Man up, Proteas

THE Proteas have had an inglorious time of it in Sri Lanka in the Test series. The first Test was over in a hurry, as old problems of not being able to play spin surfaced. The second Test went into its fourth day today with very little hope of a South African victory. To be honest, if the Sri Lankans had enforced the follow-on, the game might have been over by now. Faf du Plessis’s team have not become bad Test players overnight; they simply have not had the game plans, technique and patience to stomach the heavy spin attack of the home side. There are some grizzled batsmen in the SA line-up, mixed in with some fresh faces. And given that this was the first action in a while for players not playing in any other leagues up north, perhaps rustiness could be explained.

After the first Test defeat, there was brave talk of hard work put in practice ahead of the Colombo clash.

It did not take long for the situation to unravel badly again, though.

THERE is a suggestion which has support from some top-level players, that the toss in Tests should be done away with. The theory is that the visiting team’s captain should have the automatic right to decide whether to bat or bowl first. The thinking is that this policy would prevent hosting sides from preparing pitches to suit their bowling strengths, for example Sri Lanka providing dust bowls to suit their spinners, or South Africa lining up seaming mambas on which fast bowlers can sow havoc.

Chucking out the toss would be tampering with the fabric of the game, but you can see the sense in what is being suggested, if hosting cricket boards are giving grounds men orders to skew contests by virtue of the surfaces they provide.

Will we get to the stage where this new approach to the toss is made law? Hopefully not. Implicit in the term “Test” is that the contest should be just that, a hard uncompromising duel over five days which pushes the players on both sides to the limits of their abilities and skills, whether they bat or bowl first. Cricket’s authorities should definitely tighten up the monitoring of pitch standards, though.

But the Proteas need to man up, work hard at their craft and take on and try and beat all-comers in any conditions, it’s what they signed up for.