Steve Smith has reflected on a near-perfect day, decorated by another landmark century, a couple of fine catches and a bit of daring advice to his skipper that helped briefly tip the second Test Australia's way in one helter-skelter hour.
On Thursday morning at Lord's, Smith had reached another batting milestone in his extraordinary career, moving on to his 32nd Test century the day after reaching 9000 runs in the five-day game.
But he went on to have just as much influence in the field after the injury blow to key spinner Nathan Lyon threatened to completely derail Australia's day with England motoring along handsomely in response to the visitors' 416.
"It wasn't ideal," reflected Smith. "We're going to miss Nathan this game and could miss him for a little while. I said to Patty (Cummins), 'why don't we go for it with the short stuff?'
"That's how they play their cricket, I though it worked well on this wicket. We had to revert to a different tactic."
It worked a treat indeed, with three of England's key batters then falling into the trap, with Smith himself removing two of them thanks to smart catches in the deep.
The first came on the boundary as Ollie Pope didn't get hold of all of Cameron Green's bouncer, and the second was absolutely key, as he dived forward to scoop up Joe Root's mishit hoik off Mitchell Starc.
"We felt like we were in the game for a lot of the time there," said Smith, pondering England's self-destructive 45 minutes.
"Until probably (Ben) Stokes, he came out and he started to duck under a few, but we were setting the fields and they were taking it on and creating opportunities."
Earlier, Smith had again put his name on the Lord's honours board serenely - he's the fourth Australian to have his name inscribed twice to go with his 2015 double hundred - brushing away the pain of 2019 and his poleaxing by Jofra Archer.
"Got off to a pretty good start, I was getting off nice. Good to get on the honours board," he said.
Unbeaten on 85 overnight after looking in complete control on the opening day, nothing seemed more inevitable to the home crowd than his three figures.
He had one scare when beaten by Stuart Broad on 99 but reached his ton soon after with an imperious cover drive off James Anderson, earning a warm embrace from batting partner, captain Cummins.
England were finally glad to see the back of their old tormentor when he was caught in the gully by Ben Duckett for 110, attempting to drive Josh Tongue. He'd batted for 184 balls and hit 15 fours.
The milestone ton, coming a decade since his first down the road at The Oval, brought the 34-year-old level with Steve Waugh in the list of Australian centurions, with only another former captain Ricky Ponting ahead of them on 41.
With 9079 Test runs in total in his 99th match, Smith's average of 59.73 is superior to Waugh and any of the other batters above him in the hundreds list.
LIST OF THE MOST PROLIFIC CENTURY MAKERS IN TESTS
Sachin Tendulkar (Ind, 1989-2013) 51
Jacques Kallis (SA, 1995-2013) 45
Ricky Ponting (Aus, 1995-2012) 41
Kumar Sangakkara (Sri Lanka, 2000-2015) 38
Rahul Dravid (Ind, 1996-2012) 36
Younis Khan (Pak, 2000-2017) 34
Sunil Gavaskar (Ind, 1971-1987) 34
Brian Lara (WI, 1990-2006) 34
Mahela Jayawardene (SL, 1997-2014) 34
Alastair Cook (Eng, 2006-2018) 33
Steve Waugh (Aus, 1985-2004) 32
Steve Smith (Aus, 2010-current) 32
