ACS Overseas First-Class Annual 2018

South Africa in 2017/18 South Africa maintained their second-place position in the ICC rankings, indeed somewhat closing the gap on leaders India. By the end of the 2018 season, the side could point to eight wins in the previous twelve months, as against four defeats. But this positive record was perhaps somewhat devalued by the fact that three of the wins came at the start of the 2017/18 season when South Africa hosted two Tests against Bangladesh followed by a single Test against Zimbabwe. All these games were won with ease, as indeed they ought to be if South Africa is to maintain credibility as a challenger for the top slot. The next assignment, still at home, was tougher: three Tests against top-ranking India. The home side could take much satisfaction from the 2-1 win, in which its seam attack, with Vernon Philander in particularly impressive form, proved too much for the visitors’ powerful batting line-up. Four Tests followed against the improving Australia team, fresh from a convincing 4-0 Ashes win. The visitors maintained this fine form in the first Test, but Kagiso Rabada’s 11-wicket haul in the second left the rubber all square with a tight struggle apparently in prospect. But in the third game, surely to be recalled for ever as the ‘sandpaper Test’, Australia’s ball-tampering was mercilessly exposed by the all-seeing eye of television and it rapidly became evident that this was not an isolated lapse of judgment by an inexperienced player but a deliberate strategy in which the team management was complicit. In the face of the ensuing furore Australian morale collapsed, as did the batting, and South Africa won the remaining Tests by crushing margins of 322 and 492 runs. Two Tests in Sri Lanka during the 2018 ‘off’ season were to spoil what had been, to that point, a most impressive set of results. South Africa’s batting, so strong at home, totally failed to adapt to the unfamiliar conditions as, in four completed innings, South Africa recorded its three lowest totals against this opposition. The low point was the second-innings 73 in the first Test, South Africa’s lowest since readmission, as inevitably both Tests were lost by heavy margins. It was scant consolation that among the wreckage Keshav Maharaj demonstrated his quality with 9-129 in the first innings of the second Test, surpassed for South Africa at this level only by Hugh Tayfield’s 9-113 against England back in 1956/57. In terms of personnel, AB de Villiers ended his self-imposed exile from the Test side, which has lasted since 2015/16, and showed what the team has been missing. His form against Australia was particularly impressive. But new opening batsman Aiden Markram did even better: making his Test debut against Bangladesh at the start of the season, he went on to record the remarkable feat of scoring exactly 1000 runs in Test matches alone in 2017/18. With the stalwart Dean Elgar at the other end, the opening batting looked in excellent shape. But perhaps the outstanding member of the team was a bowler: in the ten home Tests of 2017/18, Kagiso Rabada took 56 wickets at only 16.98; and by the end of the 2018 season his career tally, from 32 Tests at that point, stood at 151 wickets at 21.71. Still only 23, he has the potential to be one of the game’s true greats. Blessed with players of immense talent, South Africa remained one of the strongest sides in world cricket and looked the part of champions against virtually any opposition at home, or against weaker nations anywhere. But they failed to show the consistent success against all opposition, home and away, that is the hallmark of a dominant side. It is true, of course, that a similar reservation could be entered about the current Championship leaders (as indeed it is, in the introduction to the India section). Flat pitches and, perhaps, an unadventurous approach by the captains meant that the main domestic competition, the Sunfoil Series, was dominated by draws – of the 30 matches, only 7 reached a positive result. A major factor was a change in the point-scoring system, which now 353