0Australië stoom op in die geveg teen Proteas

Wanneer Engeland kwadraat tot Australië in die laaste reeks om die As ek, soos baie, gedink dat die besoekers sal die urn in die vyf wedstryde behou. Dit was altyd 'n moeiliker stryd as die somerkragmeting, maar 'n oorwinning was verwag.

Speler vir speler Engeland was net te sterk, En hulle was nie? Op daardie stadium, met die opvallende uitsondering van die middelorde Maestro Michael Clarke, 'n gekombineerde XI van die twee kante sou deur die drie leeus oorheers word. Anders as kaptein Clarke wat die gekombineerde span sou gemaak het? Miskien is David Warner vir Michael Carberry? 'N Geskikte Ryan Harris vir Chris Tremlett of Tim Bresnan? Seker eersgenoemde, waarskynlik laasgenoemde. 'N Plek vir Shane Watson? Miskien - maar wat sou hy vervang? Op die oog af, egter, Eng­land cer­tainly appeared the stronger outfit.

Fast for­ward a few weeks and the view from the bound­ary is some­what dif­fer­ent. Aus­tralia anni­hil­ated and humi­li­ated Eng­land in every dis­cip­line, out­play­ing them in every area and keep­ing their foot on the accel­er­at­or through­out the series and into the one day capers. Now forever con­fined to the his­tory books from that ini­tial start­ing XI thanks to Australia’s dom­in­ance are Kev­in Pietersen (hard), prob­ably Jonath­an Trott (due to oth­er factors for which Aus­tralia merely provided the coup de grâce) en Graeme Swann. Eng­land are not going to replace their 13,000 com­bined runs and Swann’s 250 odd wick­ets overnight and Aus­tralia will no longer have to face any of them when they next lock horns. They didn’t just win an import­ant series they won the psy­cho­lo­gic­al battle as well – Eng­land were left emo­tion­ally scarred and will take time to rebuild and recap­ture past glories.

Even after the thrash­ing of Eng­land, egter, I still thought the per­form­ance of the green bag­gied out­fit was a mere flash in the pan. Surely the thrash­ing was simply down to a tired Eng­land side who had only just fin­ished one Ashes series and couldn’t quite motiv­ate them­selves for anoth­er scrap? Com­bine that with a few key play­ers out of form or sorts and you have a mere aber­ra­tion, doen jy nie?

Well the recent events at the Super­S­port Park in Cen­tur­i­on in the first test of South Africa v Aus­tralia would make it seem I have to eat yet anoth­er rather large slice of humble pie. weer, voor dié wedstryd, few of the Aus­sie start­ing XI would have made it into a com­bined South Africa / Aus­tralia side. The Pro­teas have been at the top of the world rank­ings for a while now – and with good reas­on – they have class run­ning through the entire spine of the side. Graeme Smith sets the stand­ards for oth­ers at the top of the order – and Hashim Amla and AB de Vil­li­ers fol­low in style. Jacques Kal­lis may have depar­ted but tal­ent still remains. They are backed up by a fero­cious pace bat­tery. So as good a series as the Aus­sie top order (Brad Had­din included) had against Eng­land and as well as the bowl­ers bowled they all lack the con­sist­ency of the greats men­tioned above, doen hulle nie? Well Aus­tralia have simply picked up from where they left off in dev­ast­at­ing Eng­land. One test in and the great South Afric­an side, top of the world rank­ings, lay in tat­ters. Of course they could yet turn it around – and if they do then massive cred­it to them. But the Aus­sies are in that cock­sure pos­i­tion of old. Their tails are up and their con­fid­ence there for all to see. They have humi­li­ated their prey and ground it to dust.

Waar het dit vandaan? On paper Aus­tralia lack many world class play­ers – gone are the Warnes, McGraths en Waughs van hierdie wêreld. But that appears not to mat­ter. After a largely quiet few years Aus­tralia, wil dit voorkom, are roar­ing back to the top.

They have man­aged to find a team spir­it, unity and bond that appeared some­what lack­ing dur­ing the non­sense that was ‘home­work gate’ and still in short sup­ply dur­ing their Ashes battle in the Eng­lish sum­mer. They play way above the sum of their com­bined parts. If the com­bined aver­ages of Eng­land (aan die begin van die reeks om die As), Aus­tralia and South Africa (die begin van hierdie reeks) are com­pared then there is little to choose between them. Eng­land aver­age 358, Australië 374.06 (although this is skewed by debutant Alex Noon­an aver­aging 58 Van hierdie een toets. If Shane Wat­son had been play­ing in his place then the com­bined aver­age is 352.39). South Africa’s recent dom­in­ance is shown by a slightly high­er aver­age of 376.39. But in real­ity there is little to sep­ar­ate the three.

This upturn in form seems to have coin­cided with coach Dar­ren Lehmann tak­ing con­trol. He has clearly worked won­ders on the team – his long stint as an adop­ted York­shire­man has clearly done him the power of good. Team eth­ic is the most import­ant part of the setup. The play­ers are per­form­ing to the abso­lute max­im­um of their abil­ity and when it mat­ters. Goeie op hulle. Ques­tions remain about the age of the side and the young­sters wait­ing in the wings. But you can only beat what is put in front of you and Aus­tralia are most cer­tainly doing that.

Who­ever replaces Andy Flower as Eng­land supremo should look no fur­ther than Lehmann’s example.