DANE ELDRIDGE: New-look Steve Smith might be an oddball but he is getting the job done for Australia

The boyish Steve Smith we once knew is a thing of the past, now replaced by a bad ass brute who picks fights with batting partners and old ladies in his eyeline.

After spending his formative years shy and his post-sandpaper years a virtual monk, Smith’s cherub charm is gone in favour of a hitman who isn’t afraid to tell a mug how it is.

Despite the Sixers forgettable showing in last night’s BBL finals opener, the 36-year old-continued his rampaging form with more batting of intelligence and inhumanity.

While his 37 from 24 balls was well short of his half-century against the Brisbane Heat and brutal record breaking ton against the Thunder, it still featured the raw voltage that has hallmarked Smith’s latest renaissance.

In fact, the former Aussie skipper is playing with such sublime aggression it’s not only thrust him back in to calculations for Australia’s T20 side, it’s almost distracted the punditocracy from their lazy habit of focusing on his mannerisms.

In a nod to his new home town of New York, Smudge 3.0 has a newfound Bronx attitude that has not only fired the Sydney Sixers BBL finals charge and deposited quicks on to the Brewongle Stand roof.

It’s also seen him mic drop at press conferences, clap back at Poms and hoard the strike from T20’s greatest runscorer.

Smith’s militant policing of the sightscreen and the strike - savagely banishing old ladies to their seats and Babar Azam back to the non-strikers end - and his authoritative takedowns of Jofra Archer and Monty Panesar during the Ashes prove the babyfaced altar boy is long gone.

But while admittedly well-intentioned, the hyper focus on Smith being a rare cat merely because of his mannerisms not only proves this game is still as buttoned-down and bryl-creemed as it’s ever been, it also risks missing the wider point entirely.

And best of all, none of it’s caused him to lose a wink of sleep.

Declaring nowadays he’s “pretty chilled”, Smith is no longer the tightly wound worry wart who shadow bats at 3am.

Historically uneasy in the public eye and never satisfied regardless of his score, the right-hander’s well-documented batting anxieties used to famously cause him insomnia during Test matches.

Add his constant self-adjusting at the crease like a baseball manager sending signals to his pitcher, and there was no doubt the bloke was never at peace whether on 203* or his own lounge.

But from the moment Smith breezed back in to Australia in October for the Ashes, the changes in his outlook were plain to see.

Casually quipping upon arrival that two weeks preparation for the Ashes was “probably too much” as it only takes him “two hits to get sorted”, we just shrugged and assumed his fiancé had been giving him more throwdowns than usual.

Then after delivering a withering rebuke of Panesar - responding to the spinner’s claims he was a “cheat” by thrashing his comical appearance on quiz show Mastermind - we merely assumed he’d accidentally sipped a Diet Coke before fronting the press pack.

But when Smith picked a fight with Archer at the Gabba, we realised these uncharacteristic acts were not a coincidence.

Sure, there’s still a degree of “faux bad” about Smith when he gets angry, kinda like a Christian rapper.

But his legendary “you only bowl fast when there’s nothing going on, champion” rebuke would’ve never occurred in his previous life, even despite years of fake news about the seamer having his measure.

And as for the Panesar presser, the old Smith would’ve been diplomatic and detached.

Not only because he was too shy, but also because like the deluded Homer visualising Bart as a tasty ham in The Simpsons, he’d have been daydreaming of runs and envisioning the journalist as a vacant midwicket.

But the new “horns up” Smith is different gravy - and with only a few years of his career left to unfold, we need to ride the slipstream while it lasts.

The former skipper has clearly stated all his T20 eggs are in representing Australia at the LA Olympics and that he thinks the “ship’s sailed” on a World Cup recall, but surely the Aussies could do with his new serated blade on the friendly decks of the subcontinent next month.

It could be another treasured legacy builder and hopefully give the pundits pause to switch their focus where it belongs.

Sure, cricket is a game traditionally reluctant to embrace anything different, and that’s why traditionalists are still coming to terms with reverse sweeps and Billy Bowden.

But while admittedly well-intentioned, the hyper focus on Smith being a rare cat merely because of his mannerisms not only proves this game is still as buttoned-down and bryl-creemed as it’s ever been, it also risks missing the wider point entirely.

We need to soak this up, because we’re in the midst of a talent so unimpeachable he’s protecting international superstars from the strike.