A clash of flawed equals

The opening gambit of South Africa's tour of England was low-key yet foreboding. In the bucolic environs of Taunton, and in the most glorious sunshine of the year so far, they amassed 455 runs in a day without breaking sweat, then jogged through the motions in the field, shaking off their early-season rust in a performance that whispered their intentions for the summer. The big statements can wait for another day, but rest assured, they will arrive.

That's because the big statements always arrive whenever South Africa's Test team lands in England. Three times since readmission they have toured the country, and three times they have seized the initiative in the series with performances of single-minded brilliance. What is more, Lord's, the venue for next week's first Test, has always been instrumental in establishing that early-tour dominance.

Famously, the Australians have not lost at the old ground since 1934, and South Africa's post-apartheid record is shaping into something equally formidable. Three wins out of three, and nothing closer than the ten-wicket tanking they dished out to England in 1998. It's little wonder that July 10 was plastered across every South African's lips at Taunton. They clearly regard it as a date with destiny.

South Africa's last appearance in a Lord's Test resulted in arguably the most auspicious of their 75 victories since readmission. Only three players remain from the side that won by an innings and 92 runs in the second Test of 2003, but two of them - Makhaya Ntini and Graeme Smith - shared the Man-of-the-Match award that day with a pair of totemic and tireless performances.

It was nothing less than a victory for national unity. Ten wickets for 220 runs on the one hand, as Ntini became the first black South African to have his name on the Lord's honours boards, and a crushing innings of 259 on the other, as Smith welcomed the new England captain, Michael Vaughan, with a performance every bit as bruising as the 277 with which he had consigned Nasser Hussain's reign to the history books in the previous Test at Edgbaston.

South Africa's tours of England have been brimful of such passionate displays - Kepler Wessels' bloody-minded hundred in 1994, for instance, or Allan Donald's twin five-fors at Lord's. Not once, however, have they managed to hold onto their advantage. Drawn rubbers in 1994 and 2003, and a 2-1 loss in 1998, are all they have to show for their efforts. Lack of inspiration, ill-fortune, and a downright loss of nerve have all conspired to deny them the victory that would count -second only to that elusive series win in Australia - as their most gratifying of all.

Perversely, it is a fragility that heightens, rather than diminishes, the anticipation ahead of this summer's battles. Test cricket is never more compelling than when the heart and soul of its competitors are laid bare for all to see - a contest between flawed equals is infinitely preferable to a perfectly awesome demolition. South Africa's desperation for success has enabled them to win series in eight of the ten countries in the world since readmission - including India, the final frontier for most non-Asian sides, where they have triumphed in four Tests out of ten. But Australia (understandably) and England (unfathomably) remain beyond their grasp.

South Africa have had so many opportunities to bury their English hoodoo - never better than in 1998, a series that, in the mind's eye, somehow still seems filed as yet another 1990s defeat. As Tim de Lisle wrote in the following year's Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, "at the end of the second act, [England were] clinging to a precipice, in a hurricane, by one finger, while the baddie took leisurely aim, from a sheltered vantage point, with an automatic weapon". The bullet missed its target, England saved the Old Trafford Test by batting out the final two days, and then won the final two Tests at Trent Bridge and Headingley - the former thanks to Mike Atherton's legendary duel with Donald, in his pomp and apoplectic.

Simply put, England versus South Africa is one of the most consistently enthralling contests that Test cricket has to offer. Both teams may regard Australia as their most obvious and implacable foes, but their respective records against the Aussies since 1993 - England P42 W9 L27, South Africa P24 W4 L15 - confirm they are deluding themselves if they think they are worthy of being regarded as equals. Instead, they scrap in their contrasting styles for the right to be considered the best of the rest, and the fact that both teams have lately been blind-sided by India seems strangely apposite.

It is almost as though they have fought themselves to a standstill. Since 1994, the year of South Africa's return, the teams have played six series, three at home, three away. They have won two apiece, with two draws, and there has never been more than a single Test between them in the final analysis of each rubber. Their individual match record is equally inseparable. Eight wins each with 12 draws making up the numbers, including two - Old Trafford 1998 and South Africa's escape in Durban in 2004-05 - that were as squeakingly close as the teams' current standings in the ICC World Test Championship. England are currently third, on 110 points; South Africa lie in fourth, one notch behind them.

The prospects for the coming series could hardly be tastier. South Africa are still smarting from their 2-1 defeat on home soil in 2004-05, a series in which England required their finest attack in history to bludgeon a path to victory. This time, however, the bowling big guns are all in the opposition armoury, where Morne Morkel and Dale Steyn will be exciting the speed gun on July 10, rather than Andrew Flintoff, Simon Jones or Steve Harmison. Not for the first time on their tours of England, South Africa start as favourites because of the pedigree of their performers. It's an accolade they have often struggled to live up to.

And yet, the key confrontation of the summer could well be between the two South Africans who have never yet exhibited a shred of self-doubt. Smith and Kevin Pietersen have never pretended to get on - the word "muppet" was bandied about when Pietersen's autobiography hit bookshelves last year - and yet, the stature of the two men in their respective sides is non-negotiable. At some stage in the course of this series, one of them is going to have to blink. The impossibility of predicting who it will be is precisely why this promises to be contest to savour.