By Scott Heinrich

At the moment, we would be lucky if we were called club cricketers SA skipper Graeme Smith

What a difference a year makes.

When England staged a rousing comeback in last summer's final Test at The Oval to draw the series with South Africa, it was rightly hailed as an achievement.

Graeme Smith's team were ranked second in the world at the time - they are now sixth - and to England a drawn home series against them was almost as good as a win.

Since then the two teams have traded places; England are on the up and up while South Africa are in the grip of decline.

The contrast could not be more vivid with the next encounter between the two sides, in South Africa later this year, looming.

Since the 2003 series, South Africa have won four of the 11 Tests they have played. England's last 11 have brought 10 victories and a draw.

England's Test team will embark on the tour with the confidence of a team which has developed a winning habit, though predictably they are taking nothing for granted.

"Every game is a different game, they'll be at home and I'm sure they'll come out with all guns blazing," paceman Matthew Hoggard told BBC Sport.

Hoggard says England will have to reach new heights to beat SA

"We'll go over there full of confidence but we won't be taking them lightly. I'm sure they'll be in form when they play us.

"We know we're going to have to play better than we have done all summer to beat them."

England will justly be on their guard come December, but is not alarmist to say South Africa are in the grips of a mini-crisis - not when the coach is considering quitting and the captain has compared his team to club cricketers.

Eric Simons lambasted an "unacceptable" display after the second Test in Sri Lanka, and Smith was equally vehement.

It may be a Smith attribute to speak anything and everything that is on his mind, but nevertheless his troops have been poor.

A promising start to the tour, where they were full value for a drawn Test in Galle, soon made way to a heavy defeat in the second Test and a one-day series that is over with two games to play. And all this without Muttiah Muralitharan.

A young captain, Smith's abilities are being put to the test

It was not long ago that South Africa were legitimate contenders to the 'best around' title, snapping as they were at Australia's heels.

A measure of how far South Africa have fallen can be gauged by Australia's Test and one-day victories in Sri Lanka earlier this year. And all that with Muralitharan.

South Africa will point to tough road trips to Pakistan, New Zealand and now Sri Lanka in the past year, and it is true their only home series resulted in a big win over West Indies.

But, as England now know, winning sides don't need excuses.

The hallmark of a good team is strength in depth, and England certainly have a number of players in a number of positions pushing for selection.

But another trait of the successful is stability of selection. Of England's history-making touring party to the Caribbean, only Rikki Clarke and the retired Nasser Hussain won't be going to South Africa.

South Africa, meanwhile, have struggled to replace the likes of Gary Kirsten and Allan Donald. The form of Herschelle Gibbs and the ageing Lance Klusener is a worry, while Smith himself has failed to replicate his run-hungry deeds of last year.