Prose, it's said, consists of words in the right order, poetry of the right words in the right order. Cricket selectors understand a similar distinction. Picking the XI is only the beginning; they must be deployed in the optimum formation. The second Test is throwing up evidence that the current South African thinking is all a-jumble, or at least out of date. Thirty months ago in the World Cup, Lance Klusener appeared to have conceived a new style of batting, his swing as emphatic and pitiless as the descent of a guillotine. Nowadays, he looks more like the condemned man: his stance is crabbed, his bat face closed, and he is no more a Test match No.6 than an ICC referee.

The stroke Klusener played today in sustaining a first-ball duck smacked of nothing but defeat, an ungainly shovel back to Andy Bichel, following his ignominious pair against New South Wales at Sydney. The task of guiding the visitors to a competitive score was left to his captain Shaun Pollock, who from his vantage of No.8 roused Nantie Hayward to a last-wicket stand of 44.

Pollock, in fact, has been advancing with the bat as steadily as Klusener has been receding. Thirty months ago, he was a handy lower-order batsman. Today, he not only played a range of attractive strokes, but addressed Brett Lee's hostile spell with the second new ball as convincingly as anyone.

The statistical trajectories of Klusener and Pollock over the last year tell the tale starkly. Since the start of South Africa's tour of the Caribbean in March, Klusener has averaged less than 20, despite bulking his aggregate with a century against India at Bloemfontein. Pollock's average over the same period almost exceeds 50, while seven of his 16 innings have been not-outs; and the undefeated innings, though it is often overlooked, can be a waste as wanton as the innings curtailed by a careless stroke.

Klusener continues his tenure at No. 6, however, while Pollock maintains his vigil at eight and nine. The rationale for Klusener's inclusion in this Test XI was, presumably, that his bowling provided insurance against the indeterminate fitness of Allan Donald. Yet Klusener was not entrusted with the ball, even after Donald's anodyne opening, and it is many years since his medium-pace was influential at international level.

The South Africans will have to face the unappetising reality that they are losing this rubber off the park as completely as they are on it.

Gideon Haigh is one of Australia's leading cricket writers and the author of several books including The Summer Game, the acclaimed history of Australian cricket from 1948 to 1971.

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