Smith likely to lead ODI side

Mickey Arthur, South Africa's coach, has indicated that captain Graeme Smith will neither be rested for the second Test against Bangladesh nor for the three one-dayers that follow.

"I'm keen for Graeme to stay with us," Arthur told supercricket website. "It's a different story playing Bangladesh here and we could easily have found ourselves in serious trouble in the first Test. We were put under pressure and without the contribution of our experienced players it could have become a huge issue."

Arthur said Smith "kind of agreed with me that he needs to stay." Smith has played 19 out of 22 Tests and 43 out of 50 ODIs South Africa played over the last two years. There were reports earlier that Smith would skip the ODIs and return home to attend to his injured knee and Neil McKenzie would be named captain in his place.

But Arthur said if Jacques Kallis and Mark Boucher were left out of the ODIs then it would be important to have some experience left. You still want some leaders around, you can't just throw the youngsters in without some sort of guidance." Smith is then likely to be named captain for the ODIs when the selectors meet to pick the squad on Tuesday.

Arthur, however, assured there would be opportunities for younger players in the one-day side, especially since the next World Cup is in the subcontinent and the Champions Trophy is in Pakistan later this year. "There's no point in Jacques bending his back in a one-day series because his contribution in India is going to be vital. Maybe we should look at AB de Villiers behind the stumps in case anything happens to Boucher. Makhaya [Ntini] is starting to come back into good form, so maybe we should think about preserving him for India."

Arthur insisted South Africa's priority over the next year is Test cricket. "We have the three toughest tours in cricket back-to-back - India, England and Australia. We've been building for it for two years and we don't want to mess with the best test team."