Callum Ferguson is under no illusions about what is required if he is to avoid becoming Australia's latest one-Test wonder.
Runs. Lots of runs.
Ferguson was called up for the second Test but logged scores of three and one in Hobart, where South Africa cruised to a series victory.
The 32-year-old was axed as part of a wholesale clean out of the Test XI, which itself followed the resignation of chairman of selectors Rod Marsh.
Trevor Hohns, serving as Marsh's interim successor, indicated publicly on Sunday it wasn't the end of Ferguson's Test ambitions.
Hohns also relayed the same message over the phone to Ferguson.
"He said the door is certainly not shut. Get out there, make runs and certainly you've got an opportunity to get back in there if you do put them on the board," Ferguson recalled.
"It is disappointing any time you get left out of a side, so it's back to the drawing board.
"Make runs for South Australia, win games for South Australia and hopefully fight my way back in."
Coach Darren Lehmann noted Ferguson, Joe Burns and Joe Mennie were all unlucky to pay the price for Australia's woeful loss at Bellerive, where they were skittled for 85 after being sent in.
"Do you reckon we don't feel for Cal?" Lehmann told radio station FIVEaa.
"The challenge, as we spoke to Callum (about), now is to go back and really dominate Shield cricket.
"If he made runs in Brisbane it might have been a different story. But he didn't, neither did Joe Burns.
"He was unlucky. Joe Mennie was unlucky (to be dropped) after one Test."
Ferguson tallied a total of eight runs in the recent Sheffield Shield clash in Brisbane, where Burns was also twice out in single figures.
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