For a period of 23 Tests, Marnus Labuschagne was statistically the luckiest batter in Test cricket.
He had more genuine chances dropped or missed than any other batter from his debut up until the end of the 2021/22 Ashes series. He was more often than not able to turn those reprieves into significant scores.
In more recent times, it’s been slim pickings. In fact, it’s been 23 Tests since his last century, dating back to the fourth Ashes Test at Old Trafford in 2023.
He’s been left out of the ODI squad travelling to take on Zimbabwe and South Africa later this month. The right-hander has only missed five of Australia’s last 56 ODIs, raising questions about his future in the Test side.
“We’re still very much working through what that Test squad looks like, but I can say we separate out those formats,” chair of selectors George Bailey told reporters when unveiling the ODI squad.
“He has played some really important one-day cricket for us; at his best that looks a certain way, but the way that squad and team is structuring up there just wasn’t space for him.”
If you break down Labuschagne’s career into the period before his last Test ton and the period since, there is somewhat of a trend: his luck has seemingly run out.
The 2023 Ashes series in England was the last time Marnus Labuschagne made a Test century. (Getty Images: Richard Heathcote)
Looking at only genuine chances missed by opposition teams — dropped catches, missed stumpings, opposition teams not reviewing a decision that would have seen him dismissed, or wickets on a no ball — he was given a reprieve 25 times from 75 innings where he faced at least one ball.
That’s a chance every three innings from his Test debut in 2018 to his most recent hundred back in 2023.
Across his first 20 Tests he scored six centuries and 12 fifties, earning him a batting average of 62.15. If, in that time, he had been taken at the first opportunity, that average drops to 46.50.
In the 2019-2021 World Test Championship cycle, Labuschagne played 13 Tests and scored the most runs of any other batter in the world. He finished that period with 1,675 runs at an average of 72.82. Across the 23 innings he was required to bat in, he was afforded 12 chances, or one every 1.92 innings.
When you compare that with Steve Smith in the same period, he was given a reprieve four times, which equates to one every 5.5 innings. Smith was still able to score 1,341 runs in that WTC cycle, which highlights Labuschagne’s ability to capitalise when given the opportunity.
In fact, his entire Test career has been based on it.
Labuschagne’s luck was a key feature of his game in his early Tests, with his ability to capitalise on opportunities given to him by opposition mistakes. (AP: Rick Rycroft)
Labuschagne made his Test debut in 2018 due to the bans handed down to Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft after the sandpaper incident the last time Australia’s Test team toured South Africa.
That put him in the frame for the 2019 Ashes squad and, after a red-hot Smith was hit in the neck by a Jofra Archer bouncer at Lord’s, Labuschagne got his next chance as the first concussion substitute in the history of international cricket, courtesy of a rule introduced the month before the series started.
In the next Test in Leeds, Labuschagne was dropped on 14, 42 and 60, and England failed to review an edge that would have been given out when he was on 35. He went on to make 80.
That series, including that fortunate knock of 80 at Headingley, cemented his spot in the side, with Usman Khawaja the unfortunate one to make way when Smith returned, a decision that left Khawaja on the outer for three years.
His ability to turn a reprieve into a significant score was a hallmark of his early Test career. Labuschagne’s maiden Test century came against Pakistan at the Gabba in 2019 when he scored an impressive 185 off 279 balls. Pakistan fans might still be ruing the fact he was dropped by Asad Shafiq on 33 that same innings.
Labuschagne made a habit of scoring big runs when given a reprieve by the opposition. (AAP: David Mariuz)
In that WTC cycle alone, if he had been taken at the first opportunity, his batting average would drop to 55.68, which would have had him ranked 11th in the world.
It’s not just his luck that’s seemingly run out; it’s his ability to capitalise on it.
From that first Ashes series to his last Test century, Labuschagne was able to turn missed opportunities into scores of 50 or more on nine occasions, including five hundreds.
Since that last century, he has been afforded only four reprieves, and the most he’s added to his total is 18 runs.
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He was briefly dropped from the side after failing to impress as a makeshift opener in last year’s World Test Championship final, missing Australia’s tour of the West Indies. But, after only three Tests out of the side, he came back in for the 2025/26 Ashes and has remained in the team since.
When you compare that to the likes of Jake Weatherald, who has been in and out of the Test squad with questions around his form, Labuschagne has not just been given chances by opposition fielders; he’s also been given them by the Australian selectors.
With an important series against South Africa on the horizon and his omission from the ODI squad, all eyes now look to see if his luck really has run out.
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