By Scyld Berry
Pietermaritzburg James Anderson, England's leading Test wicket-taker, is doubtful for the first Test, which starts in Durban on Boxing Day, after experiencing an increasing tightness in his right calf muscle.
A grim-faced Anderson left the team hotel after the rest of the team had gone to the ground, to have scans on his right leg. They will be analysed in England before the results are sent back to South Africa.
Jimmy Anderson leaves the field injured during an Ashes Test in July.Credit: Getty Images
Anderson had felt the tightness from the start of this tour in Potchefstroom, but he bowled four overs in the first innings of the three-day match there against a South African Invitational XI, and one over in the second before lightning curtailed the game.
Anderson was not considered for the second three-day game against South Africa A because he knows his own game so well that he can get himself fit for a Test match, leaving the opportunity of match practice to others.
"He has probably earned that over his career, the amount of overs he has bowled for England and the wickets he has taken," Ottis Gibson, England's bowling coach, said about leaving Anderson to prepare himself.
"The stage he is at in his career you treat him slightly different to someone who is just coming in," Gibson added. "He is a very experienced senior pro and he knows exactly what he needs to get himself ready for a Test match nowadays."
Anderson's warming-up was still going well when he bowled on the square at the lunch interval on the second day against South Africa A, and fielded briefly as 12th man, but the problem flared up later when he bowled in the nets behind the pavilion.
It would be different if he was going into a one-off Test or the last match of a series. But it looks at this stage like being too great a risk to play Anderson in the first Test with the second Test beginning in Cape Town only two days later. Better to let him fully recover and introduce him in the second Test, which starts on January 2, when fresh legs will be welcome.
Anderson is 33, and England started to learn how to live without him when he strained his side in the third Test against Australia at Edgbaston last summer.
Stuart Broad had to take over as England's attack leader, and bowled the first over for the first time at Trent Bridge, and to such effect that he finished with 8-15 as Australia were all out for 60.
For the Durban Test, Chris Woakes will be able to slot in alongside Broad and Steven Finn if Anderson is ruled out. With a new ball Woakes can achieve much the same shape as Anderson with his outswinger and at greater pace.
Where Anderson will be really missed is when the ball gets old. In the three-Test series against Pakistan in the United Arab Emirates, Anderson was so adept at reverse swing - and unrelenting accuracy with it - that he took 13 wickets at only 15 runs each, and conceded only 1.87 runs per over: figures up with the best that any England pace bowler has achieved in Asia.
In this calendar year Anderson has taken 46 Test wickets, cruising past Ian Botham's record of 383 wickets for England in the Antigua Test, then past 400 in the home series against New Zealand. In his total of 110 Tests he has taken 426 wickets at 28.96.
The Daily Telegraph, London