A bridge too far

"Like Steyn playing in this match or what?"

If only he was. The worrying reality, though, is that West Indies were bundled out for 193 on the opening day of their four-day match against South Africa A by bowlers who are unlikely to feature in any of the full international matches that follow this warm-up fixture in East London.

That query from a cricket fan on Wednesday morning in the Croisee was prompted by the news that the tourists were tottering at 112 for seven after choosing to bat first at Buffalo Park.

Given the 24-year-old fast bowler's sensational performance in a losing effort in the Twenty20 encounter last Sunday, it was probably understandable for some to think that Dale Steyn was drafted into the home side to wreak further havoc and undermine the confidence of the Caribbean batsmen even more ahead of the opening Test.

However, his absence in the context of such a pitiful effort (it would have been much worse but for commendable lower-order resistance by Darren Sammy and Rawl Lewis) leaves you to wonder how we will fare back in Port Elizabeth when Steyn spearheads an attack that also includes fellow pacers Makhaya Ntini, Andre Nel and Shaun Pollock, along with the left-arm spinning option of Paul Harris. And let's not forget the proven, if more occasional, threat of Jacques Kallis.

Monde Zondeki, the medium-pacer whose five-wicket haul led the dismantling of West Indies batting line-up, last played for South Africa more than two years ago. Charl Langeveldt, who shared the new ball with Zondeki, remains a fringe player at Test level, although he is still very much part of the South African set-up in the one-day game. Of course, we need no reminding of his effectiveness in the shorter form after his memorable hat-trick more than two years ago in Barbados saw the tourists snatching an unbelievable one-run victory in front of stunned thousands at Kensington Oval.

Of the other bowlers who contributed to their opponents' demise in the first innings, Vernon Philander is the typical medium-pace trundler, while the wicketless Friedel de Wet is a useful seam bowling all-rounder who, at the age of 27, isn't exactly banging on the door of his national selectors. In other words they are there or thereabouts, including the slow bowling options of Johan Botha, a converted offspinner with a questionable action (which means he will be vying for attention with Marlon Samuels in this match) and Justin Ontong, who is best remembered for being drafted into the South African Test squad as a batsman against Australia in Sydney five years ago at the insistence of the then South African cricket boss Percy Sonn.

Whether Chris Gayle is fit to play or remains in the dressing room nursing the injured hamstring sustained in Zimbabwe two weeks ago, West Indian die-hards were already bracing for a bleak holiday period given our history of struggle in South Africa. Barring a much more determined and resolute effort in the second innings of the current match, those fears could only have intensified by the time the first ball is bowled in a series of three Tests that will be played back-to-back-to-back.

With the subsequent Tests in Cape Town and Durban close on the heels of the curtain-raiser, there is no respite for the team that is on the back foot after the series opener, no chance to regain form and confidence-either with bat or ball-against a provincial or representative side before the real battle resumes. But this has been the trend of international cricket schedules for some time now, so there's really no point making any noise over a reality that confronts every team.

Nor should we be seeking solace in the apparently ready-made excuse that it is very tough to make the transition from the shortest form of cricket to the longest with the benefit of just one warm-up game. Again, this is the way it is these days in an environment dominated by the demands of television for more compact international schedules and therefore fewer fixtures of the kind that went into its third day today in East London.

What the early exchanges in this encounter are again making blindingly obvious is the world of difference between Twenty20 and the first-class game. It is a bridge that we have found increasingly difficult to cross as this distressing era of decline lingers, whether in terms of batsmen applying themselves to the task without succumbing to impatience or bowlers exercising the necessary discipline to persist with a particular line of attack for an extended period of time.

John Dyson is already learning how tough his job is, and will find sympathetic West Indian ears in short supply, especially as the new head coach did not make himself available for the southern African campaign until the Zimbabwean leg was over. So the challenge of so much to do in so little time is partly his own creation, although it has to be admitted that none of his predecessors, despite the benefit of more preparatory work, ever managed to make any significant strides in turning our fortunes around at Test level.

As the regional side's first day of first-class cricket for six months confirmed, lifting hopes on the basis of Twenty20 success is like trying to circumnavigate the globe in a barrel. With all the will and all the talent in the world, you can only get so far, and not very far at that.