Huge summer of cricket for South Africa

The Proteas welcome England first for a three match T20 series and then a three match ODI series in the Western Cape starting next week Friday. The players and management are all already in their bio-secure bubble ahead of the series opener.

Smith knows that the organisation that is Cricket South Africa have got a massive period ahead of them to try and get the ship back on track.

"This summer is going to be massive not only from a cricketing perspective but from the financial side in getting our team back playing and showing that we can pull off safe events during the COVID-19 pandemic," Smith said. "The opportunity for the fans to get away from a little bit of the politics and go back to the actual thing of watching our team play and hopefully play well.

"It's going to be a busy summer with England here and then Sri Lanka for test matches, our team is scheduled to go to Pakistan and after that Australia and Pakistan come here. So over the next period it's going to be busy and hopefully the cricket will shine through."

LISTEN: Nick Tatham chats to CSA Director of Cricket Graeme Smith

Of all the international sides England have been the busiest with a fairly full summer and then a handful of players in the Indian Premier League so they will head into the upcoming series with far more cricket under their belts.

"They are world champions and have some fantastic players in their own right," Smith stressed. "I believe that we are building a squad and this is the longest period that our national squad has been out of action so it's going to be hard to get straight back into it against a team that has been playing consistently over the past few months.

"We've certainly got enough talent and ability to compete and hopefully in these ten days of preparation the guys will be ready to take them on."

The Proteas had begun to make strides following a strong white ball series against Australia before the lockdown but Smith isn't looking too deeply into that and wants the team to refocus now going forward towards the T20 World Cup.

"I'm just glad that we are through it and getting cricket back and now we can progress some of those thoughts and plans we did implement.

"The T20 World Cup has been shifted out to October next year so over the next year that's a big goal for us to build a power side that can go and be successful in India," he added in anticipation.