Gibbs dropped for remaining Tests

Herschelle Gibbs, for all his absurd talent, has endured a poor run of form this summer © Getty Images

Herschelle Gibbs, the South Africa batsman and Garnett Kruger have been dropped for the remaining two Tests against New Zealand. South Africa won the first Test at Centurion by 128 runs last week, but Gibbs put in another disappointing performance with a match aggregate of eight runs.

In his last ten Tests, he has made just 437 runs at an average of 25.70. His last hundred was made against England over a year ago.

"Herschelle and I had a meeting yesterday (Friday), and we agreed that a break and a fresh start next season will do him a world of good", Haroon Lorgat, South Africa's convenor of selectors, said. "Garnett is most unfortunate to have picked up a shoulder strain when he was set to play in the first Test at Centurion.

"With the outstanding performances of Makhaya Ntini and Dale Steyn in this match, and with Andre Nel in reserve, we have decided to release him."

Lorgan confirmed that South Africa will not be replacing Gibbs or Kruger.

"At the start of the series we had carried an unusually large squad of 16 players. This was designed to take into account the fact that there was no domestic cricket being played," he said. "With one Test completed, we are now able to reduce the squad to 14 players and will reduce it further to 13 for the last Test at Liberty Life Wanderers."

South Africa team (from):

Graeme Smith (capt), Jacques Kallis, Boeta Dippenaar, Ashwell Prince, AB de Villiers, Mark Boucher (wk), Shaun Pollock, Nicky Boje, Andre Nel, Makhaya Ntini, Dale Steyn, Andrew Hall, Jacques Rudolph, Hashim Amla