PRETORIA (South Africa), Sept 6: Shaun Pollock leads South Africa into the summer season with his team having reached a crossroads and expectation at home growing apace.

After the ICC Champions Cricket Trophy in Sri Lanka, South Africa stage three short home Test series.

Then, next March, they will try to become the first hosts to lift the World Cricket Cup.

But this all comes on the back of a disastrous 3-0 Test drubbing in Australia last winter, and a serious mauling two months later in the return rubber.

“It’s only when you play the best sides that you really start learning,” Pollock told BBC Sport Online.

“When you’re dominating games and winning series it’s easy to control situations, but when you’re up against it you learn quickly what’s required and act on it.

“I’ve discovered more about captaincy through these defeats than in all our earlier victories. Sure, sometimes you acknowledge that you’re being outplayed by a better side, and that it’s beyond mere tactics.”

In Kingston, Jamaica, West Indies cricket coach Roger Harper was upbeat about the Windies chances at the Champions Trophy.

“I am confident that the team will do well,” said Harper before the team’s departure for Colombo.

“All the players have been playing in the Red Stripe Bowl which certainly would have prepared them, to an extent, for the ICC Champions Trophy.—PPI