Cape Town – Uncapped seamer Dane Paterson being the only additional, on-site presence to the XI who did duty in the New Year Test defeat raises an interesting question: are the Proteas planning to field a five-strong pace battery against England in the third clash at St George’s Park from Thursday?

That has already been a source of speculation in some media after South Africa’s selectors confirmed, a few days ago, an unchanged extended squad of 16.

But they also went a long way to revealing the Proteas’ hand for the key clash in the Friendly City – the four-match series is locked at 1-1 – by releasing all of Temba Bavuma and Beuran Hendricks (Lions), Andile Phehlukwayo (Dolphins) and Rudi Second (Warriors) to play in a new round of 4-Day Franchise Series fixtures beginning on Monday.

So with those games (Cobras v Titans in Cape Town, Warriors v Knights in East London and Dolphins v Lions in Maritzburg) only due to finish on day one of the Test, it stands to reason that any of that quartet would only be summoned to the camp in a last-ditch emergency.

While head coach Mark Boucher and company are probably favoured to resist a knee-jerk hallmark at this point by installing the same side who scrapped acceptably hard – still in transitional times, remember – before being defeated at Newlands, either of long-time first-choice spinner Keshav Maharaj or all-rounder Dwaine Pretorius (though that move would thin the batting further) seem the likeliest endangered figures if Paterson is suddenly pushed to the forefront for a Test debut.

More traditionally renowned for his death bowling and other cerebral skills in white-ball cricket, the 30-year-old from the Cape Cobras would represent a slightly surprise choice for the third Test; the likelier scenario is that he is in PE primarily as cover in the lead-up for the three main pace incumbents in the SA ranks – Kagiso Rabada, Vernon Philander and Anrich Nortje.

Even more debatable would be if he nudged out Maharaj for a berth, as that would leave the Proteas with an excessive stock of five seamers on a usually sluggish surface which generally cries out for the presence of at least one frontline spinner.

There is an understandable theory in Test cricket that if a captain has five quickies available to him, four tend to do the overwhelming bulk of the work and the fifth becomes a relatively redundant figure.

Left-armer Maharaj isn’t in his most consummate Test form, a pattern that has lingered since the collectively depressing tour of India at the outset of the current summer.

He has not, in fact, taken anything more than three wickets in a single innings over the course of a further 14 since his career-best (and unlikely to ever be repeated by him?) nine for 129 in Sri Lanka’s first knock at Colombo in mid-2018.

Yet Maharaj has usually still managed to keep a pretty good lid on things from an economy point of view, and perhaps a bit more confidence needs to be placed again into his attack-minded guile and variation in the Friendly City after he lapsed – presumably under orders to a good degree – into an arguably too defensive, plant-it-in-the-rough mode from over the wicket against the English at Newlands.

He also had no benefit of a solid period in first-class cricket ahead of the current series, the T20 Mzansi Super League occupying an inconveniently lopsided chunk of the few weeks before Joe Root’s team arrived here.

Of the 18 Tests played at St George’s Park in the post-isolation period – beginning with the near-funereal first in 1992/93 when SA fielded Omar Henry and India enjoyed the services of both Anil Kumble and Venkatapathy Raju – only four have shown instances where at least one of the teams involved have seen fit to go in without a specialist slow bowler at all.

Only once has the policy borne the satisfying fruit of a win for the side in question, too: in 2013/14, when the Proteas beat Australia (helped by some magical bursts of reverse swing from a Dale Steyn-led attack) with a pace arsenal of Steyn, Philander, Morne Morkel and Wayne Parnell, with only part-time tweaking help from Dean Elgar and JP Duminy.

South Africa came a cropper to England at St George’s in 2004/05 when their one-dimensional seam attack was Shaun Pollock, Makhaya Ntini, a rookie Steyn, Andrew Hall and Zander de Bruyn, as did West Indies in 1998/99 when they tried an all-speed battery of Messrs Ambrose, Walsh, Dillon and McLean.

The home nation did earn a draw there with England in 1999/2000, despite again snubbing a spinner: while the tourists fielded Phil Tufnell for variety to their own plans, the SA bowling line-up was Donald, Pollock, Hayward, Klusener and Kallis.

