South Africa wicket-keeper Mark Boucher Thursday said he was ready to stand up on the slow West Indian pitches during the World Cup.

"I think standing up is something that all keepers expect when they come to the West Indies because these are like the subcontinent conditions when you have to do that sort of thing," Boucher said.

South Africa, the world number one team, were facing the Netherlands in their opening Group A match at Warner Park here on Friday.

The 30-year-old Boucher is the second best one-day wicket-keeper behind Australian Adam Gilchrist (423 dismissals) with 353 victims to his name.

As a hard hitting batsman, Boucher has 3,607 runs with one hundred and 21 half-centuries.

Boucher hoped wicket-keeping on slow grounds would not be a problem and spin may come into play.

"It (spin) depends on the wickets we play on. Brian Lara didn't even use his spinners," said Boucher, referring to the West Indies' 54-run win over Pakistan in the opening match at Sabina Park on Tuesday when Lara didn't call on his slow bowlers.

"But the ball seemed to spin a bit in the Australia-Scotland game, the wickets are still new so we have to see if spin's going to be a big factor."

South Africa's group rivals Australia, the defending champions, got their campaign off to a resounding start when they beat Scotland by 203 runs here on Wednesday.

Boucher praised Australia for being ruthless.

"Scotland didn't put up a bad show, but Australia were very professional and clinical like they always are," said Boucher of the Ricky Ponting's team whom South Africa play in their crunch group match here on March 24.

The two top teams qualify for the second round Super Eights.

"Getting through to the next stage is the challenge, we've have good practice and need to get the job done. We want to be clinical and professional and have learnt some hard lessons in the past World Cups."

South Africa have never won the World Cup since their readmittance to international cricket in 1992.

Boucher was part of the South African team which was ousted from the 1999 tournament on run-rate after their semi-final with Australia ended in a tie.

And he was batting in the match against Sri Lanka when they were ousted in the first round on home soil in 2003 when there was a misunderstanding of the rain rules.

(Article: Copyright © 2007 AFP)