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***Official*** South Africa In Australia

Sudeep

International Captain
Sums it up completely

SA would've struggled to make 250 against Warne and particularly McGrath

In this innings, it was a foregone conclusion after a couple of hours

Fortunately, there are a lot of good young players in Oz and its simply a matter of picking the right ones and letting them gain experience
Still need a decent spinner, IMO. Especially if Australia wants clean sweep sides as they used to. With a good pace attack, and no spinner, they will still lose Test matches often, even if they eventually win series.
I don't see that spinner coming out of Australia, at least in the near future. All the ones currently playing in the domestic circuit that I have seen are below average, unless I'm missing someone.
 

social

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Still need a decent spinner, IMO. Especially if Australia wants clean sweep sides as they used to. With a good pace attack, and no spinner, they will still lose Test matches often, even if they eventually win series.
I don't see that spinner coming out of Australia, at least in the near future. All the ones currently playing in the domestic circuit that I have seen are below average, unless I'm missing someone.
The issue is not finding another Warne in the short term

It's about having a guy that can hold up an end in unfavourable conditions and take a few wickets i.e. a Harris

Krezja can take wickets but needs to be more consistent whilst even Nathan Haurritz looked to be capable of doing a reasonable job but any players needs to be given time and the expectations need to be managed
 

howardj

International Coach
Horrie took 3 for today, and also impressed in the Adelaide Test match. I know some of you boys love your Bluebaggers, so any chance of Horrie leapfrogging Krejza (who I think Ponting lacked confidence in today) for Melbourne?
 

social

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Horrie took 3 for today, and also impressed in the Adelaide Test match. I know some of you boys love your Bluebaggers, so any chance of Horrie leapfrogging Krejza (who I think Ponting lacked confidence in today) for Melbourne?
He was good in the Adelaide test match so deserves another go at some stage

Krezja deserves the benefit of the doubt as he came into this test with almost no overs under his belt
 

Bahnz

Hall of Fame Member
Hee, that was awesome! Though I have to say, I would've preferred it if the saffers had lost a couple more wickets to keep it interesting to the close. A pity that Haddin didn't get that last 6, if he had it would've been a world record run chase.
 

Top_Cat

Request Your Custom Title Now!
Sums it up completely

SA would've struggled to make 250 against Warne and particularly McGrath

In this innings, it was a foregone conclusion after a couple of hours

Fortunately, there are a lot of good young players in Oz and its simply a matter of picking the right ones and letting them gain experience
Don't agree at all. The attack you describe is the exact one that weren't able to even extend the same team last time SA were here. Warne and McGrath couldn't do much that day and today was eerily similar; the deck was flat, very few balls misbehaved and SA just wanted it more. The Aussies bowlers weren't poor but did lack spark whereas the Saffies innings' had purpose and intent. Siddle, i thought, was a vastly improved bowler from yesterday, he just couldn't extract any useful movement out of the deck. Just like Lee and Johnson

If you wanna pick on something, pick on the Aussie batting; as has been said already, some of the get-out shots were absolutely woeful. Symonds, for all his good batting before getting out, needs to be slapped about the head for chucking away a ton in the first dig, for example.
 

Ikki

Hall of Fame Member
Actually, McGrath wasn't really effective against the Saffies - especially at home. In fact, at home he's been pretty poor. But last time the Saffies were here McGrath only played 1 match.
 

Sudeep

International Captain
Don't agree at all. The attack you describe is the exact one that weren't able to even extend the same team last time SA were here. Warne and McGrath couldn't do much that day and today was eerily similar; the deck was flat, very few balls misbehaved and SA just wanted it more. The Aussies bowlers weren't poor but did lack spark whereas the Saffies innings' had purpose and intent. Siddle, i thought, was a vastly improved bowler from yesterday, he just couldn't extract any useful movement out of the deck. Just like Lee and Johnson

If you wanna pick on something, pick on the Aussie batting; as has been said already, some of the get-out shots were absolutely woeful. Symonds, for all his good batting before getting out, needs to be slapped about the head for chucking away a ton in the first dig, for example.
My comment was more general rather than with respect to this Test. My speculation is that we'll not see as many matches won by the Australia bowlers like before with this attack.
 

Uppercut

Request Your Custom Title Now!
Hindsight is wonderful, innit?
Still though, i enjoyed that digging :)

For a team with a now-outdated reputation for choking, these guys are awesome chasers. Smith now averages 56 in the fourth innings of tests, having made 100 three times. Since their last series loss against Sri Lanka, they've made 150+ runs to win in the fourth innings seven times. Their only failure batting last in that period was when Sreesanth and Zaheer ran through the side at the Wanderers two years ago.
 

TazzX

U19 12th Man
We are about to find out whether they're of reasonably equal standard. My gut feeling is it's gonna be Australia winning the series without challenge and SA unable to win a single match.
Can we have a thread with all the stupid things you said in this thread :D

This is cricket at its best and I can't believe that people still make such wild predictions knowing how quickly the game can change :D

:ph34r:
 

Johnners

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
'grats to South Africa, their important batsmen really stood up when it counted and dug in (aside from 1 or 2 reckless shots), quite unlike the Australian batsmen who seemed intent on throwing away their wickets.

I think Burgey summed it up best in his post, the whole team played pretty poorly (Johnson, and Haddin aside) and in reality Australia were really only saved from a humiliating victory by Johnsons awesome spell. Again we've seen just how important Clark is to the team, if he was in, instead of Siddle, or even Lee, I would've backed Australia to win it 10/10 from the start of play this morning. I know the selectors won't do it, but Bollinger really needs to come in, in place of Siddle.

All that aside though, absolutely stoked by how Johnson bowled this match, especially given how much **** people on these boards have given him even when he was the top wicket taker for the previous 2 series. Hope you're all eating humble pie ****s
 

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