Ken Borland

Proteas captain Dean Elgar has spent much of the series pumping up the tyres of his team-mates, telling them how good they are, but now that Australia have won the rubber, he said on Tuesday, on the eve of the third and final Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground, that it was time for the team to make amends.

Well-beaten in both Brisbane and Melbourne, Elgar has made it clear that there is still much to play for and he expects his team to do everything in their power to restore some pride.

“There’s nowhere to hide in Test cricket and the top five need to find a way to execute their batting disciplines,” Elgar said. “Whatever we do in terms of selection, hopefully we provide a better spectacle than in the first two games.

“There’s also a lot for us still to play for – the World Test Championship final is a massive incentive – and we should be playing every Test like it is our last.

“But talk is cheap, we need to go out and perform and really make amends. It’s very frustrating because these are really talented players, but it just hasn’t gone our way.

“We want to go home with a lot of pride restored and so there’s still a lot to play for, as well as our position in the World Test Championship. It’s about how we rise up to the challenge and grasp the opportunity,” Elgar said.

Cynics would say whatever changes South Africa make to their XI will be like putting mag wheels on a skedonk. But the Proteas have to make at least one change due to Theunis de Bruyn returning home for the birth of his daughter.

“The only options in our squad in terms of batsmen are Rassie van der Dussen and Heinrich Klaasen,” Elgar confirmed. “Rassie has played for an extended period at Test level so he’s more experienced, while Heinrich is immensely talented and maybe deserves an extended chance.”

South Africa could well make a second change, bringing in a second spinner – Simon Harmer – but Elgar intimated that the off-spinner would have to replace another bowler.

“We need to have another look at the pitch, but Simon is definitely in the mix because Sydney has been low and slow, with a bit or turn, recently, so that might force our hand,” the captain said.

“But Keshav Maharaj is still our number one spinner and I’m still a 6/5 fan, that’s what I’m thinking. But all options are on the table, although playing seven batsmen makes it a massive ask for the bowlers.

“They’ve had a big workload, especially in the last Test when they racked up big numbers of overs. So it’s a big ask to have just four bowlers, especially only three seamers,” Elgar said.

The Proteas were the owner of a proud record in Australia, having won their last three Test series there, but sadly they will leave those shores after the third Test having surrendered the rubber to their great rivals and having raised serious concerns over the well-being of the game in South Africa.

Blown away by an innings and 182 runs in the second Test in Sydney to go 2-0 down in the three-match series, South Africa have been dominated in humiliating fashion. It is not overstating matters to say the Proteas batsmen have been made to look like fools by a potent Australian attack.

But it is not just in the last two games that the batting has failed; it has been a recurring theme for most of the year and Cricket South Africa, as the custodians of the national team, need to respond to what has become a full-blown crisis.

The inexperience of the current Proteas team – they took 309 Test caps on to the MCG, 234 of them belonging to four players, compared to Australia’s 572 – is a factor, but CSA are going to have to take a long and serious look at the domestic system that is feeding players into the national team.

The domestic game needs to hone both the skills and temperament of those players who are elevated to the international stage.

From dealing with a 10-day quarantine that almost turned their hotel rooms into prison cells, to getting over a humiliating defeat in the first Test, the Proteas showed immense resilience in bouncing back to beat New Zealand by 198 runs in the second Test in Christchurch on Tuesday, allowing them to level the series and ensure the Black Caps have still never won a rubber against South Africa.

Man of the Match Kagiso Rabada, who led the way with the ball with 8/106 in the match and played a vital innings with the bat, said after the impressive triumph that resilience seems to come naturally to the Proteas team.

“It just seems to be our natural character, resilience has always been the word that just seems to fit us best,” Rabada said. “It’s never easy to beat us and we proved it again in this series.

“And to see young guys stepping up like Lutho Sipamla and Kyle Verreynne, and Sarel Erwee in his first series, there are lots of good signs for the future.

“It was no use harping on about how badly we played in the first Test, we recognised that we totally did not rock up and New Zealand were too good for us, but we had to put game-plans in place and react under pressure.

“Mentally we had to come back. We had to wake up, rock up and execute. We were under pressure, so it means a lot not to lose the Test series. We would have liked to have won, but credit to us for bouncing back,” Rabada said.

Although the 26-year-old still occasionally has moments of breast-beating emotion that pour out on the field, he is now a much more calculating, composed bowler. While there can be no doubting his passion, Rabada has developed a cool, ruthless streak.

“As a fast bowler you very seldom feel at your very best, so I just go out and try and implement the basics as well as possible and try to adapt to the conditions as best you can,” Rabada said.

“You’re always overcoming challenges and you just try and create your own luck through hard work, sticking to your process and refining it where necessary. And then you just have to allow it to happen.”

Given the Proteas’ history of being slow starters in series, there are those who would be tempted to arrange that they always lose the first match of a rubber like they did against India, before rebounding superbly to claim the spoils 2-1.

Even captain Dean Elgar admitted in the wake of the epic seven-wicket win in the decisive third Test at Newlands that he was aware, and rather bemused by, the trend. South Africa were well-beaten in the first Test against India at Centurion, going down by 113 runs. But they then staged a remarkable comeback, winning by seven wickets at both the Wanderers and in Cape Town, chasing down daunting targets of more than 200 on pitches with plenty of movement on both occasions.

“There were so many lows in that first game and losing first-up is never ideal at home,” Elgar said. “But it’s almost a trait of the Proteas that we need to be 1-0 down to realise that our backs are against the wall.

“So after losing the first Test we really knew we were up against it, but the guys really stood up from a character point of view. It worked to bring the best out of the players.

“I’m very relieved the guys responded the way they did and it was a proper squad effort, and a few individuals did exceptional things as well.

“Those were the highlights – the individual performances of players like Keegan Petersen, Marco Jansen, KG Rabada, Temba Bavuma and Lungi Ngidi. It boils down to the mutual respect we have in the squad,” Elgar said.

After all the turmoil over the last couple of years, the sensational victory over the world’s No.1-ranked side is evidence that things are stabilising in South African cricket. Under-fire coach Mark Boucher is comfortable that his national team are doing okay whatever his strident critics might be saying.

“I believe we turned the corner quite a while ago, actually. We’ve had pretty solid results for the last six months to a year,” Boucher said. “We’ve tried out a few players and they are coming good now.

“So we are getting some depth, but we are keeping our feet firmly on the ground because we know we are not the finished product. But I liked the intensity we showed, especially in the run-chases when we were looking to score,” Boucher said.