Kallis To Skipper Proteas

Kallis - takes over from Smith.

Jacques Kallis has been confirmed as South Africa captain, in the absence of the injured Graeme Smith for Friday's NatWest Series match against England at The Oval.

Smith this morning had a meeting with a surgeon to ascertain the prognosis on his tennis elbow problem, after which he was ruled out of the rest of the series.

Kallis has captained his country in seven one-day internationals since 2006.

England need to win the third match on Friday to be sure of series victory.

Kallis said he wants the team to "just relax" and play cricket.

"It's a sad situation that I've come in to but we'll take the opportunity, it's something that I have done before and I have enjoyed it," said Kallis.

"But losing Graeme is a huge loss to the side, you don't replace guys like that easily.

"We pride ourselves on our performance and we've played some good cricket over the last two years.

"It is a changing side but there's no excuse to perform the way we have. The pressure is now on England to win the series."

He added: "They've been in a situation a few times before and not followed through and we've been in a situation where we've been 2-0 down in a series and come back to win it so I think it's going to be a hard, tough couple of games.

"Every game is our final."