Steve Smith receives teammate's backing after Allan Border takedown of 'ridiculous' act
Steve Smith has received the backing of Australian Test teammate Alex Carey after former national captain Allan Border described antics from the champion batter as \.
Border unloaded on Smith after he applauded Ravindra Jadeja for beating his outside edge in the first Test of the Indian series, giving the gun spinner a thumbs-up.
"Play with a harder edge," Border said on the Fox Cricket broadcast.
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"I mean, we're giving blokes the thumbs-up when they're beating us outside the off stump.
"What the hell is going on? That is just ridiculous.
"Don't go stupid, but Australia play hard-nosed cricket.
"We're even giving someone (a) thumbs-up ... bloody hell."
Steve Smith applauds Ravindra Jadeja after the gun Indian spinner beat his outside edge in the first Test. Fox Cricket
Carey was pressed on the scathing remarks from Border, famously nicknamed "Captain Grumpy", ahead of Friday's Delhi Test, in which the Australians will be trying to fight back after losing the opening match by an innings and 132 runs.
The prize for winning this series — the Border-Gavaskar Trophy — is named in honour of the legendary batter and captain.
"We highly respect Allan Border," Carey said.
"I guess among the group guys do it differently.
"We come up against these (Indian) players a lot.
"You're probably alluding to the Steve Smith comment more than any but, you know, he's mates with a lot of them (the Indian players), and that's the way he (Smith) plays. He does it in all situations.
"He plays around with his hands and does all that stuff. And I think that's probably what gets him pretty focused.
"They're obviously strong comments but, as a group, we believe in what we're doing and come the second Test we're ready to put a few learnings into place."
The Indians celebrate removing David Warner in the first Test. Rafiq Maqbool/AP
The Australians have changed their approach on the road back from the 2018 sandpaper scandal, conducting themselves in a friendlier manner on and off the field.
The cultural overhaul was led by former coach Justin Langer and ex-captain Tim Paine, and has remained a focus under the leadership of Pat Cummins.
Former captain Mark Taylor defended Smith when asked about the quirky thumbs-up incident on 2GB's Wide World of Sports radio.
"We make decisions based on what we see on television cameras from a long way away," Taylor said.
"I don't want to see players moping around all the time, either, with their heads down and feeling sorry for themselves. So, you've got to stay up over there.
"Yes, you've got to be tough, you've got to be mentally tough.
"Now, however you go about that in Australia, you need to be twice as tough in India because the conditions are very different.
"Provided you're switched on on the field...
"The thumbs-up you often see from Steve Smith ... you see that all the time with him. It's an acknowledgement to the bowler that, 'You got past my bat'. And it's a pretty good bat.
"Provided they're mentally tough and they're ready for the challenge — that's the big thing.
"And how you do that is often very much an individual thing, so Australia, all the individual players, have to look at how they went about Test match one and do it better, probably technically as much as anything, going into Test two."
The second Test will get underway on Friday afternoon (AEDT).
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