Steven Smith the Test batter might be the greatest since Bradman but Smith the captain is an intriguing what-if. There is enough evidence of a brilliant cricketing mind inside that head, but his captaincy career has never had that one defining moment of triumph that people tend to associate great captains with.
Home Ashes for Australia stand out only when lost, so the two Ashes wins in Australia don't really enhance Smith's stature as captain. He led Australia to Test series leads in India and South Africa, but was denied on both occasions. That intense period left him frazzled, desperate and prone to what happened in Bengaluru and in Cape Town, which unfortunately remain the defining images of his captaincy. It also denied him a chance to lead in an ODI World Cup.
With the white ball, Smith led Sydney Sixers to the Big Bash League title way back in 2012, but that is remembered only slightly more than the Major League Cricket title he won with Washington Freedom last year - meaning, very slightly. This is not to say Smith has not been a good captain, but we are talking about what is most popularly remembered.
His brightest period as captain remains when Smith came within one shot of leading a new, young team to an IPL title. Chosen to lead Rising Pune Supergiant ahead of MS Dhoni in 2017, Smith took them to a top-two finish in the league stage, anchored the final chase on a tricky surface, took it to eight needed off four, but found the fielder in the deep when he pulled the trigger one final time. We all know what winning an IPL can bring to a captain, but it is so cruel that losing the final by one run still makes you forgettable.
This Champions Trophy provided Smith an unexpected opportunity to conjure something with a similarly young side. By default Smith will now lead only a weakened Australian side because his leading means Pat Cummins is not available, but here that was just the start of it: he came in without any of his frontline quicks, with three of his allrounders getting injured or retiring one by one, and a treacherous format that could have knocked them out with two rained-out games.
Coming into the semi-final, Smith's use of his limited bowling resources came in for praise, but he would need to play the perfect game against India to take his captaincy dream further. For long parts, especially with their tactics, Australia did play a flawless game.
They selected well for the conditions even if it meant going in with just the two quicks, they chose to bat first on a surface that has kept slowing down, and they batted better than any of the three sides that have lost to India in Dubai. A lot of that batting effort came down to Smith himself.
And yet the pivotal moment of Smith's latest captaincy fling remains his getting bowled to a full toss having pre-meditated a charge when he had done about three-fourths of the work that goes into an all-time great innings. His and Glenn Maxwell's wickets in 37th and 38th overs made Alex Carey bat with one arm tied behind his back. Only 59 runs came in the last quarter of their innings, and yet they were able to stretch India's extremely strong and deep batting.
Forget about dropped catches. India's Player of the Match in the last match dropped a catch off a no-ball and proceeded to kick it into the fence whereas their opponents New Zealand fielded out of their skins. It is much more efficient to produce more chances than to fuss over dropped catches, which can happen to anyone.
So the real what-if remains around Smith and if he needed to pull the trigger that early. Especially when Carey was batting smoothly in that 54-run stand. The answer to it lies in how Australia attained that original position of strength. It didn't come to them without taking regular risks. It shows in how Australia played 66 false shots, and India only 40.
Just look at how calmly India were able to accumulate ones and twos in the middle overs compared to how Australia had to rely on boundaries to stay at a healthy scoring rate. Australia scored 128 runs in boundaries to India's 106. When the bowling is so good that you are not getting risk-free runs at five an over, you are obligated to take risks.
India not only had the superior spinners, they also had almost illegal depth in both departments courtesy Axar Patel and Ravindra Jadeja coming together efficiently in the same XI. India even have Kuldeep Yadav as a specialist for just after the 40th over, when they get an extra fielder out, to nullify the slog overs to an extent. So Smith had to take the risk at some point, which, given the conditions and India's depth, meant it had to come against the quickest man to 200 ODI wickets.
Having scored ten off the previous 18 balls he had faced, 16 off them from Kuldeep and Varun Chakravarthy, Smith decided he had to target Mohammed Shami, who might at least give him pace on the ball. Five attacking shots in six balls brought him just five runs, and the sixth proved to be fatal. Had they not lost those wickets then, Australia would have had a shot at 30 to 40 more runs, which would have given us a thriller.
Who knows if Smith the captain gets another shot at glory, but his latest near-miss was not down to any mistake from him. He just came up against a team with incredible depth for these conditions.