*Follow our chief writer on Twitter: @RobHouwing

Wellington – Top New Zealand referee Glen Jackson announced on Friday he was giving up the job just months after being overlooked for a role at the Rugby World Cup.

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After 25 years as both a stand-out flyhalf in New Zealand and England during his playing days and then overseeing 32 Tests, Jackson said the time was right to “move on to something different but hopefully still be involved with rugby.”

The 44-year-old earlier admitted it was “tough” when his name was missing from the list of referees for the World Cup last year and that he was reconsidering his future.

“My goals have changed a bit after missing out,” the five-time New Zealand referee-of-the-year said at the time.

Jackson played for the New Zealand Maori and had 60 Super Rugby games with the Chiefs before heading to the United Kingdom, where he played 159 matches for the Saracens and won the coveted Golden Boot for the most points scored in the 2006-07 season.

His playing career ended in 2010 and he was fast-tracked to refereeing at Super Rugby level a year later, overseeing his first Test – England against Fiji at Twickenham – in 2012.

Cape Town – Proteas skipper Faf du Plessis says that he is opposed to the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) proposal to cut Test matches from five days to four.

It is widely known that the ICC could decide to shorten the length of Test matches from 2023 onwards and Cricket South Africa (CSA) in a press release on Tuesday stated that they were in full support the move.

READ | CSA fully behind shift to 4-day Test cricket

However, Du Plessis had other opinions on the matter calling for Test cricket matches to remain five days long.

“My opinion is that I’m a fan of Test cricket going on for five days,” Du Plessis told reporters in Cape Town after his side had lost the second Test to England.

“The great draws of the game have gone to five days. I understand that a lot of money is being burned on the fifth day, because so many Test matches are not going five days. There’ll always be an opinion on both and people will sit 50/50 on it.

“I’m still a purest of the game because I’ve been a part of some great draws that have gone five days. And today is no different, there would definitely not have been a result (in Cape Town) on four days on this wicket,” said Du Plessis.

“Yes, not many matches go on to five days. When you’ve got a shattered Ben Stokes running in towards the end of the day after a long spell and we’re just trying to survive that, for me, is what makes the extra day so special.”

England captain Root noted his displeasure at the ICC proposal after England won on Day 5 of the second Test in Cape Town by 189 runs.

“I like five-day Test cricket, I might get in trouble for that,” said Root on Tuesday.

The ICC approved South Africa to host a once off four-day Test match against Zimbabwe in 2017, which the Proteas won.

Meanwhile, Indian skipper Virat Kohli has also opposed to the notion of four-day Test matches, saying that it isn’t “fair to the purest format of the game”.

Cape Town – South African-born former England great, Kevin Pietersen, has accepted honorary life membership at the Western Province Cricket Club (WPCC).

SCORECARD | Proteas v England, 2nd Test – Day 3

The WPCC, which celebrated its 155th anniversary in 2019, offers a honorary life category of membership to “only the very finest Test cricketers from around the world”.

In order to qualify, players need to have retired from the game.

Pietersen, 39, was born in Pietermaritzburg, before heading to England where he qualified to play for his adopted country thanks to his English mother.

Pietersen made his debut for England in 2005 and played his final Test in 2014.

In total, Pietersen played 104 Tests, scoring 8 181 runs at an average of 47.28. He also hit 23 centuries and took 10 wickets with is off-spin and 62 catches.

On Sunday, Pietersen took to his Instagram account to confirm his latest honour, writing: Fabulous lunch yesterday! I gladly accepted honorary life membership here at the Western Province Cricket Club. Newlands is the most wonderful ground and to join so many of the great names on this list, is quite a honour. THANK YOU!

Pietersen joins a select group of house-hold names as WPCC honorary members, including Sachin Tendulkar, Ian Botham, Graeme Smith, Graeme Pollock, Barry Richards, Ricky Ponting, Steve Waugh, Jacques Kallis, Viv Richards, Gary Sobers, Don Bradman and Allan Border.

Pietersen is currently commentating on the ongoing second Test between South Africa and England at Newlands, the third day of which starts at 10:30.

– Compiled by Garrin Lambley