Can Australia overcome their biggest problem against the Proteas?

Durban: For all the changes to the Australian team and international cricket since the fateful 2018 South Africa tour, one theme runs consistently from that episode to the one about to begin at Kingsmead.

Australia will lose the series if they cannot find a way to put substantial runs on the board.

It was, fundamentally, the growing dominance of the Proteas’ 2018 bowling attack that pushed the team then led by Steve Smith into increasingly desperate measures to try to avoid defeat – and that was a group which had entered the tour having made big runs in their previous assignment against England at home.

This time around, Australia’s batting looks vulnerable if not outright poor, weakened by several years of battling seaming pitches and the inability of players like Marnus Labuschagne to live up to past achievements.

Add to that the abdominal injury that ruled out Cameron Green – the sole centurion from the August home series against Bangladesh – and there is much uncertainty about where runs will come from.

Head coach Andrew McDonald pointed to the team’s need to bat with a sustained Test match tempo.

“There’s been conversations about where we can improve … there has been a lot of work, a lot of thought,” he said. “We have played in conditions that haven’t been favourable to the bat. So you know the numbers are slightly lower than what you would expect, but the flip side of that is the bowling numbers have come down.

“If we get some flat periods in this series, it’ll be the ability to go big, put the scoreboard pressure back onto the opposition, and yeah, we feel as though there will be periods potentially across this Test series that those conditions present. It’s about maximising those.

“We have been playing fast-forward cricket, if you want to call it that, in the conditions that we’ve been in. So the ability – it’s more mental, really – just to get back into that tempo of rolling through the overs, knocking them around, building totals. We have seen that when we have had flat surfaces, we have had the ability to do that as well. So I think that’s the challenge – not to get caught up in the speed of the game.”

Though Smith is refreshed and highly motivated to perform on this trip, he cannot do it all on his own. Travis Head, recently afflicted by a pattern of drag-ons that he has attributed to medium pace bowling on slow pitches, will be vital at the top.

“For me, it’s all about risk and reward,” he said. “Reward of runs against risk, and what may look high risk to people in the box watching the game or at home sometimes feels low risk to me in the middle. So it’s that balancing act. It’s not always going to look good. That is hardly a good-looking dismissal ever in the game.

“Everyone looks pretty ugly when they get out. It’s what the build-up of that looks like, and most times I feel like I’ve got control. I’ve got that balance right.

“Sometimes people go too hard. Sometimes people go not hard enough, and there’s always criticism the other way if you’re five off 50 balls. So yeah, you’re always trying to balance that, and I’m just trying to keep percentages in my favour as much as I can.”

What’s likely to be a turning pitch in Durban has left the Australians to delay their team selection until close to match day. Cooper Connolly, Nic Maddinson and left-arm spinner Matt Kuhnemann are all in contention to play, with a range of configurations open to Pat Cummins and company.

The Proteas, led ably by Temba Bavuma, will likely be missing Kagiso Rabada as he recovers from a hamstring tear. Spinners Keshav Maharaj and Simon Harmer will be significant factors at Kingsmead on a surface likely to take turn.

The hosts will also have vivid memories of the 2025 world Test championship final at Lord’s, where Aiden Markram – a veteran of the 2018 bout – made the match-winning runs that Australia could not.

“They’re not as in your face,” Bavuma has said of this Australian side. “They still play their cricket hard. They’ve still got guys like Travis Head at the top, who look to put you under pressure.

“And then they still have that quartet of a bowling attack always putting you under pressure. But they’re probably not as brash and in your face as if I think of 2016 when we toured Australia. They made you feel uncomfortable.”

The tale of this series will largely be told by how comfortable Australia’s batters can get.

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