The grand dame is ready for her close-up

Times Media - February 20, 2014

TELFORD VICE, Port Elizabeth

In the dozen tests played at St George’s Park since re-admission, the captain who won the toss has put his opponents in to bat eight times. But in only three of those games has the same skipper celebrated victory.

Twice, that captain has been South African. The other time, he was Australian.

Sides who have been put in to bat here have won three times. SA have twice been that team.

But only once in those 12 tests have Australia been SA’s opponents. That was in March, 1997, when Jason Gillespie took eight wickets in the match, Mark Waugh scored one of the better centuries seen in this country and Ian Healy clattered Hansie Cronje into the stands behind fine leg for six to seal a series victory along with a two-wicket win.

That also condemned SA to their first series defeat in six home rubbers since they rejoined the test arena in 1992.

A clue to how the second test between SA and Australia at the grand dame of this country’s test grounds might pan out after Graeme Smith and Michael Clarke walk out to conduct the toss this morning can be had in the Wisden report on that 1996-97 match.

“The key was the pitch, which had such a thick mat of grass that it looked like an Essex ground of the 1950s, Westcliff or Clacton maybe. It was automatic that (Mark) Taylor would bowl.”

Something like that “thick mat of grass” has been brooding in the middle of an otherwise smoothly emerald St George’s Park for days now. You can almost hear it growing.

What the groundsman, Adrian Carter, will have done with it by the time the ground is handed over to the match officials remains to be seen, but there is no doubt that the pitch has been the star of the pre-game show.

Which is as it should be. Too often, SA venues roll out just another SA surface - bouncy but not overly fast and offering a touch too much movement off the seam.

St George’s Park dares to be different, which explains why captains ask their opponents to gauge its character on their behalf so often.

This goes against one of cricket’s stuffiest conventions, handed down by WG Grace himself: “When you win the toss, bat. If you are in doubt, think about it, then bat. If you have very big doubts, consult a colleague - then bat.”

Grace played 22 tests, none of them at St George’s Park. More’s the pity - if he had turned out for England here he might never have spoken such nonsense.

He might also, a hundred or so years on, have ventured under the grandstand to procure the finest boerewors roll to be had anywhere in cricket, cocked an ear to the well-worn strains of the brass band, and made sure to check whether the wind was coming from over the scoreboard or from the west.

All of which is important at St George’s Park, ground of hope, glory, and thinking hard about what to do if you win the toss.