1st over: Australia 4-0 (Maddinson 0, Head 0) Jansen is only slightly off target with the first ball of the game as he drifts on to Maddinson’s thigh pad and concedes four leg byes. Verreynne dives hard to his right but is unable to reach the ball. The towering all-rounder finds his range just back of a length and movement away from the left-handed batter but is unable to lure Maddinson into a loose stroke.

Nic Maddinson is at the crease with new opening partner Travis Head at the non-striker’s end. Marco Jansen has the ball in hand and the first Test between South Africa and Australia is under way in Durban …

South Africa and Australia are lined up for the national anthems with first ball just a few minutes away.

The sun is belting down in Durban at the moment with the forecast for a high of 27C. But a hint of cloud is expected to drift across Kingsmead Stadium during the afternoon. Rain was forecast for day two but the latest forecast suggests that has cleared up.

Nic Maddinson will open for Australia alongside Travis Head. The senior partner of that duo had some choice words for the former greats who have criticised the current side for a lack of runs in recent times.

I think it’s unfairly judged a fair bit from a group of past players, pretty much, that put the bullet through a lot of players. But that’s what they’re paid to do. Some of them need a job, so they go after us and that’s totally fine. This group is strong enough to deal with those sort of things. That’s how it is.

It’s unfortunate sometimes to have some of that feedback from a generation of players that we have huge respect for, but that’s the caper.

South Africa captain Temba Bavuma admits he would have elected to bat if he won the toss and he confirms two spinners are in the XI.

It looks a nice wicket. Weather’s good as well, but with that being said, we’ll have to do the job with the ball. Try to exploit whatever moisture that is there in the wicket.

I think obviously with our bowling attack, our twin spinners, they’ve added a bit of extra dimension into our bowling attack. So if the conditions suit them, which we hope it would, looking at the wicket, they can come into the game. And saying that we do have the strength there in the fast bowlers.

Australia’s bowling attack of Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Nathan Lyon is expected to be the same as lined up for the tourists in 2018. The batting, on the other hand, is much harder to nail down – but that hasn’t stopped Geoff Lemon from weighing up the case for and against the main contenders for the final spot or two.

Matt Renshaw has done good things against the white ball, but his preparation to be the country’s new opener in Durban has consisted of one innings against Bangladesh in Mackay. Marnus Labuschagne reassured with a warm-up century, but that game was so relaxed that he might have played in flip-flops. Cameron Green was an issue until two Test innings ago, then having finally produced a performance of note, got injured. That means Beau Webster will be bowling cover, with one of Cooper Connolly or Nic Maddinson to get Green’s job with the bat.

A choice between those two options is truly bizarre.

South Africa’s role in the ignominious 2018 series has largely been pushed into the background even as it should have been a celebrated first Test series victory on home soil against Australia since their readmission to international cricket. Daniel Gallan wonders what the scandal and fallout for Australia meant for the secondary protagonist.

For South African cricketers, administrators and supporters, the most surprising aspect of the Sandpaper scandal was not that it happened. After all, the ball had been suspiciously reverse-swinging during the first two Tests of that ill-fated series in 2018. The atmosphere had turned febrile after a stairwell bust-up between Quinton de Kock and David Warner in Durban and after supporters directed misogynistic abuse at Warner and his family in Gqeberha. Nathan Lyon had promised before the tour to “head-butt the line” of what was acceptable. Darren Lehmann, then Australia’s coach, came from an old school where bullying was sugar-coated with the phrase “mental disintegration”.

No, what surprised South Africans most was the scale of the fallout, and how one tiny piece of sandpaper could cause so much national angst.

Australia’s return to South Africa for a first Test series since 2018 is unlikely to put the ball-tampering scandal to bed. Especially while serious doubts remain over whether the full version of the events in Cape Town has ever been revealed. Geoff Lemon will be covering every day of this series for us. He is as well placed as anyone to look back at what happened at Newlands eight years ago – and what could come out in the future.

The slew of retrospectives has understandably given rise to sandpaper fatigue, audiences tired of hearing about an old story before a new series, while others do historical revisions. Various pundits have suggested that the bans for the players involved were an overreaction, a position that has merit given the prevalence of ball-tampering in the sport, but ignores the press conference in which Smith and Bancroft foolishly lied to cover theirs up. Other observers have argued that whatever the details, the story is so old as to be dead. “What’s left to come out after eight years?” asked Starc this week.

The answer is everything, because nothing ever really has.