CENTURION: South African coach Shukri Conrad brushed off criticism about the uneven scheduling of the World Test Championship after his team qualified for the final.

South Africa beat Pakistan in a dramatic two-wicket win in Centurion on Sunday to earn their sixth successive Test win.

On the average points system used for the championship, the South Africans are guaranteed a place in the final next June, even if they lose their last match, the second Test against Pakistan starting on Friday.

“People abroad will be shouting that we had an easy draw. Well, I’m not going to apologise for that. We’re just thrilled that we can be at Lord’s next year,” Conrad said after the victory against Pakistan.

Australia’s win against India in Melbourne on Monday put them in pole position to join South Africa at Lord’s, although they still have to play a fifth Test against India and two matches away against Sri Lanka.

South Africa’s path to the final illustrated the imbalance in the quantity and quality of the fixtures for the nine teams contesting the World Test Championship (WTC), a fact highlighted by former England captain Michael Vaughan, who called for a revamp of the format.

“At the moment every team plays a wildly different number of games and that just does not create a balanced outcome or totally fair league table,” Vaughan wrote in a column for British daily The Telegraph.

South Africa’s programme consisted of just 12 matches, the joint lowest number together with Bangladesh.

England played 22 Tests and Australia and India, the other members of cricket’s ‘big three’, had 19 fixtures each.

South Africa had six series, all of only two matches. They shared a series against India 1-1 but did not play against Australia or England.

Australia, India and England, by contrast, played each other in a five-match ‘marquee’ series.

With no team dominating, they all shed points, affecting their average points standings.

After sharing the honours against India, South Africa effectively forfeited a series in New Zealand because their governing body prioritised a Twenty20 tournament.

Conrad could not select any players contracted by the T20 franchises, which ruled out most of his first-choice players.

Since then, though, South Africa have won away series in the West Indies and Bangladesh and beaten Sri Lanka at home before scraping home against Pakistan.

Conrad admitted that his team were far from their best at Centurion, needing an unbeaten ninth wicket stand of 51 between Marco Jansen and Kagiso Rabada to secure the win.

“The WTC weighs on you, you really want to get to the final, but we need to be a lot more resilient and clinical. We saw what pressure did to some of our players but they will grow enormously from experience.

“We are so much better than we showed in this match but we want this team to never know when they are beaten and we want the opposition to know that too,” said Conrad.

Published in Dawn, December 31st, 2024