<p><strong>Cricket News-in-Brief - December 31, 2011 – Part 3</strong></p>
<p><strong>Mickey Arthur believes Australia’s current bowling attack has the potential of becoming the best in the business.
</strong>The South African took over as Australia’s coach last month, replacing Tim Nielsen.</p>
<p>The Kangaroos have developed some very good fast bowlers like James Pattinson, Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Ben Cutting and Trent Copeland. All of them have the ability to represent the team at the highest level.</p>
<p>Arthur was delighted to see such talent in the Aussie ranks and said that his aim was to continue gaining strength with the passage of time.</p>
<p>Other than the young fast bowlers, the Australians have a few experienced guys like Ben Hilfenhaus, Ryan Harris, Mitchell Johnson and Peter Siddle, which develops a very interesting competition within the team.</p>
<p>The Kangaroos are currently hosting a series against India and lead the four match Test series 1-0 with three more games to go. Considering the performance of the fast bowlers, Michael Clarke and his men might go out with four pacers in the Sydney Test.</p>
<p>However, Arthur said that the team will only be finalised after taking a close look at the playing conditions in Sydney.</p>
<p><strong>South Africa’s skipper Graeme Smith was hopeful of a better show in 2012,
</strong>after his side failed to deliver strong results in 2011.</p>
<p>The Proteas did not play much cricket this year and hosted a couple of series against Australia and Sri Lanka towards the end of 2011. However, the team failed to perform consistently and was not even able to dominate Sri Lanka, side which had never won
a Test match in South Africa before their success in Durban recently.</p>
<p>Smith and his men have faced severe criticism following the loss to Sri Lanka, but the team is hopeful if turning things around next year. They still have one more Test to go in the series and will look to win it to silence their critics.</p>
<p>The South African captain said that his side was fully motivated to deliver strong results next year and the negative talks about them were simply useless.</p>
<p><strong>Veteran South African wicketkeeper Mark Boucher has been axed from the One Day Internationals (ODIs) against Sri Lanka.
</strong></p>
<p>AB de Villiers will take the responsibility of leading the side and also keep wickets at the same time for the Proteas.</p>
Tags: