Steyn sets Wednesday cut-off for Boxing Day return

Dale Steyn is not a certain starter for the Boxing Day Test in Durban and expects an early decision to be made over his hamstring injury. The South African fast bowler was ruled out of the opening match at Centurion on the morning of the game, handing a debut to Friedel de Wet, who almost bowled South Africa to victory with 4 for 55 on the final day.

Steyn will spend the next two days putting in further rehabilitation work and remains hopeful of rejoining the South Africa line-up. However, he doesn't want any doubt hanging over the side as they prepare for the second Test and is targeting Wednesday - when the squad meets up in Durban - as his key time.

"I've got until Wednesday to get it ready," he told Cricinfo. "I think we will make an early decision this time on whether I will play, rather than wait until the morning of the game. That puts other players under stress and basically throws the guys into the ocean.

"I'm hopeful. I was very keen to play in Pretoria and having a few more days off has given me extra time to get it right, so I don't see any reason why I shouldn't be ready for Boxing Day.

"I just want to make sure it's 100% because we have a lot of cricket to play, not just against England but also a tour to India, and hamstrings can be quite a difficult area to sort out. Just when you think you've got it right, it hits you again and slows you down. We are hoping that everything will be right for Durban, that's the goal, and we've been working really hard."

The decision not to play at Centurion was swayed by Jacques Kallis's rib injury that prevented him from bowling until the final afternoon, when he sent down three gentle overs. With just three frontline quick bowlers it would have meant an extra workload for Steyn.

"The hamstring was about 50-50 and we didn't really know whether I would make it through a long spell of bowling," Steyn said. "The safe thing was to pull out rather than find I wouldn't be able to play the second and third Tests and maybe even the fourth."

Yet the man who replaced Steyn at the 11th hour almost became the matchwinner as de Wet created mayhem in the final hour with a stunning new-ball burst. He removed Jonathan Trott, Ian Bell and Matt Prior to send the England dressing room into a state of panic until Paul Collingwood and Graham Onions saved the day.

"He showed what he is capable of in the second innings and hopefully he will be around for a while," Steyn said. "He's spent a long time in domestic cricket and has taken his chance to show he can perform at the top level. I'm very happy for him."

Steyn offered 29-year-old de Wet one simple piece of advice before he began his international career. "I told him some of the mistakes I made going into my debut and said, 'Don't let the occasion get to you. Treat it as another game and do the same things as you would playing for your domestic side.' He'd done all the hard work to get to this stage."

As de Wet was tearing through England late in the afternoon, Steyn was cheering each wicket from the balcony. It was the first part of the game he'd sat down to watch properly after all the fitness work he'd been doing on his hamstring.

"I thought, it was day five and anything is possible," he said. "It would only take one spell and the new ball was still to come, so I decided to sit down and watch. When we needed one wicket to win I wanted to kick myself for not watching from lunchtime.

"I never got very nervous. I think I would have been worse if it had been a one-day game. That's when you hide behind the door and peek out to take a look. In this case we were never going to lose the game, it was just more the excitement of whether we'd win and at worse we would draw it."

As Graeme Smith said after the game, Steyn believes the way South Africa controlled the majority of the Test and finished a whisker away from winning has given them an early advantage in the series, though the scoreline remains 0-0.

"We were a bowler short in Jacques and what he provides in terms of balance is something you can't buy over the counter in the supermarket," Steyn said. "If he'd been bowling we would have had a stronger side.

"Going into day five, England were looking to only draw the game and to defend on that wicket was probably the hardest thing to do. If they'd gone for the runs, they may not have had as many problems. We are quite happy with the way things went and have been able to suss out what they are like in the longer format. We can prepare even better for the second Test in conditions we know much better than the English."