Bayliss backs England to keep getting better

Head Coach Trevor Bayliss believes there is more to come from his England side after they secured a Test series victory away to South Africa.

A seven-wicket victory in Johannesburg handed the tourists a 2-0 lead with only the fourth Test in Centurion to come, adding the significant achievement of downing the world's top-ranked Test side on their own patch to last summer's Ashes success.

However, despite passing a couple of notable milestones in his first year in charge, Bayliss insists there is plenty of scope for further improvement.

I had a look at the players that were here, there was a lot of potential but potential never won anything, there's a lot of hard work to be done yet, he told ecb.co.uk.

There has been a lot of good work done in the past, not just by the players but the coaching staff.

I still think they're a few years away from their best yet.

England's third-Test triumph came after another unplayable spell with the ball from Stuart Broad, who ripped through the Proteas' top order with a spell of five wickets for one run en route to figures of 6-17.

The 29-year-old is now the top-ranked Test bowler in the world, and Bayliss admits his latest match-winning spell brought back memories of last summer's Ashes Test at Trent Bridge, where Broad returned figures of 8-15 as the Australians were dismantled on the opening morning.

Yesterday morning I was hoping for a minimum 50-run lead and a few South African wickets by the afternoon, added Bayliss.

I thought we batted reasonably well to get a small lead. We didn't know what was going to happen after lunch - eight wickets in a session is memories of Trent Bridge.

Stuart Broad when he gets on a roll is a very intimidating character off a long run.

He's a very skilful bowler as well who puts the ball in the right area and moves the ball both ways.

As we've seen with his record, when he's on and his rhythm is good he gets a lot of wickets for not many runs.

While England's bowling was outstanding, it was backed up by some sharp fielding - most notably with James Taylor holding a couple of screamers at short-leg.

And Bayliss had reminded his side at the lunch interval of the importance of ramping up the pressure out in the middle.

It was a bit of a reminder about what we've done when we have fielded well in the past - it's about helping to put pressure on the opposition, backing the bowlers up; try and make the batter feel that he doesn't know where his next run is coming from.

I thought in the first innings we were a little bit quiet in the field.

We were standing still and waiting for the ball to come to us, so I wanted to change that attitude. We went out after lunch and did that and backed up the bowling beautifully.

Meanwhile England seamer Steven Finn looks likely to miss the fourth Test with a side strain.

Finn felt tightness in his left side during England's series-clinching victory at the Wanderers and was sent for scans on Sunday morning.

But head coach Trevor Bayliss was pessimistic about his prospects, paving the way for Chris Woakes, Chris Jordan or Mark Footitt to feature in Centurion, as England eye a historic 3-0 success.

Steven is away getting scans but to be honest I doubt very much whether he'll be available for the next Test, Bayliss said.

We'll have to wait and see how bad it is and make a decision on the one-day and Twenty20 series.

But at this stage it looks like we have to make a replacement there heading into the last Test.

That's unfortunate because I thought he was probably our most dangerous bowler in the first two Tests.

England return to Cardiff this year for two One-Day Internationals as Glamorgan host the final games of both the Sri Lanka and Pakistan Royal London Series at The SSE SWALEC. Adult tickets are priced from £35, juniors £10, and a family ticket only £80. Click here for further details.