South Africa will need to be greater than the sum of their batting parts if they are to challenge Australia across the three-Test series which could have a huge bearing on who reaches the World Test Championship final in June.

"We are growing him in terms of his all-round ability and he has the ability to do something special with the bat," Maketa said. "From our point of view he's a work in progress and we know he could and he is capable of being part of at least two fifty partnerships.

"We are going to have to back our batters to score the runs and our bowlers to take the wickets."

And with a Test bowling average of 18.59 it would appear very difficult not to play Jansen for his bowling, although South Africa did find a way to do that against England at Old Trafford when they opted for two spinners.

"It's been a sharp rise," Maketa said. "We know for a fact that people around the world have taken note and now coming up in this series it will be a different challenge, people have seen enough of him to come up with different plans. But when it comes to his performances we are very pleased because he gives us variety we need for our attack. In terms of pace and height and the areas he hits, it sets him apart in terms of a lot of other left armers."

"He's still young, but in terms of experience and having been here before it's something that a lot of the other bowlers are using to lean on him for information," Maketa said. "We've been quite clear in terms of lengths we want to hit, if you look at the Wanderers it offers the same, more or less, where you can get carried away with the sexy bounce and be ineffective so we've been working hard on making sure we hit the fuller length and making the batter play."