Kirsten coaching role adds bizarre twist

Johannesburg: In a bizarre turn of events Peter Kirsten has a single coaching session today to prepare a Northerns/Gauteng side whose selection is as bizarre as they come for the game against the England XI starting tomorrow.

While the visitors are to turn up at Centurion in the morning, Kirsten, the Northerns coach, has been given a three-hour session with the side which is supposed to test Nasser Hussain's visitors in a game where the gates have been thrown open to the public.

At this stage it is still doubtful whether David Townsend will have recovered from his ankle injury in time for the four day game while confusion still surrounds who issued the orders for the side to be selected the way it has although Northerns president Richard Harrison and Gauteng chairman Gerald Ritchie were consulted by Clive Rice, a national selector, on Saturday about the players to be chosen.

As it is there is still unhappiness within The Management ranks of the South African A side with suggestions that it should be renamed as a SA President's XI if the handing out of caps to players seemingly brought into make up the numbers is an example of current national selection philosophy.

At this stage, however, England's focus when they turn out at Centurion for the morning practice session will be on who is likely to share the new ball on what the tourists feels is going to be the fastest, bounciest surface they are likely to encounter so far this tour. If it contains the sort of bounce we had in the weekend game where South Africa A beat Sri Lanka A by an innings and 116 runs, the England XI batsmen could be in for a testing four days.

Yorkshire's Chris Silverwood, cooling his heels since his arrival as cover for injured players such as Dean Headley who is still battling with a back ailment, may get a game, not that it will mean a Test call up a week later when the first Test of the five match series starts at the Wanderers tomorrow week.

Darren Gough's bowling form and left-arm seamer Alan Mullally may convince the touring team selection panel to give their two star bowlers a "warm up" game. Mullally, who bowled so well in the World Cup earlier this year, is seen as one of the dangers in the England side and having a crack at batsmen such as Adam Bacher and Daryll Cullinan could be counter productive to the national selectors thinking.

Mullally may not have the best of Test averages and his current ranking of 35 is well below that of Gough (19) and Andrew Caddick (20), yet Mullally is seen as one of the prime bowlers of this series the way he runs the ball away and brings it back with uncanny mystery.