Smith wants CSA to sort out scheduling shambles

Sydney: South Africa captain Graeme Smith has expressed the hope that cricket administrators will sit and talk to sort out the current quandary around the scheduling of their upcoming tours.

Smith conceded a three-Test series against Australia is far from ideal, suggesting the country`s respective cricket chiefs should put their heads together to reach a solution to the scheduling dilemma that leaves the Proteas on a plane home by early December. Unlike their previous tour in 2008-09, the world No.1 Test nation will not play marquee matches in Sydney and Melbourne, instead being given early summer showdowns with Australia at Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth before returning for their own home series against New Zealand and, later, Pakistan. “It`s a tough one because our summer is our summer back home as it is here,” the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Smith, as saying. “It`s a productive period in South African cricket and people, our fans back at home, want to see us. It would be nice if the administrators could [talk]. Maybe Australia can come to us for a summer also, and mix it up like that?” he added. Smith defended the decision of Cricket South Africa, which is in the midst of a board restructure following the dismissal of chief executive Gerald Majola for his part in a bonus scandal, to stage a Twenty20 match against the Kiwis at Port Elizabeth, rather than a Test, on Boxing Day this year. “I don`t think it`s going to be a yearly thing, I think it`s going to adapt to who is touring as far as I understand,” Smith said. ANI