Steve Smith has left the door open on his Test future, admitting that even the chance to finally win an Ashes series in England will not persuade him to make a decision this far ahead.
The 37-year-old Australia batter is taking his career one series at a time and remains unsure whether he will be part of the Ashes campaign next summer.
“I don’t even know if I’ll be there yet,” Smith told The Telegraph.
“I’m kind of a series-by-series proposition, as I’ve been for a while, and that’s still a fair way away for me right now. I’d love to win one there or to have won one there, but you wait and see if that comes to fruition.”
Smith has played 125 Tests, scoring 37 centuries at an average of 54. He remains ranked second among batters in the ICC Test rankings and has averaged 49.4 over the past two years.
His immediate attention is on Australia’s three-Test World Test Championship series against South Africa. The tour will mark his return to Test cricket in the country for the first time since the 2018 ball-tampering scandal.
Smith insists there is no need to dwell on that episode as Australia prepare to face a South African attack he expects to provide a stern challenge.
“For me, it’s just another series,” he said. “All that happened a long time ago, and we’ve played a lot of cricket and have been back to South Africa since then for one-dayers.”
South Africa defeated Australia in the World Test Championship final and Smith expects another competitive series against a team boasting a strong pace attack.
The assignment is the first part of a demanding stretch for Australia, with New Zealand and India also on the Test schedule.
While his long-term plans remain unclear, Smith is still finding motivation through T20 cricket. One of his ambitions is to remain involved in the format with an eye on the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
“Right now probably it’s just the Olympics to try to be a part of that,” he said.
Smith has no fixed retirement date and says he is still enjoying the game. He also remains confident in his batting despite the increasing difficulty of scoring on seaming Test pitches.
“I feel like I’m batting really nicely,” he said. “I’ve found different ways to go about things on these tricky surfaces and still be able to score runs.”
For now, Smith is focused on contributing with the bat, in the field and in leadership. His next major decision can wait.
