South Africa's captain Graeme Smith is bowled by Australia's Nathan Bracken during their World Cup semi-final in Gros Islet on Wednesday. - ReutersJOHANNESBURG (Reuters):
SOUTH AFRICA'S inconsistent performances at the Cricket World Cup culminating in a seven-wicket semi-final trouncing by Australia are to be investigated by the national governing body.
Cricket South Africa (CSA) said the team's performance in the semi in St. Lucia on Wednesday was deeply disappointing, and added that the weaknesses exposed by the defeat would be dealt with "as a matter of urgency".
"Although this does not take anything away from the Australian victory - a team that is playing at its prime - the Proteas' performance was disappointing to say the least," CSA chief executive Gerald Majola said in a statement yesterday.
"There are weaknesses in the Proteas squad which will be addressed as a matter of urgency," Majola continued. "There was an alarming inconsistency in the performances by the Proteas."
South Africa went into the World Cup having claimed the Inter-national Cricket Council's number one ranking before the tournament, then losing it to Australia.
But they only finished fourth in the second-stage Super Eight phase of the Cricket World Cup and were forced to play defending champions Australia in the semi-final in St. Lucia, being bowled out for just 149 and losing with 18.3 overs to spare.
Majola said CSA was trying to discover why the team were so inconsistent in the Cricket World Cup, given that they were provided with everything they asked for in terms of preparation and support.
"No stone was left unturned over the past two years in preparing them for this World Cup. In addition, they were given a professional support staff of 12. So ... we have to find out why they were so inconsistent and put remedial measures in place.
"Other general weaknesses facing South African cricket lie with mental strength, swing and spin bowling. We are dealing with these issues at the High Performance Centre," Majola added.
Exchange programme
The statement said South Africa was instituting an academy exchange programme with India and Pakistan.
"This will enable us to send a squad of spinners to the sub-continent for specialist coaching and for selected batsmen to learn to play spin in those conditions.
"Pakistan and India will then be able to use their bowlers and batsmen to train in our quicker conditions," Majola said.
"We remain, however, deeply disappointed in the Proteas' performance in the semi-final and at the World Cup in general. We will take the lessons learnt from this into our immediate and future plans," Majola added.
South Africa have reached three semi-finals in five editions since being readmitted to the World Cup in 1992, and have lost them all.
Skipper Smith defends semi's plan of attack
GROS ISLET, St. Lucia (AP):
GRAEME SMITH defended South African batsmen's ill-fated aggression in the seven-wicket Cricket World Cup semi-final defeat that saw their top order perish for a paltry score against an accurate Australian attack.
After Smith opted to bat first in Wednesday's semi-final, South Africa conceded the advantage to defending champions Australia when they crumbled to 27 for five.
The batsmen were punished for trying to play aggressive strokes before getting their eye in - just what Australian skipper Ricky Ponting had prepared his bowlers for.
South Africa were bundled out for 149 and Australia sprinted to a seven-wicket victory with more than 18 overs to spare.
"We've been quite aggressive throughout and we felt that we could be quite aggressive upfront," Smith said.
Ahead of the semi-final, Smith said that South Africa wanted to call the shots and not let Australia dictate terms as in the preliminary round match when they beat the Proteas by 83 runs.
Ball did swing
"The ball did swing in the beginning and once you're three down, it really became very difficult to wrest back the initiative," said Smith, whose dismissal off the 15th delivery of the game began the South African slide.
Coach Mickey Arthur also said the aggressive shots that contributed to South Africa's defeat were a calculated risk.
"I don't think we played reckless shots and threw the wickets away," said Arthur. "We had a plan, we wanted to destroy Australia's momentum somehow and we needed to get on top quickly. It was part of the plan, but it never came off."
Smith said the top order's dismissal had to do with some good bowling and some bad shots.
"Life becomes a bit difficult when a strike bowler like Shaun Tait comes in as the first-change bowler," he said.
Young pacer Tait (4-29) and seasoned spearhead Glenn McGrath (3-18) capitalised on South Africa's mistakes to do the maximum damage, leaving Smith to acknowledge that South Africa's performance was below par.
