Separately but unanimously, Shaun Pollock and Stephen Fleming both used the word 'brilliant' to describe the cricket played by South Africa during the first four matches of the Standard Bank one-day international series, a series wrapped up by the home side with their five-wicket victory in Kimberley.

New Zealand came to South Africa flushed with their success in the ICC KnockOut 2000 tournament in Kenya and fancied by many to extend South Africa on their home soil. What has happened, however, is that New Zealand have barely had a look in.

The closest they managed to come to avoiding defeat was in the first match in Potchefstroom when rain forced a washout. Even then, South Africa had laid the platform for a massive score after 38 overs with Nicky Boje tearing in to the New Zealand attack for his first of two centuries in three innings.

Since then South Africa have won three on the trot. With just two matches, in Durban and Cape Town remaining, New Zealand have nothing left in the one-day segment of the tour to play for but pride.

On Saturday New Zealand’s batting sparked to life as they mounted their most imposing total of the series. Stephen Fleming (85) and Roger Twose (89) both might have had centuries but lost their wickets in the push for extra runs towards the end, while Chris Nevin finally came good with 68 after two failures.

Fleming thought New Zealand’s 287 for seven was defendable, Pollock thought it was gettable. But on a fine batting pitch, New Zealand needed early wickets. Again South Africa employed Daryll Cullinan to open and again he went early, but on Saturday, Pollock changed the script by sending Jacques Kallis in at his usual number three position.

After Boje’s run – 105 not out, 64 and 129 – Kallis had to come up with something special to justify the change. He did. On Wednesday Boje and Gary Kirsten set a new second wicket record against New Zealand with a stand of 160. On Saturday, Kallis and Kirsten moved the record up another 12 runs.

Kallis has been criticised in the past for a lack of urgency in his batting, but you could hardly fault him for that on Saturday. He pulled his entire repertoire of tricks out of the bag for the Kimberley crowd – the carve over cover, the extravagant slash, the thumped straight hit – as he rollicked along to 93. But very seldom did he overshadow Kirsten.

Indeed, Kirsten, now one of the team’s elder statesmen, is also in the form of his life. He might have had a hundred on Wednesday, but got out on 94 and although he admitted to getting 'the jitters' during the 90s on Saturday, he saw it through this time, reaching three figures off 104 balls.

Kallis holed out on 215 and Kirsten went for 101 on 221 and there was just a sense that New Zealand might still have a sniff. Lance Klusener made nine, Jonty Rhodes added a quick 25, but at 255 for five in the 46th over, South Africa still had a way to go.

But, of course, Boje was still to come, and he hasn’t yet given it away to New Zealand. With Mark Boucher in harness, South Africa eventually romped home with seven balls to spare, Boje hitting six, four off Cairns to wrap it up.

On the quick, bouncy South African wickets (with the exception of Benoni), New Zealand simply haven’t had the firepower to unsettle South Africa, a fact readily acknowledged by Fleming.

He pointed to the absence of Danny Vettori and Dion Nash as mitigating (or contributory) factors, and it is also the case that Cairns is carrying a knee injury and might well not last the tour.

And this lack of bite in the attack could become even more serious for New Zealand when the Test matches come around.

"It’s a big concern," said Fleming. "As captain I couldn’t be more worried about it."

But the last word to Pollock: "The guys have played brilliantly throughout the series. We’ve dominated a lot of the cricket that’s been played."

© CricInfo Ltd