Northeast in good heart

Sam Northeast is set to face the new ball in the one-off Test against South Africa

Opening batsman Sam Northeast is confident England Under-19s can end their tour of South Africa on a high with victory in the one-off Test which starts tomorrow.

Northeast, who is on Kent’s books, has been one of the tourists’ outstanding performers over the last three weeks - his third Under-19 tour in as many years.

The 19-year-old hit three sixties in the five-match one-day series and fell three short of a half-century in the first of two Twenty20 games.

Despite Northeast’s top-order runs, England lost both series and their Test warm-up match to a University Sports South Africa XI.

However, the right-hander remains optimistic about their chances over four days at Willowmoore Park, Benoni, where preparation has been hit by three days of rain.

“I’ve had a pretty good tour with the bat and I feel in good nick,” he told ecb.co.uk.

“As a team, even though we lost to South African Universities, I think we know that as a team we're capable of beating South Africa Under-19s.

“We lost narrowly in the one-day series and I think we all know we have a lot of potential here and, if we turn up, we will be able to get a win.”

Northeast agrees with team-mate Hamza Riazuddin’s assessment that England’s players are best suited to the longer form of the game.

He admits, though, they will have to improve on their eight-wicket defeat inside two days against the Universities XI this week.

“There’s a lot of players who’ve played some first-class cricket so I’d agree, definitely batting-wise even though we didn’t show it against the Universities,” he said.

Liam Dawson will resume the England captaincy for the final match of the South Africa tour

“There’s a lot of first-class status in the team. In Twenty20 cricket, none of us had really played that.”

He added: “There’s a lot of potential here and maybe we didn’t quite realise the situation of the pitch itself.

“It was a grassy seamer, and we just tried to go and play out the way we normally do, and maybe they just played the conditions more than just within themselves.

“They looked physically bigger and stronger but the potential is more with us really.”

Northeast, who made 30 and 20 against the students, captained the side but will hand over to Liam Dawson for the Test.

As a veteran of previous tours to Malaysia and Sri Lanka, Northeast was able to draw on added experience in the field.

“I really enjoyed it. It was going well after the first innings. It was hard to play around with the runs we had, really, but I really enjoyed it and I would like another opportunity if I could. It’s quite hard having just a one-off game to show yourself,” he said.

“As a senior player I feel I can give a lot more this year than I have in previous years. It’s just knowing the environment and hopefully I put that across when I captained.”

The former Harrow pupil feels he has learned a lot from his third trip with the age group.

“It’s always another experience to have really and to take on board, even if you don’t do so well, you can always take it on to the next tour away,” he added.

“The last two tours, even though I didn’t play as well as I would have liked to, it’s another chance for me to gain some experience to hopefully learn from that.

"Every tour you gain more experience and hopefully learn from it in your next tour.”