Beleaguered South Africa in need of a domestic revamp

Take a breath. Step back. Go for a walk. Think about something else. Because it's been this bad before. Worse, in fact, although at the moment it won't feel that way. For now, as Dean Elgar said in Melbourne on Thursday, "You have to keep reminding the guys that they're not crap cricketers. " He's right, and he might want to tell all cricketminded South Africans the same thing. But the truth to be countenanced is that Elgar and his team haven't been good enough - neither in the last two Tests of their series in England in August and September nor in their first two in Australia in the past 13 days. South Africa have lost all four of those matches, usually because their batting has been brittle. They have gone down in as many or more consecutive Tests 10 times in the past, most recently from February to October in 2019 when they lost two at home to Sri Lanka and three in India. Since readmission it's also happened in 2001/02 and in 2005/06, when South Africa lost five Tests on the bounce. Both times their opponents were Australia, who have also inflicted - or been part of - two of the South Africans' other lengthy losing streaks.