Cricket South Africa on Tuesday confirmed the schedule for coach Shukri Conrad’s two -Test tour to New Zealand early next year.
With the Proteas playing min five-day cricket in recent seasons, new red-ball coach Conrad has been looking at opportunities to get his white-kit manne in action.
South Africa have only played three Tests to date this year - a drawn match away to Australia and two home wins over the West Indies - with the team’s next match being the Boxing Day Test against India at SuperSport Park.
TEST TOUR ALERT 🚨
— Proteas Men (@ProteasMenCSA) July 17, 2023
We're heading to Aotearoa 🏏
🔴![CDATA[]]>🔴 2 Tests
🗓️ 4 - 17 February 2024#SummerOfCricket #NZvSA #BePartOfIt pic.twitter.com/eHK4C0ST3o
That means Conrad’s team would have played only four five-day matches in 2023.
Still, CSA CEO Pholetsi Moseki is adamant that they are still hungry to play in this format of the game, saying: “The tour of New Zealand will be an excellent opportunity for the Proteas to test themselves away from home for the first time during the new cycle of the ICC WTC.
“This tour confirms CSA’s commitment to honouring the ICC’s Future Tours Programme (FTP), regardless of other competing and equally compelling engagements. It is an affirmation of our appetite for Test matches, which we always take delight in playing.”
The first Test gets underway from 4 – 8 February at Bay Oval in Mount Maunganui, Tauranga, before the Proteas take on the Black Caps in the second Test between 13 – 17 February at Seddon Park in Hamilton.
A three-day warm-up match is scheduled from 29 – 31 January in Christchurch in preparation for the series that forms part of the ICC World Test Championship (WTC) 2023-25 cycle.
The sides last met in 2022, when South Africa came from behind to draw the two-Test series 1-1.