Australia in South Africa

Australia will be touring South Africa, the nation which is ranked no.2 in Test cricket.

The T20 squad for Australia has been announced with Johnson dropped - no surprises there. Haddin has retired from the format and the incumbent Tim Paine is out injured, nonetheless Wade is the better option. Paine is a test specialist in my opinion and I'd like to see him in the test side as soon as possible, even ahead of Haddin.

Mitchell Marsh, brother of Shaun, is in the squad ahead of Hastings who is also injured. He's a 19 year old all rounder who Mickey Arthur compares to Jacques Kallis. He's a genuine all rounder and from the looks of things his game is a lot better than Moises Henriques, whose career never really took off.

The other bolter is Patrick Cummins, the 18 year old NSW fast bowler who scored a CA contract out of no where. I've seen the kid bowl and he already hits 150kph, believe it or not. He has been doing a lot of weight and strength training and presumably he's still growing so on that basis it wouldn't surprise me if he continued to his 150kph on a regular basis. His action looks a little bit like Anderson's, but there's a little bit of Mohammed Zahid about the way he bowls. The way the ball rises and the sheer pace is very Zahid-esque. That is, if anybody has seen Zahid bowl before. I haven't seen anyone this genuinely quick emerge from Australia at SUCH a young age since Lee or maybe Tait, although Cummins' action is more orthodox and not round arm/slingy.

The locals are a bit concerned that the home side will be rusty - they haven't played any serious cricket for ages.  On top of that , the Aussies have played two series and done well in both. Test cricket in October/November will be quite novel for us here - I'll be at Newlands , that's a certainty!

in fact I just read that ABD is ruled out for 6 weeks, what a shame! Such an important series and the newly appointed captain gets injured because of this CLT20 circus! Pathetic!

That will be interesting Mikey, logically Hashim being the vice captain should get the nod, but then yeah, Smith or Botha could come into the picture. I personally think that CSA will go with Hashim because they run their cricket professionally and there must have been good thought before appointing Hashim as the VC of the team initially, obviously that means he is your "next"man so they shouldn't hesitate to take this decision. Hashim and AB are about the same age so they obviously aren't grooming Amla for anything, it's should be either AB or Hash.

I would not have Botha even in the playing eleven - let alone leading the side. 

Amla has been appointed as the ODI and T20 captain, Smith will of course continue to be the test captain, I'd say good move by RSA... and yes Botha may not make it to the starting eleven, Tahir will be the main spinner, Petersen may or may not play, depending upon whom they choose among Parnell, Tsotsobe and Petersen.

Parnell has gone down hill. Maybe too much wrong type of cricket too early in his career. eh should have played more FC than T20s. I still think he has time on his side but he needs to bowl more and more - he seems to me a bowler who will get better once he bowls  more and get the rhythm.

Yeh Zuhair, signs are not that great for Parnell, but the potential is there. Problem is, if international cricket doesn't work out they have professional T20 to fall back upon and that creates a huge problem for these young kids. They just aren't dreaming about playing for their countries anymore.

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On what Sledger is saying, I absolutely agree. Amla is a naturally shy, reserved person. There's nothing wrong with that, sometimes those sorts of personalities are good for the team. Nonetheless, he doesn't look like leader material and probably lacks the attitude for it. De Villiers is an aggressive cricketer and I think he has more natural ability, whereas Amla comes across more as a sidekick rather than the superhero.

I think Kallis or Boucher should have been given the captaincy, maybe even someone like Dale Steyn who comes across as astute and aggressive in his approach - rather than timid and perhaps moderately defensive. If Australia beat SA then I don't think Amla will do much more captaining in the future - but we'll just have to wait and see how he performs before we judge.

Edited by Mikey - 04 October 2011 at 8:16am

Being a captain is not just about tactics. I'm certain Amla has a very good 'cricket brain'. But he needs to be a leader to his players - I just can't see him having any 'control' over someone like Steyn or Smith for instance.

I too will be very much interested in watching Amla as a captain. Yes he comes across as a shy kind of a person but as pointed out by Mikey and Zuhair that doesn't mean he shouldn't become a good captain or a leader. You don't really have to be a natural leader to get things going.

Edited by sam_ahmed - 04 October 2011 at 6:33pm

Cummins is a gem. I haven't seen anyone bowl that fast at his age, I'm dead certain Lee wasn't bowling that fast at 18. Makes me think that he could be hitting over 160kph regularly when he fully matures and grows physically.

Was not shocking - it would have surprised me had he stayed longer. He had to be rusty and his feet got stuck to the crease - it will be long beofre he hits form

I'm disappointed that RSA lost but I'm happy for AUS. Cummins was impressive and looks a really good prospect, perhaps the best I've seen from Australia since Brett Lee. I think RSA should play Tahir in the XI ahead of Petersen, Tahir will be difficult to get away. I'd also prefer Parnell or Albie Morkel ahead of Theron and surely surely surely Boucher ahead of any other wicketkeeper (even ABD) across all formats.

Originally posted by Mikey Parnell showed a lot of promise at the start of his career, it will be interesting to see where he heads for here on in. If I was him, I'd definitely focus on the bowling side of things - if he can get an inswinger going he'll be very useful.

Definitely showed his promise with the BAT today. But his bowling is just awful at the moment...

Fair result 1-1, both the teams are missing their stars when it comes to T20 and they both played well. White's captaincy was poor, really shouldn't have left it to O'Keefe, Cummins and then David Hussey in the last 3 overs - makes no sense. They picked Marsh as an all rounder, so he should have bowled in the middle to allow the better bowlers to do the job at the end.