Ex-Australian coach Tim Nielsen has warned of a looming four-pronged South African pace battery with the cagey tourists resting fast bowling big guns in their final tour match.
Tearaways Dale Steyn and Kasigo Rabada sat out Friday's fruitless final day of the two-day match against a South Australian XI in Adelaide.
In their absence, the visitors were battered by the second-string South Australians, who made 8-435 in reply to South Africa's opening-day 489 all out.
Quicks Morne Morkel, Vernon Philander and Kyle Abbott were wicketless for two sessions as wicketkeeper-batsman Tim Ludeman plundered 167 including eight sixes and 20 fours and captain Sam Raphael made 91.
Morkel picked up a pair of consolation scalps and Abbott one for an unflattering scorecard ahead of the first Test against Australia starting on Thursday in Perth.
But former Australian boss Nielsen warns the South Africans are cherry ripe for the Test series after playing a pair of two-day warm-up games in Adelaide.
"I reckon it's their last little bit of cream on their cake," said Nielsen, who has watched both games and is now South Australian cricket's general manager of high performance.
"They will get to Perth and have a couple of good runs prior to the Test.
"Most importantly for them, I expect, 95 per cent of their team now are very experienced and good-quality Test match players.
"They will know what they will need to do to prepare well and I expect they are facilitating that process both through the games and the nets here and they will hit Perth ready to go."
All South African batsmen, bar opener Stephen Cook, have been among the runs in the tour games.
And Nielsen noted the tailored lead-ins for their pace brigade, as he predicted four South African quicks to feature in the series opener.
"I expect they'll play four quicks and potentially use (JP) Duminy to bowl some offspin, and maybe even (Dean) Elgar can roll out some left-arm spin as well if they want," he said.
"I would expect they see that as being their most-potent attack to try and take 20 wickets in the Test in Perth.
"They have played pretty well in Test match cricket for a while now using a pretty standard formula for their group and their team."
