{"id":12207,"date":"2012-07-08T00:19:54","date_gmt":"2012-07-07T22:19:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/07\/cricket-smith-wants-to-knock-england-off-top-spot\/"},"modified":"2012-07-08T00:19:54","modified_gmt":"2012-07-07T22:19:54","slug":"cricket-smith-wants-to-knock-england-off-top-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/cricket-smith-wants-to-knock-england-off-top-spot\/","title":{"rendered":"Cricket-Smith wants to knock England off top spot"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">July 7<\/span> (Reuters) &#8211; Captain Graeme Smith is confident South<br \/>\nAfrica have got what it takes to replace England as the number<br \/>\none team in the world test rankings.<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Something has to give when England, who have not lost a home<br \/>\nseries for four years, take on second-ranked South Africa in a<br \/>\nthree-match encounter that starts later this month.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>England&#8217;s last home defeat was against the Proteas who have<br \/>\nnot lost on their travels since 2006.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We hope getting to number one can be a reward for our<br \/>\nconsistency,&#8221; Smith told reporters on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have been near the top of the rankings for a long time<br \/>\nnow and had a taste of it for a small while (in 2008).<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are hoping now with everything we&#8217;ve done, and the way<br \/>\nwe&#8217;ve prepared, and are going to prepare, that we will be ready<br \/>\nfor the first test at The Oval (on July 19),&#8221; added Smith.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The South Africans, fresh from a few days of team bonding in<br \/>\nthe Swiss Alps, are in upbeat mood.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have come here with a degree of quiet confidence,&#8221; said<br \/>\nSmith. &#8220;We have performed well away from home for a period of<br \/>\ntime now.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have that strength within the squad and strength in<br \/>\nconfidence to know we can perform well away from home.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>July 7 (Reuters) &#8211; Captain Graeme Smith is confident South Africa have got what it takes to replace England as the number one team in the world test rankings. Something has to give when England, who have not lost a home series for four years, take on second-ranked South Africa in a three-match encounter that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-12207","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12207"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12207\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}