The last thing South Africa wanted to do was go in and bat on Friday evening after spending a day and three-quarters in the field. And you should always consider doing what creates most discomfort for the opposition.

England have a good looking top six, all capable of playing shots, but maybe because there have been so many changes in recent years these players feel they have to play carefully, score runs slowly and consolidate their places.

People say that bowlers win matches and batsmen save them. Well, I disagree. Batsmen win matches too, if they play positively, score runs and give their bowlers an extra hour or two to do their job.

These days a Test side should be looking to score at three runs an over, or even more. That would give a side 270 plus at the end of the day. From that point of view England were not far off target when they made 249 on the opening day. But they should have accelerated on the second day, reached about 450 and then put South Africa in for an hour.

For partly the same reason I cannot accept that Graeme Hick is not worth a place in the side. A hundred first-class hundreds says a great deal for a batsman and he has just scored four in a row.

I have seen a lot of him over the years and find him very impressive. He appears to have sorted out some technical problems and when he gets in he can really dominate an attack. The strange thing is that the selectors seemed very patient with him and he repaid that loyalty by averaging 40 plus in his last two years in the England side, lifting his overall Test average to just over 36. Then he was suddenly dropped. There is still time to get him back in the side and I would put him first in the queue when a vacancy arises.

As for South Africa's batsmen, I do think they are sometimes under-rated. I know that not one of them averages 40 in Test cricket but they have nearly all made centuries and looked the part at this level. Gary Kirsten, even though he failed yesterday, and Daryll Cullinan are our best players. Daryll had a bad time in Australia against Shane Warne but a lot of batsmen have suffered the same problems and he appears to have come through it.

Batsmen such as Hansie Cronje, Jacques Kallis and Cullinan are so much better players for having played county cricket in England. I had the chance to play for Nottinghamshire in the mid-Sixties but declined. I did not fancy the idea too much because there were too many declarations and 'gimme' runs and I could not see how it would improve my batting.

At the same time so many players have improved their game by coming into county cricket and while this has benefited their respective countries, it has been to the detriment of England. It was a difficult problem for the game's administrators in this country because there was a need to enhance county cricket by importing quality overseas players.

As for South Africa's bowlers on this tour we know that Allan Donald and Shaun Pollock are the real top quality performers but I was most encouraged by the performance of Paul Adams. He bowled to contain and he bowled well, taking three wickets and never coming in for punishment.

I gather England are thinking about playing two spinners later in this series, with Ian Salisbury possibly coming in to support Robert Croft. If this is the case the role of Adams on turning pitches could be crucial. He has been expensive in the past but the last 18 months have seen him make a lot of progress. He really looks to have a big future.

I was disappointed by our bowling on the first day. This is a real line and length pitch that our fast bowlers tried to do too much on. Batsmen were not made to play enough. By taking nine wickets for 200 runs on the second day we merely showed what could have been done on the first if the ball had been put in the right place.