South Africa keen to avoid upsets

World Cup Super 8, Guyana: South Africa v Ireland
Match starts Tuesday 1430 BST

Gibbs was one of four batsmen to fall to Johnston in the warm-up

South Africa are determined not to lose focus in forthcoming matches against the remaining lesser sides, starting against Ireland in Guyana on Tuesday.

After that the Proteas play Bangladesh on Saturday and coach Mickey Arthur is determined to secure maximum points.

"When you plan for the rest of the Cup these are both 'banker' games but with that comes added pressure," he said.

"If things go well we'd also hope to work a bit on run-rate, but first prize is to leave Guyana with six points."

After being comprehensively beaten by 83 runs against Australia in their final first round match, South Africa then suffered a scare against Sri Lanka.

Wild paceman Lasith Malinga captured a world record four wickets in four balls before the South Africans scraped home by one wicket.

Right now I firmly believe the semi-finalists will be Australia, Sri Lanka, New Zealand and South Africa based on what I have seen but we still have an awful lot of work to do SA coach Mickey Arthur

"That took quite a few years off my life," Arthur said.

"At five down with four runs needed I started packing away the kit bags but then it suddenly became very hectic.

"It was always going to take something special from there and Malinga certainly nearly delivered it."

The coach admitted he "wouldn't mind staying away from Australia" in the semi-finals but was confident his team could secure a place in the last four.

"Right now I firmly believe the semi-finalists will be Australia, Sri Lanka, New Zealand and South Africa based on what I have seen but we still have an awful lot of work to do."

Ireland almost caused a major upset in a warm-up match against the South Africans shortly before the tournament began.

Their intrepid seam duo Trent Johnston and Dave Langford-Smith helped reduce their illustrious opponents to 91-8 but they were eventually beaten by 35 runs after being bowled out for 157.

Skipper Johnston insisted his team would not be in awe of any opponents.

"We played well in the warm-up against South Africa and then during our win over Pakistan so if we can repeat those two performances we can achieve the best results."

He admitted, however, that improvements needed to be made on the team's opening Super 8 match against England, which saw them beaten by 48 runs.

"We need to lift our performance by at least 25% in the remaining matches."