Nocturnal 
South Africa are playing a Test match on home soil for the first time since January 2025, but it seems not everyone has rushed to get tickets. According to ESPN Cricinfo, just over 7,500 tickets have been sold for day one and day three of the Durban Test against Australia, with only a little over 8,000 sold for the Saturday session.
It’s a strange state of affairs given what South Africa have achieved since that last home Test. Back in January 2025, they weren’t even world champions. In the time since, Spain have won the football World Cup for a second time, Zohran Mamdani has become mayor of New York, and Katy Perry has been to space – all handy reminders of exactly how long South African fans have gone without a home Test match.
In between, South Africa pulled off one of the great turnarounds in the format, beating Australia – the defending champions – in the World Test Championship final at Lord’s to be crowned world champions themselves. That result makes the Durban Test, their first assignment on home turf since that famous win, a rematch against the very team they dethroned.
You might expect that to be a selling point. Instead, the modest advance sales suggest plenty of seats at Kingsmead will stay empty, even with a newly minted world champion side in action against their conquered opponents.
Adding to the pressure on the hosts, strike bowler Kagiso Rabada has been ruled out of the first Test against Australia, Cricinfo reported, a significant blow for a South Africa attack hoping to build on their world title in front of home supporters.
Why it matters
Sparse crowds for a newly crowned world champion side point to a wider problem for the five-day game in South Africa, where red-ball fixtures have often had to compete for space with white-ball cricket and the Betway SA20 franchise competition. A near two-year gap between home Tests, followed by underwhelming ticket sales even after a WTC triumph, suggests the test format still has work to do to win back domestic crowds.
Interest from further afield tells a slightly different story. Google Trends data shows “SA vs Aus” trending among UK cricket searches this week, with more than 2,000 searches logged, hinting that plenty of fans elsewhere are following the series closely even if Kingsmead’s stands aren’t full.
What happens next
The Durban Test is the first of the series between South Africa and Australia, giving the world champions a chance to show their Lord’s win was no fluke. Rabada’s absence leaves a gap in the bowling attack for the hosts to manage. Whether crowds build as the match goes on, or whether South Africa’s long wait for home Test cricket continues to dent public interest in the format, remains to be seen.
