Batters must take next step in SA’s Test evolution

For the next fortnight, while their attention is on Bangladesh, the Proteas will also be focused on themselves and, in particular, the need to dominate the opposition.

The players have absorbed the enormity of overcoming Australia, but there’s been an awareness in the last few days that they also let slip opportunities to assert themselves and too often made winning harder than perhaps it should have been.

The Newlands Test offered the latest example for skipper Temba Bavuma of his team’s propensity to let a good position slip from their grasp. At 140/0 at lunch on day one, South Africa would have been eyeing a first-innings total close to 500. Instead, 200/1 became 329 all out.

While it made for a thoroughly absorbing contest, it created more stress than was warranted, given their dominance in the first session.

Among batters and bowlers, the talk in the South African camp this week has been about not only staying ahead but widening the gap.

“I think throughout our two- to three-year journey as a team, there have been a lot of incidents where I guess you can deem it to be soft, where we have given the opposition some sort of breathing life into the game,” Bavuma said.

Intriguing context

That kind of goal provides an intriguing context for a two-match series that can easily be overlooked in between the more glamorous assignments against Australia and England.

Since climbing their cricketing Everest by winning Down Under for the first time, Bangladesh have struggled, losing the next Test to Australia in two days, then drawing against Afghanistan, followed by a loss on home soil to the West Indies, and a draw against the same opponents.

I think the least that we are trying to do as a team is to maintain the standard we have created

—  Temba Bavuma, Proteas captain

That second Test only finished on Monday and created a short turnaround for the Tigers ahead of this morning’s start at the Wanderers.

Add in the fact that they’ve lost all eight Tests they’ve played in South Africa, and the task for the Proteas looks easy, especially on hard and pacey Highveld pitches. However, by pursuing a more ruthless streak, Bavuma is placing demands on his players that he hopes will ensure the absence of complacency.

“I think whatever intensity and focus we need, we always look at ourselves. We’ve kind of reset it as a team to say, look, we’re halfway through our journey. We’ve gone through three series, Pakistan, India and Australia. Now we’ve got three ahead.

Ways SA can improve

“We’ve taken stock of where we are, we’re happy with where we are, and we’ve looked at ways that we can improve.”

Following the intensity of the Australian series, Bavuma stressed the importance of his side not slipping off the levels they achieved, especially in the second and third Tests. “I think the least that we are trying to do as a team is to maintain the standard we have created,” he said.

Following disappointing results for the Springboks in Paris and Bafana Bafana in Soweto on Friday night, Bavuma joked that he’d been getting messages from friends saying, “It’s all up to you guys now”.

He smiled, but internally, Bavuma will welcome that additional demand for the first Test.

He named his side yesterday, with Zubayr Hamza getting his first start since the New Zealand tour in 2024, while Dane Paterson’s fuller length saw him chosen ahead of Corbin Bosch for the fourth seam bowling slot.

Hamza gets the opportunity to make the No 3 spot his own, ahead of a period in which Proteas coach Shukri Conrad is desperate to build stability in the batting unit.

For that to happen, the batters must be ruthless, and in so doing take the next step in the evolution of a team that has a growing list of achievements.