South Africa were the third country to play international cricket after England and Australia, in 1889, but had a tough start. It was 17 years before they won a Test and almost 70 before they were regularly beating their opposition. The mid to late 1960s, a time when Graeme Pollock, Eddie Barlow, Mike Procter and Ali Bacher were in action, marked a first golden age, albeit one that excluded South Africa's majority population.