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Australia kick-start the countdown to the 2015 World Cup with the ODI series against South Africa on Friday as the two teams meet for the first match of five at the WACA in Perth. You can follow the live scores and commentary of game at Perth starting 11:20am local time, 2:20pm AEDT.
While cricket is often said to be a game of momentum, it’s difficult to see Australia get too much out of their T20I series win against South Africa. By itself, it was a job well-done by Australia after they had fallen 1-0 behind in the series but the selectors of both sides have re-booted most of the squad-members for the ODIs.
As a result, Australia will welcome back captain Michael Clarke, David Warner, George Bailey, Mitchell Johnson and Nathan Coulter-Nile while South Africa will have the services of AB de Villiers, Hashim Amla, Faf du Plessis, Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel.
These two sides enter this series knowing they are two of the top favourites going into the 2015 World Cup – the bookies have them at 3/1 and 9/2 respectively – and this match-up on the same pitches where that tournament will be played could give a good look into where they stand.
Australia and South Africa had met only recently. It was in a tri-series in Zimbabwe, where the two featured in two round-robin games before facing off in the final too. It ended 1-1 in the league stages of the tournament while South Africa eased their way past Australia in the final.
The tracks in Zimbabwe, however, were quite different from those the two sides will encounter at Perth. The Zimbabwean surfaces looked tailor-made for slow bowling, while Perth will have the quicks licking their lips in delight.
So much so that Australia haven’t picked any frontline spinners for the first two ODIs and will start with five speedsters including all-rounders Shane Watson and Mitchell Marsh. Glenn Maxwell has been selected for the playing XI ahead of Steven Smith and he will Australia’s only slow bowling option.
South Africa will play Imran Tahir alongside their quick bowling line-up to give them bit of variety, which is a good alternative to consider despite the nature of the track. Tahir has a bowling average of 18.78 over 24 ODIs, which is excellent going so far and his battle with the Aussie batsmen will be an interesting one.
One other such match-up will be between du Plessis and the Aussie quicks. He has had a great time against Australia, having smashed a couple of centuries and a 90 in that tri-series in Zimbabwe against them.
It did not look like there was any love lost between him and the Aussie on more occasions than one over those innings and one expect more of that aggression transcending on to the field again.
Join me for this first ODI between Australia and South Africa on Friday here and you can follow the live score of this game from 11.20 local time and post your comments in the section below.
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