Steve Smith jokes that if players like Sam Konstas are the future of Test cricket, it might be time for him to give it away.

The pair, at either end of their careers, surged Australia to a commanding position across the first two days of the Boxing Day Test.

Konstas with a swashbuckling two hours of bravado and Smith with a typically calm, craft and well-composed century.

Australia’s teenage debutant didn’t shy away from the spotlight on day two either. He was revving up the famous — and very rowdy — bay 13 in the evening session and gave the same part of the crowd a hearty fist pump after the Aussies claimed the wicket of Virat Kohli late in the day.

Konstas is the best glimpse we’ve ever had of Australia’s Test future, but Smith said it wasn’t an easy watch.

“I don’t think much fazes the young kid, as we saw yesterday, he was reverse ramping Bumrah and I was having a heartache up in the box,” he said.

“If it’s the future, maybe it’s time for me to finish. I mean, you have got to have some serious courage to do what he did yesterday.