JOHANNESBURG, Dec 11: Graeme Smith said on Thursday South Africa wanted to atone for their poor performance in the 2003 World Cup during the home Test series against the West Indies.

“We owe it to ourselves to make up for the disappointment of that tournament,” Smith said on the eve of the first match of the four-Test encounter here.

“I’m really excited about captaining South Africa at home.

South Africa have not played a Test at home since the World Cup in February and March.

Smith saw the West Indies’ batsmen as a greater threat than their bowlers.

“West Indies don’t seem to have the same quality of bowlers that they had back then (in 1999-98), but facing ‘unknowns’ can be as dangerous as facing Courtney Walsh and Curtly Ambrose,” he said.

West Indies captain Brian Lara remarked he was hopeful his team could overcome the loss of injured off-spinner Omari Banks, fast bowler Jerome Taylor and batsman Marlon Samuels.

“We have had something of a disrupted preperation, but over the years the strength of West Indies cricket has been the depth of our reserves and I’ve noticed that start to come back in recent years,” Lara said.

He captained the West Indies team that lost the Test series 5-0 in 1998-99. He said the current side were a better combination.

“This is a better team than 1998-99 despite the retirements of Curtly Ambrose and Courtney Walsh, and there is no doubt we’re better prepared.”

With the Wanderers pitch seldom helping spin bowlers, it would be a surprise if late arrival Dave Mohammed was rushed into the Test side, which suggests Fidel Edwards and Ravi Rampaul will be part of an all-pace attack.

Teams (from):

South Africa: Graeme Smith (captain), Mark Boucher, Herschelle Gibbs, Jacques Rudolph, Jacques Kallis, Neil McKenzie, Martin van Jaarsveld, Shaun Pollock, Andrew Hall, Robin Peterson, Makhaya Ntini, Andre Nel, Garnett Kruger.