England cricket star Jamie Smith sends warning to India and Australia - 'We're close'

Jamie Smith will use the next fortnight to reboot ahead of 10 Test matches which could propel Bazball constellation into the galaxy of superstars. After signing off from his promotion to open for the one-day side with a dazzling 64 off 28 balls against at The Oval, Smith will return to the middle order for defining Test series against and .

Win them both, and England will return to No.1 in the Test rankings for the first time since 2012 - and the players will go down in Ashes legend. Next stop for Smith is , starting on June 20, and his sense of anticipation is palpable.

He said: “It feels like we’re close to it now, we’re almost there. The next 10 Tests are massive, we’re playing the two best nations. You know the magnitude of what we’ve got coming up, but if we can try and stay in the present (without looking too far ahead) then it’s a good time to test ourselves against the best.

“It would be nice to get away now and have 10 days of good practice. It’s one of the things you don’t get much time to do in the season - to go away and improve your game. You sort of get to a point where you just carry on playing games and moving from one to the next. It’s nice to have that little reset.”

Smith, 24, has enjoyed a prominent first year in England’s Test ranks after being fast-tracked into the side ahead of , and , averaging 42.73 in his first 10 games. He admitted his promotion to open for the one-day international team under new skipper came as a surprise - and by his own admission it was not an instant success.

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He said: “I can’t say it’s not had its challenges - it’s a new role, and you’re sort of riding that success and failure. In the previous game I made nought and when that happens, you sit around for the next six hours wondering what to do and feeling like you’ve missed out on the opportunity.

“But then you play an innings like this last one and you feel good again - that’s the perks of the job at the top of the order. You’ve got so many opportunities to go out, impose yourself on the game and, I guess, win games. If you can put your side ahead of the curve it makes everyone else’s job a lot easier.

“The nature of white-ball cricket is to be positive and thankfully it came off this time, but it didn’t last week. There will be times when it’s like that (feast or famine), but I won’t be consistent by blocking just to try and get a score - I’ll always be positive and put on on the front foot, regardless of whether I’ve had a few failures or not.

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“I was a little bit surprised to be promoted to open - it had been floated and there had been passing conversations about it, and I guess for me it’s a stepping stone. The majority of my experiences when I’ve opened for Surrey haven’t been great when I was a little bit younger and a little bit afraid to hit the ball.

“But that’s the great thing about opening the batting for England, especially because ‘Ducky’ () is so experienced and playing with great confidence at the other end. If there’s a few dots, you don’t feel as if you have to do anything different because he’s playing so well at the other end.”

England’s 3-0 clean sweep against West Indies in the one-day series augmented Brook’s growing stature as white-ball captain, where his batting has flourished under the burden of leadership.

In eight games as skipper, he has scored 443 runs at 73.83 - compared with a mediocre 504 runs at 25.20 under his predecessor Buttler. England’s demolition of the Windies was their first whitewash over the 50-over course since before their limp defence of the in 2023.