Does Mickey Arthur have a plan?

I know that coach-bashing is a popular past-time in South African sports, but the more I look at the selections and planning around our national cricket team, the more I wonder whether or not Mickey Arthur really has a clue about where he’s taking this team?

The openers crisis
Our inability to find a decent opening pair is a starting point. Yes Ashwell Prince has had some success there but he’s indicated that he doesn’t want to play there on a regular basis and it puts a lot of pressure on the rest of the team when he gets out cheap.

Yes these may be our six best batters, but why are we trying to make an opener out of somebody out of a middle-order batter?

We have the Andrew Putticks and Stephen Cooks of the world who are chalking up the runs, but whenever the mess hits the fan we draft Herschelle Gibbs back in or try and invent an opener.

Friedel de Wet
De Wet at the age of 29 has come out of nowhere to represent the test squad and somehow is now the first choice back up to Dale Steyn. With Ntini’s retirement this makes him part of the first-choice attack. Where did he come from? He was never given a run in the ODI or T20 side before he suddenly got a surprise call-up.

Wayne Parnell, Lonwaba Tsotsobe, Rory Kleinveldt, Johan van der Wath, Yussuf Abdullah, Ryan Mclaren and Albie Morkel have all been given a crack in the ODI side. Somehow De Wet leapfrogs over all of these guys and Johan Botha into the first test team?

Imran Tahir
The Pakistani / we think South African spinner was out of the blue included in the fourth test match squad at the Wanderers.

Then he was dropped when questions around his eligibility were raised.

All of a sudden he has jumped ahead of all the other bowlers – including the very successful and experienced Johan Botha as a test candidate?

For sure it is easy to be an armchair fan and criticise Arthur and the selectors for the makeup of the team, but there doesn’t look like there is any real process happening here to develop and build a sustainable long-term team.

That's better!

Ah a MUCH more satisfying day in the cricket. My only grumble is that World Sports Betting didn't have any bets up for a top SA batter in the second innings as I was trying to lay down some moola on Graeme Smith.

I actually thought that Hashim Amla batted particularly well today and while Smith got the really big score, it was Amla who looked more fluent - surely it makes more sense for Amla to move up to partner Smith and drop Prince in the middle order if the selectors want to stick with this top 6?!

Otherwise it is time to give either Andrew Puttick or Stephen Cook a crack at the opening berth... unfortunately the selectors don't appear to have given much thought to building squad depth and haven't really given them much t of a run in the ODI side so its a bit difficult to know how they fit into this side.

While the Prior / Onions partnership for the last wicket was a little frustrating, I thought that we actually bowled really well. Morne Morkel finally looked like he wanted to show the world what he can do and Dale Steyn looked fast and scary. While Friedel de Wet didn't pick up any wickets I thought he played his role well and his figures were respectable (16 3 36 0).

I have to say that I am a little surprised that Steyn didn't pick up the original new ball - will be interesting to see what happens in the second innings.

Very satisfying to see the Poms being belted around "Fortress Newlands".