Smith defends early declaration

Graeme Smith defended his decision to make an early declaration after South Africa crashed to an eight-wicket defeat in the final Test with Australia on Friday.

South Africa, needing to win the third match to square the series, gambled everything on a calculated last-day declaration that backfired and resulted in a 2-0 series defeat.

"Yes, we've lost but we've said throughout the game that the difference between 1-0 and 2-0 for us is nothing. It's still a lost series," Smith told a news conference.

"To set a declaration and try to go for a win was in our minds the only way to play. The negative option never came in."

The Proteas led Australia by 92 runs on the first innings but two days of persistent rain thwarted their hopes of building a massive second innings lead.

They aborted their second innings at 194-6 an hour before lunch on the final day, setting Australia a target of 287 off 76 overs to win.

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No team had ever made that many runs in the fourth innings to win a Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground but the Australians cruised to victory with almost 16 overs to spare with Ricky Ponting chalking up his second century of the match.

"Obviously the rain yesterday effected our plans and caused us to take more and more risks today but in the best interests of cricket, and our own cricket, it was the right decision," Smith said.

"Everyone in the whole team wanted to be positive this morning and go for a win.

"Cricket itself needs positive games and for us as a team moving forward, we really need to be positive, it's the only way we can take South African cricket forward."

Smith said his team had not counted on the pitch holding up so well after five days and found an unlikely ally in Ponting, who made 120 and 143 not out in his 100th Test appearance.

"Graeme was pretty much forced into doing it that way this morning," Ponting said.

"They had to come out and try and score as quickly as they could this morning and to get enough runs on the board to try and defend at the same time they had to give themselves enough overs to try and bowl us out.

"But that wicket was still pretty good. There was very little variable bounce and the spinners didn't really play a part in the game.

"There was no other way he could have gone with it. If South Africa wanted to give themselves a chance to level the series then they had to declare somewhere around where they did."