Australia’s star batter Steve Smith opened up about his struggles with vertigo prior to the third Ashes Test, which he missed at the Adelaide Oval last week.

Smith vertigo symptoms paved the way for Usman Khawaja’s selection in Australia’s playing XI. The southpaw scored 82 in the first innings and 40 in the second dig, helping the hosts register an urn-clinching 82-run win over England.

Having regained fitness, Smith is all set to feature in the Boxing Day Ashes Test, starting on December 26 at the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground.

Ahead of the game, Smith revealed how he was not feeling great leading up to the Adelaide Test and had to share his problem with Australian coach Andrew McDonald.

“As soon as I started batting in Adelaide I didn’t feel great, wasn’t tracking the ball well, had a bit of head stuff going on. Three days out, hit again, played golf that afternoon. I’d already spoken to Ron [coach Andrew McDonald] and was like ‘I don’t feel great’, so he goes ‘just try to get out and do some things and see how it goes’. So I played that afternoon, felt awful that night. I felt terrible the next day, didn’t hit or do much. Then I hit the next morning and felt ordinary again. I tried the next day, morning of the game and I just wasn’t … I couldn’t track the ball. Felt dizzy. When I had my head back and come up (to face), I needed to recalibrate every time my head came up, it was all over the place, and in the end we made the right decision. I felt awful that day. And playing in that heat wasn’t going to help me – those first two days were bloody hot. So, yeah, I sort of got to the decision, which was the right one, although I think I would’ve liked to bat on that wicket,” Smith told The Age on Wednesday.

The 36-year-old detailed about how he had been facing the issue in the past and how he has been doing some training exercises besides sporting goggles with a laser on it.

“I’ve had a few different things with my head in the past, head knocks, some vestibular stuff, some vertigo stuff. It was more the vestibular stuff this time. It wasn’t the room spinning with the vertigo, which I’ve had previously, but it’s the eye-tracking and not being able to focus on things, particularly moving targets. I felt really slow, really heavy in the head, tightness in the neck and not much fun. I’m still talking to people about it. I’ve got some training exercises I need to do, tracking things, wearing goggles with a laser on it, drawing different shapes and things like that. So it’ll be a bit of that, strengthening my neck. Fingers crossed it’s gone and never comes back. That would be nice,” he added.

Steve Smith had batted in the pink-ball Test at Gabba with eye patches under his eyes to adjust to the conditions.

Sharing his experience, Smith said: “I felt like I batted pretty well in Brisbane, even with the pink ball, it’s not been one of my strengths in the past. The black things I was wearing under my eyes, I’m 100 per cent certain they worked, and I think I’ll be bringing them out in normal night games against the white ball as well.”