Ashes 2019 | None of us imagined the heights Steve Smith would go on to scale, says Shane Watson

In the first Ashes Test at Edgbaston, Steve Smith became the second-fastest batsman in Test history to score 25 Test hundreds, after the great Sir Donald Bradman. But back in 2013, he scored his first-ever Test ton against England at Oval, and at the non-strikers' end was no other than Shane Watson, who has now revealed that none of the Aussies expected the then 24-year-old to become one of the greats in Test history. Furthermore, Watson went on to praise Smith for his batsmanship, which has seen the  30-year-old reach unimaginable heights in International Cricket.

“That century was special because we saw a young batsman come of age and everything continued to go incredibly from there on. None of us imagined the heights he would go on to scale,” Watson was quoted as saying by Sportstar.

"The beauty of Steve Smith is that he is self made. He has had a couple of coaches who have worked with him, but the onus of evolving his game has been on him - he's been working on his own through exactly what's going to work and he's been incredibly effective," he added.

The all-rounder also believes that the 12-month ban for Smith worked in favor of him in a weird way, as it gave him enough time to re-evaluate his game. He also added that the former skipper will be relentless in his approach for the rest of the series, coming out to bat with a point to prove. Furthermore, he also went to express his surprise over the omission of Josh Hazlewood and Mitchell Starc for the first Test.

"There's no question that the last 12 months, when he had the time off, gave him some time to sit back and assess where everything was at from a personal and skill point of view. It freshened him up in some way. He has such a point to prove and he is going to be relentless," he said.

“The things happening with (Mitchell) Starc, (Josh) Hazlewood and (Pat) Cummins came as a surprise to me. I am sure the selectors have their own thoughts about it. Thankfully, it has worked so far, so that’s that,” he concluded.