Mutual bond with three-year maturity

“We then backed them and supported them, especially through the lean times,” he said.

From an early age, Smith never hid his ambitions. In fact, as a 12-year-old, he stuck a paper to the refrigerator at home which was virtually a list of his ambitions topped by a proclamation that he wanted to captain the South African cricket team. “Obviously that (leading South Africa) came true five and half years ago, but it was only the beginning of my ambition,” Smith said.

“If I was still in the habit of sticking notes on my fridge door, I would have stuck one there three years ago and it would simply have said: ‘Win in Australia next time’,” he wrote in his column for The Daily Telegraph. Drawing a parallel with the 2005 tour, Smith said, “In our last tour to Australia three years ago I thought it was important to show that we would not be intimidated, on or off the field, and I also wanted to deflect attention away from the younger guys in the team…

“This time we decided to concentrate all our energy on our own game and ignore everything we couldn’t control. Cricketers never worry about the weather, for example, because there is nothing you can do to change it. So any distraction, like the make-up and selection of the Australian team, did not concern us,” he said.

“It’s fair to say we started talking about this tour almost as soon as we arrived home three years ago. It has always been in the back of our minds, even through this year when we had tours to India and England,” he added.

Smith, however, believes his mission does not end with the series win and argues it rather starts here. “The challenge now, as it was with my captaincy, is not to treat the achievement as “mission accomplished” but to use it as the start of a brand new journey, a new era…I can assure you there will be absolutely no sense of anti-climax about the Sydney Test.

“We are all very aware of the prize that awaits us if we can win again and we have all dreamed of being No. 1,” he said.

Smith to miss ODIs

Meanwhile, South Africa will be without their injured captain Graeme Smith in the two Twenty20 and five ODI matches against Australia and Johan Botha would lead the side in his absence, coach Mickey Arthur said here on Thursday.

Consequentially, Neil McKenzie would stay back with the ODI squad in Smith’s place, he said. “We have decided to send Graeme home after the Sydney Test to give him the best chance of getting ready for the home series (against Australia),” Arthur said.

“He will have the blood injection as soon as he gets back and we think that by following this course of action as soon as possible after Sydney, we will give him the best possibility opportunity of being fit for the home series,” he added.

Smith will undergo a new medical process that has not been used in South Africa before, of having blood from his arm injected directly into the tear, Cricket South Africa said in a statement.

On how the team would look on paper minus its regular captain, Arthur said, “It does give us an opportunity with our ODI side. As I have always said, our one-day side is still a work in progress, it is still a young side, and we are giving an opportunity to some younger guys to stake a claim. We are looking to build our one-day side over the next two years which obviously culminates in the next World Cup on the sub-continent in 2011.

“So it will be a slightly younger one-day side. Johan Botha will take over as captain and we will keep another wise head in the dressing room in the form of Neil McKenzie. He will stay as cover in the batting department and we think that is the best route to go. It is unfortunate to lose your captain but we need to give him the best opportunity to be ready for the Test series in South Africa,” Arthur said.

The coach also revealed how much pain Smith had to endure to get through the Test series. “It is amazing what he has endured. He is four or five cortisone injections down the line. We thought the cortisone was going to work but that is not going to be the case. He has basically been getting by on cortisone since Edgbaston.

“He goes through a huge amount of discomfort and it seems to get a lot worse when he reaches 40 or 50. It almost gets to a point when he can’t grip the bat with his top hand any more. He is desperate to play at Sydney and make it a great match for the team and for South Africa. He has a very high pain threshold,” Arthur said.

Meanwhile, vice-captain Ashwell Prince is not a certainty for the final Test against Australia at the SCG. The left-hander had a hit in the nets on Wednesday but a final decision on his fitness is likely to be taken only on Friday.