MELBOURNE, Dec 25: Australia will gamble on the sore knee of all-rounder Andrew Symonds in Friday’s crucial second Test against South Africa at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

Ricky Ponting, the Australian captain, said that his side, who are 1-0 down in the three-match series against the confident Proteas, will be unable to call on Symonds to bowl his medium-pacers.

But the skipper praised the athletic Queenslander for his willingness to battle through the pain barrier in one of the biggest matches in Australian cricket history.

Humiliated by their six-wicket defeat in the first Test in Perth, Australia have replaced the expensive Jason Krejza (1-204) with fellow off-spinner Nathan Hauritz.

Hauritz took 4-95 in a solid performance against lowly New Zealand in the second Test in Adelaide last month when Tasmania’s Krejza had an ankle injury.

Hauritz, 27, has taken nine wickets at 22.00 in his two-Test career and the NSW spinner boasts an economy rate of 2.95.

The 25-year-old Krejza spins the ball more but conceded 4.53 per over in taking 13 wickets at 43.23 in his two Tests.

“It’s a harsh call on him,” Ponting told a news conference on Thursday. “But ... you’ve all read and heard why Hauritz has been picked ahead of Jason for this game.”

The injury-enforced absence of seamer Stuart Clark has left Australia leaking runs without a bowler capable of playing the role of keeping things tight from one end.

“Hopefully he [Hauritz] can do the job that we all want to see from him and hopefully that makes the job for the other bowlers in our side just that little bit easier as well,” Ponting said. “That [keeping the runs down] is the reason he’s here.”

Victorian paceman Peter Siddle, who also only took one wicket in Perth in his second Test and first on home soil, has been retained for his first MCG Test ahead of uncapped Tasmanian quick Ben Hilfenhaus and Queensland all-rounder Shane Watson.

Ponting says the knee injury of Symonds has “improved dramatically” since Sunday’s final day of the first Test in Perth, when the Queenslander didn’t bowl in South Africa’s second innings of 414-4.

“He does feel a lot better with it. He has had a number of scans,” Ponting said. “It is really now just about management through this game and then through the next [Sydney] Test match.”

Ponting will have the option of using part-time spinners Symonds and Michael Clarke to ease the workload on his pace bowlers Mitchell Johnson, Siddle and Brett Lee, who has been battling illness and took one wicket in Perth.

South Africa named an unchanged side and can snatch the top ranking from Australia if they sweep the series 3-0 in what would be Australia’s first Test-series loss at home since 1992-93.

“There’s no doubt that this is a big one. The Australian team under adversity or when a big moment or a big game comes up, we generally bring out our best performance,” Ponting said.

“You can argue last week that it probably wasn’t our best performance in a big game and maybe it wasn’t. There are no excuses. It is a big game for us all.”

Opener Matthew Hayden — who is fighting to save his career after scoring 282 runs at 23.5 in seven matches — is hoping the MCG remains a happy hunting ground after hitting six centuries in the past seven Melbourne Tests.

Meanwhile, South African skipper Graeme Smith wants his team to keep the momentum going after announcing an unchanged playing XI.

Smith, who hit 48 and 108 despite a painful elbow injury in the first Test, said: “Tactically I don’t think it [press banter] has been something that we have needed to think about.

“It’s about the cricket on the field and that’s where we are going to win our battles and make the momentum of this tour.

“We’ve done that in one Test now and hopefully we can carry that on here. I’ve been quite clear on that message from the start.

“It’s not something that I felt was necessary with the team that we had and the way the guys were feeling and the way we had been playing coming into this tour.”

Despite South Africa fielding a highly-rated pace attack of Dale Steyn, Makhaya Ntini and Morne Morkel, plus spinner Paul Harris who took five wickets in Perth, Ponting is confident his side can get on top of their bowlers.

“As I said going into the last Test, I expected South Africa to bat better than they would bowl,” Ponting said.

“For us as a batting group there are some positives that we can take out of that knowing we did get off to some good starts and mentally more than anything was where we let ourselves down.

“That has to be changed this week.”

Teams:

AUSTRALIA: Matthew Hayden, Simon Katich, Ricky Ponting (captain), Mike Hussey, Michael Clarke, Andrew Symonds, Brad Haddin, Brett Lee, Mitchell Johnson, Nathan Hauritz, Peter Siddle.

SOUTH AFRICA: Graeme Smith (captain), Neil McKenzie, Hashim Amla, Jacques Kallis, A.B. de Villiers, Jean-Paul Duminy, Mark Boucher, Morne Morkel, Paul Harris, Dale Steyn, Makhaya Ntini.

Umpires: Aleem Dar (Pakistan) and Billy Doctrove (West Indies).

Match referee: Ranjan Madugalle (Sri Lanka).—Agencies