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 Smith wants his men to wrap up the series
    Michael Owen-Smith
    August 26 2003 at 08:23AM
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Leeds - South Africa will have the luxury of going into The Oval Test next week with a full-strength side for the first time in the series.

Shaun Pollock returns to England at the weekend and both he and specialist spinner Paul Adams are certain to return to the side on a pitch where spin bowling always plays an important role.

Pollock missed the great fourth Test victory on paternity leave, while Jacques Kallis missed the first two Tests on compassionate leave, and Gary Kirsten the third through injury.

Captain Graeme Smith, while delighted at the victory by 191 runs, was determined not to take his foot off the accelerator at this stage and defend what is an unbeatable 2-1 lead in the series.
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'We want to go there to make it 3-1'
"We don't want to go there to hold on to what we have got," he said. "We want to go there to make it 3-1. That is what the boys believe. A week is a long time in a Test series as we have seen in the difference between what happened at Trent Bridge and here."

However, even Smith sometimes wonders how his team managed to get out of the hole in which they found themselves on the first two days.

"On day one England had us 21-4 and on day two they were 190-2. When we had them nine down yesterday morning, I turned to Gary Kirsten and asked him if he thought we would have them at this stage. It seemed a long way from where we were on Thursday and Friday. The boys showed tremendous character, determination and hunger to do well.

There was a lot of guts and a lot of guys stepped up to the plate and were counted."

Smith also revealed that he had faced the most difficult captaincy decision of his brief career when he won the toss on Thursday morning. "We knew it would be a bit juicy in the early morning, but we thought it would get up and down towards the end of the Test match.
'We weren't ruthless enough in the moments that counted'


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