Rather like the man on the bus who's forgotten to tuck in his shirt or knot his tie, there are issues to be solved by looking in the mirror - Dale Steyn's indifferent form, Roelof van der Merwe's travails and the team's strange inconsistency. Watching them at the moment is rather like visiting your local Chinese takeaway - a sweet and sour experience.
The provisional nature of the current Protea project was acknowledged by Mike Procter, the convener of selectors, when he told the Sunday Times this week that he wasn't sure what the future held or what the best combinations were likely to be for the ODI side.
"Some of the younger guys are in a situation now where they have to mature quickly in order to win games. Maybe they'll come through and maybe they won't."
Procter was pleased with some performances, displeased with others and generally prepared to give players a second and a third chance as he, Mickey Arthur and Graeme Smith sift through the options ahead of the 2011 World Cup - only 14 months away.
"Everyone talks about the World Cup and building for that and that's fine," says Procter. "We have to win and do well now because otherwise we'll go into the World Cup without confidence."
Clearly, though, the Proteas don't want to be experimenting too much immediately before the World Cup. Rather find out now that Ryan McLaren shouldn't bat at six (Procter labels Sunday's experiment as "circumstantial") or that there are problems with both spinners and some of the seamers, two of whom - Albie Morkel and Charl Langeveldt - were dropped at Newlands in favour of Morne Morkel and Wayne Parnell.
The Proteas are unlikely to reach the perfect 10 of Newlands again in the series and so it is imperative to bed down their best bowling lineup and decide who (of the bowlers) can best serve their purposes swinging the bat down the order.
They've clearly been hamstrung by the breakup of the Van der Merwe-Johan Botha spin duo. Having played at neither Centurion nor Newlands, Botha appears to be seen as a liability without his doosra and Van der Merwe seems - quite literally - unsure of his lines without his partner, bowling six expensive overs on Friday night uncertain whether to bowl on or about off-stump or whether to stray marginally onto middle and leg.
There were personal reasons behind Van der Merwe's poor performance at Centurion, intimated Procter, and these had changed for the better by Friday. Unfortunately, there was no corresponding improvement in the left-arm spinners' performance. It will be interesting if the selectors throw caution to the wind in Port Elizabeth today - and give Botha a run on his home ground.
When it was put to Procter that perhaps South Africa needed to start experimenting with a second spinner with the uncertainties over Botha's future (or both spinners unable to play at the same time), he admitted he hadn't given it consideration.
Imran Tahir, once seen as a possible spin partner to Paul Harris in the Test side, has taken 18 wickets at 11 for Easterns this season, but until Thursday, when the Titans played the Eagles, had been unable to insinuate himself into the consciousness of Chris van Noordwyk, the Titans coach. He was used sparingly by Richard Pybus when Pybus was still Titans coach last season and has come to be seen as an indulgence teams can't afford.
"Part of his problem is he tries to bowl too many different deliveries," says Pybus. "He needs to learn to be patient."
Then again, Tahir has a wrong un and is a big spinner of the ball. He might provide the adventure many suggest the Proteas need. He, like Thandi Tshabalala and - if the selectors are looking at a more conservative option - the Lions' underrated Werner Coetsee are all worth consideration. As is Justin Ontong, who can bowl five or six overs of spin, bat intelligently and field well. Ontong seems to be South African cricket's nearly man, with an uncanny knack of being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Still, he has his supporters, who argue that he hasn't been trusted consistently enough or given a fair turn.
Flirting with a second spinner other than JP Duminy would appear to be a must because Van der Merwe isn't mature enough to handle senior spinning duties by himself. The counter to this is that Parnell is fit and firing and Morkel is bowling straight and fast. Perhaps the second-spinner debate is redundant - and Kallis will be back, although probably not as soon as many would like.
His rib-cartilage injury has clearly disrupted plans for him to open the innings, although it's been thrilling to see Smith and Hashim Amla's new opening partnership blossom.
Mohammed Moosajee, the Proteas' manager, put Kallis's chances of appearing in the first Test in mid-December at no more than 50-50.
"He saw a surgeon in Cape Town on Friday who injected him with his own 'spun' plasma in an effort to speed up the healing process," said Moosajee. "This is exactly the same process as that used to speed up the healing of Graeme's inflamed elbow in Australia."
Kallis's absence is being felt in a variety of ways, one of the less obvious relating to his imperviousness to pressure. Kallis doesn't buckle when others do and there's a fair bit of buckling going on throughout the order at the moment, a trend which can be traced back to the Champions Trophy. This aside, AB de Villiers is increasingly playing a Kallis-type role as the team's most important batsman. There is clearly life after the savvy allrounder, which is probably the best news of all.
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