Times Media - February 19, 2014
TELFORD VICE, Port Elizabeth
Ryan McLaren’s headache has cured one of SA’s. McLaren’s removal from the equation with concussion should resolve the home side’s selection poser as they bid to stay alive in their series against Australia when the second test starts at St George’s Park on Thursday.
The vacancy looks most likely to be filled by Wayne Parnell in an exchange of allrounders, albeit for one of a more attacking, less consistent bent.
But a case could be made for picking any of the players in the squad who did not crack the nod in the first test at Centurion - Parnell, Dean Elgar, Rory Kleinveldt or Thami Tsolekile. Considering SA lost by 281 runs in not quite four days, perhaps all of them should play.
That won’t happen, but with McLaren out SA won’t have wonder how to rearrange their XI.
An intriguing choice awaits, not least because groundsman Adrian Carter has admitted to being frightened by the product of his own labour. Carter, who said he had had a “phone call from the SA camp” described the surface as “very furry, green”.
“It scares me at the moment, but I’m not that scared because I’ve still got time,” he said with an itchy mower finger. “I’d like to give it a cut.”
Carter was waiting in the middle when SA arrived for training yesterday afternoon. Presently, he was joined by Russell Domingo and Adrian Birrell, then by Robin Peterson, Graeme Smith, Alviro Petersen, and AB de Villiers.
All of them stood staring at the pitch as if it was a Jackson Pollock painting: arrestingly indecipherable.
With hands on hips, Smith and Petersen took especially long, hard looks. And well they might considering they are the crash test dummies who will open the batting.
Why SA would want a pitch bespoke for fast bowlers with the cordite of Mitchell Johnson’s 12/127 in Centurion still stinging their nostrils will take some answering.
On top of that, it was Johnson who concussed McLaren with a fearsome bouncer. Not that Morne Morkel seemed to have much sympathy for his groggy teammate yesterday: “It’s part of the game. People really like to see that bodyline type of bowling.”
It was left to Peter Siddle to spare a thought for McLaren. “It’s hard and aggressive but when you see things like that it’s disappointing; you don’t want to hurt anyone like that,” he said.
Johnson also welcomed Hashim Amla to the crease with a short delivery that ricocheted off the badge of his helmet.
“Hashim said to me it was one of the best first balls he has ever faced,” Morkel said, before trying hard to “not get caught up in these things - it’s about focusing on each ball we bowl and looking after partnerships”.
Even so, he could not avoid making a salient point: “Slow wicket or fast wicket - if the guy’s bowling at 150km/h, it’s quick.”
It is, but not quick enough to have disappeared from SA’s memory by Thursday. That promises to be the headache that keeps on hurting.
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