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With the npower Test series against South Africa just days away, ecb.co.uk takes a look back at the last time England hosted the Proteas in 2003.

Coach Duncan Fletcher’s side warmed up by winning the triangular NatWest Series, also involving Zimbabwe, beating the tourists by seven wickets in the final at Lord’s.

Nasser Hussain began the five-match npower Test series as captain but resigned after the drawn first Test at Edgbaston following a successful four-year period at the helm.

Recently appointed one-day captain Michael Vaughan took over and came face-to-face with South Africa’s youngest skipper, 22-year-old Graeme Smith.

Vaughan was in the form of his life having scored over 600 runs against Australia in the Ashes defeat the previous winter but it was Smith who stole the headlines.

The left-hander smashed 277 in the first innings at Birmingham - Vaughan replied with 156 - and 259 in the second Test at Lord’s.

South Africa went on to win at the Home of Cricket by an innings and 92 runs despite Andrew Flintoff’s valiant 142 after which Darren Gough announced his Test retirement.

Hussain and Mark Butcher both hit centuries in the first innings at Trent Bridge where Sussex seamer James Kirtley was the hero, claiming 6-34 in the fourth innings to give the hosts a 70-run victory.

England's most capped Test player Alec Stewart walks off at the Oval after his last Test innings

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South Africa seized the initiative at Headingley, where England called up veteran medium-pacer Martin Bicknell 10 years after his first two Test caps, thanks to veteran Gary Kristen's first innings 130 and Andrew Hall’s blistering 99 in the second.

All-rounder Jacques Kallis’ 6-54 consigned England to a 191-run defeat, handing the tourists a 2-1 series lead.

England coach Duncan Fletcher recalled Graham Thorpe in place of the faltering Ed Smith for the final Test at the Oval where Herschelle Gibbs' first-day 183 looked to have put the series beyond England.

But Marcus Trescothicks’s measured 219, Thorpe’s 124 and Flintoff’s 95 gave England a sniff of victory.

Bicknell and Steve Harmison took four wickets apiece to set up a nine-wicket win that squared the series as Alec Stewart bowed out of international cricket.