Jake Fraser McGurk revels in the power of highlight therapy

Within the span of just 12 months, cricket has offered young Jake Fraser-McGurk a whirlwind preview of the highs and lows that define a professional career. It's as if the game has injected him early with the antibodies needed to endure the long journey of petals and pricks that every cricketer must walk.

From the heady highs of a breakout 2024 IPL season, where he lit up the stage and captured instant fame in a cricket-mad nation, to the proud moment of earning his Australia cap in white-ball cricket, the ascent was swift. But so too came the descent: a lean patch that led to him being dropped from the national side, coupled with the lurking fear of being branded a one-season wonder in the IPL.

The 2024 IPL season was nothing short of a blockbuster for Fraser-McGurk in terms of sheer jaw-dropping numbers he produced. A hefty average of 36, paired with a turbocharged strike rate of 234, making him a standout performer. His unorthodox T20 batting style marked by his ability to launch sixes off the back foot across an audacious arc from deep extra cover to long on, instantly caught the eye of pundits. They hailed him as a prototype of the new-age batting prodigy.

Fraser-McGurk's high-risk, high-reward mantra of going hell for leather from ball one kept him perpetually dancing on the edge. But the same approach began to falter on non-conducive batting surfaces during the 2024 MLC season. The returns reflected the mismatch: just 81 runs in 7 innings. That dip snowballed into a wider form slump, carrying into both the BBL and the following IPL season, where he managed underwhelming averages of 18 and 9, respectively.

The 23-year-old showed no trace of the recent rut and returned to his ballistic best with a blazing 88 off just 34 deliveries against the LA Knight Riders. The innings oozed flamboyance, laced with 11 towering sixes, many of them launched from outrageously unconventional positions where most wouldn't even imagine clearing the rope. It was a knock that repaid the faith shown by the San Francisco Unicorns, who backed him over fellow Australian Matthew Short, who had leapfrogged Fraser-McGurk in the national selection pecking order.

"Obviously the last 12 months have been quite difficult. More downs than ups. I was just glad the last Big Bash I'd finished on a good note. IPL, obviously not great. I wanted to start the MLC well this year, but I was like six off nine in the last game. But no, I've been working quite hard on some new foundations and some new processes, few technical things with my coach, Shannon Young, and to sort of see that come to fruition out there. It's definitely a confidence booster. But I'm not going to go too high now, and just got to keep level. Because I know what it's like when you're not doing too well, because it was not too long ago. So, it's been good and I'm glad to make an impact for the team early in the tournament" said Fraser-McGurk.

The Unicorns batter stressed upon how head coach Shane Watson is helping him clear the mental cobwebs in his game by having him adopt the 'highlight therapy' as part of his pre-match routines. Fraser-McGurk now watches clips of his finest innings on repeat, an exercise Watson has prescribed as a form of cognitive conditioning. Watson has authored 'The Winner's Mindset', a book on the mental side of the game, has also been instrumental in elevating Sanjay Krishnamurthy's game by helping amplify his self-belief through tailored mental drills and visualization techniques.

"I wish bad form on no one, unless you're playing against us (laughs). But me being so young as well. I'm still learning, and people forget I'm only 23 and learning on the job as well. These last 12 months have been quite difficult mentally as well. But you've always got to keep faith and belief in yourself. Our coach, Shane Watson, does a heap of mindset stuff. And one of the most important takeaways I've had is to watch your best innings. Watching it on your phone before every game, even when you have spare time, just watching yourself doing well. And it gives you that self-belief where you think you are good enough, and you go to the game thinking, all right, here we go. Instead of thinking about outcomes, you think about your process, what you were thinking during that innings, during those balls. And usually you're thinking about nothing, and you're just in the zone. So that's probably the main thing helping me get through. I wouldn't say I'm on the other side. I have to be consistent now"

The fact that even after that blistering knock, Fraser-McGurk doesn't believe he's fully out of the quagmire of poor form is a testament to the both ends of the cricketing spectrum the game has already taken him in his fledgling career. One that has taught him to tread with vigil over vanity.