010.
By this time his parents, along with Chris and his family, had already settled in Perth. They all tried to help Chris by giving him a job in his embroidery factory. But a year later, Smith contemplated suicide. He was talked out of his ‘black hole’, as he described his depression, by his son and by Karin Lwin, a neighbor. Her empathy slowly convinced him that he was a “good man with a bad problem.”
A return to coaching proved a better rehabilitation than the clinic he had attended, while his haunting autobiography proved cathartic. But his problems persisted.
He is survived by Karin, his two children and his brother Chris.
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