Graeme Smith
Graeme Smith
Graeme Craig Smithis a former South African cricketer and former captain of the South African cricket team Test side, having succeeded Shaun Pollock after the 2003 Cricket World Cup. He was succeeded as captain of the ODI side by AB de Villiers after the 2011 Cricket World Cup. He is also currently the overseas player and captain of English side Surrey. He appeared in his 100th Test against England on 19 July 2012. He captained his 100th career Test match...
ProfessionCricket Player
Date of Birth1 February 1981
africa australian crowds failure fear forward front hard looking past people playing similar south terms
We are very similar and it is a very hard place to come and tour. In the past South Africa have had a big fear of failure but I think we have come to terms with that. We have come here and I know people have called us unimaginative but we are more open. We are looking forward to playing in front of Australian crowds and playing in Australia.
doubt seriously
I seriously doubt we will go in with two spinners.
exploit great
It would be great if we could exploit that.
It would pretty much look like he's going home.
batting came cricket drawing minds moving needs negative option positive team teams
The whole team wanted to be positive and wanted to go for a win. Cricket needs positive games. It doesn't need teams batting out and drawing games. For us, as a team moving forward, we're young and we need to be positive. To set a declaration and to try to go for a win was in our minds the only way to play. The negative option never came in.
country excited playing quite unknown
The wicket will probably be quite dry. He's an unknown talent. He's young, he's exuberant, he's really excited about playing for his country and that's good.
game held key lead might onto
The whole game could have been different. Those were key moments. If we'd held onto our chances, we might have had a lead of 100.
african cross crossed crowds dignified expect lines south support
South African crowds are going to support us but we also expect them to be dignified and not cross the lines that were crossed in Australia.
bowl guy risks team tough wants
As a team we've got to take more risks and he's (Botha) a guy who wants to bowl in tough situations.
boys confident feet firmly
The boys are confident but the feet are still firmly on the ground.
african australia daunting prospect scary south
Australia has always been a scary and daunting prospect for South African teams.
interest learn though together work
That's why I say we can learn a lot from the Aussies about how they all work together in the interest of their cricket, even though we don't always like what they're saying.
against batting difficult fact game knew last lost middle
Definitely. We're not disappointed with the fact that we got bowled out in the last innings, the disappointing thing for us is that we had opportunities but didn't take them. We always knew that batting last against the two spinners would be difficult but it was in the middle of the game that we lost it.
beat believed cases coming drive guys home number pressure series test
Coming out of the Test series, a lot of the guys who were here believed going back home we could beat them. We didn't take our chances. We had them under pressure on a number of cases in the Test series and just didn't drive it home.