Australia name unchanged side

Ricky Ponting: another win would wrap up back-to-back series wins © Getty Images

Australia have named an unchanged team for the second Test at Durban on Friday as they seek to wrap up back-to-back series wins against South Africa.

After their disappointments in the one-day series, in which they failed to defend a massive total of 434 for 4 in the decisive contest at Johannesburg, Australia bounced back superbly in the first Test at Cape Town, Their hero was the debutant seamer, Stuart Clark, who picked up match figures of 9 for 89 en route to wrapping up a seven-wicket victory.

Not for the first time in South Africa-Australia contests, however, the key figure in the build-up to Durban is the irrepressible Shane Warne. Amid rumours that the Durban wicket will be conducive to seam bowling, Warne has been talking up the prospect of an Australian victory inside three days, and has been perfecting his golf swing in anticipation of some extra time off.

"I've obviously got a psychological advantage being a spinner against those guys, with the record that I've got against South Africa," Warne told AAP. "If they want to juice [the wicket] up and negate me, I'll take my 0 for 40 and we win in three days. That means a series win and a couple of days of golf. I'll take it every time."

Such was the ease of last week's victory, Australian eyes have already begun to stray towards a seismic Ashes series which gets underway in November. Ricky Ponting admitted as much to BBC Test Match Special on Sunday, while England's impressive victory in Mumbai has ramped the anticipation up an extra notch.

But all such thoughts will need to be banished tomorrow morning, especially since South Africa will be welcoming back their leading seamer, Shaun Pollock, who missed the Johannesburg one-day match and the first Test with a back injury. His availability increases the likelihood of an all-pace attack, with Nicky Boje the most likely man to miss out.

Australia 1 Matthew Hayden, 2 Justin Langer, 3 Ricky Ponting, 4 Damien Martyn, 5 Michael Hussey, 6 Andrew Symonds, 7 Adam Gilchrist (wk), 8 Shane Warne, 9 Brett Lee, 10 Stuart Clark, 11 Michael Kasprowicz.

South Africa (probable) 1 Graeme Smith (capt), 2 AB de Villiers, 3 Herschelle Gibbs, 4 Jacques Kallis, 5 Ashwell Prince, 6 Jacques Rudolph, 7 Mark Boucher (wk), 8 Shaun Pollock, 9 Andrew Hall, 10 Andre Nel, 11 Makhaya Ntini.