I read somewhere a report in which something was mentioned - indicating that the relationship between Domingo and Smith was not a good one. The following needs to be noted -
* Smith himself indicated that he was not on song with Domingo as he was with Kisten. He mentioned that he considered retirement from the time Domingo was appointed.
* Domingo himself did not really have a relationship with Smith and most likely was not on talking terms with him either. While De Kock was batting in one of the ODI's Domingo told AB to tell Smith that he will never again play in the SA ODI side. That was to my mind unacceptable. Domingo should have spoken directly to Smith - not through a third party. Be it as it may the above rumour was confirmed as Smith left the same day for Cape Town.
* There must be more to the Tsolekile story than Cricket South Africa denied as being the case.
Be it as it may - Smith resigned and the discussion at persent is around his successor. Everyone seems to agree there are two alternatives, namely AB and Faf - with a rather surprising indication that the final selection may be Faf.
AB and Faf have been friends from school days - where Faf was the school cricket captain and AB one of the team players. Before becoming captain of the ODI side AB never captained anything - whereas Faf has a history of captaincy of various levels since his school days. That makes him stronger in the leadership stakes - or that is what is said by various sources. Irrespective of who is made captain - the other one will be the vice captain.
The general concensus of opinion is that if AB is selected he will have to give up the wicket keeping duties and for that the only replacement named is De Kock. In the latter regard it is mentioned that De Kock is already on a CSA contract.
The first test series SA will play is against SriLanka and De Kock will pick up valuable experience playing in sub-continent conditions in the IPL in April.
