Australia vs South Africa: Reasons for Sydney Test draw: Scott Boland's absence, Ashton Agar's non-existent bowling

After all, despite the pre-series bluster about this clash of two heavyweights, the hosts largely dominated this tournament. 

The Proteas barely turned up until the second innings of the final Test and will doubtless look back at the tour as both a gruelling and steep learning curve for them. 

And while they have rain to thank for giving them a chance to even fight for a draw in the final game, there were also a few issues on the side of the Australians. 

Getting so many wickets on the final day was always a task. This is something Josh Hazlewood pointed out after the match. 

"14 wickets (on Day 5) was a hard ask. If we didn't lose a day to rain, who knows what might have been," he said. 

But there were other issues – and the first of them was the absence of Scott Boland, which would always be a controversial call whenever it happened. 

It was always going to be the case that Australia would bring in one extra spinner for the Sydney pitch – and that would mean dropping one seamer. 

And given Mitchell Starc was injured and ruled out anyway, it would have made sense for the left-arm orthodox spinner Agar to come into the team in his place. 

However, Australia sprung a bit of a surprise when they chose to drop Boland and bring in Hazlewood, who had been struggling for fitness and thus missed out on the first two games. 

Since Pat Cummins is the captain, it was never likely that he would be rotated, but it was still harsh on Boland that he missed out. 

Moreover, in the second innings, an out–of–sorts Hazlewood proved to have little to no impact on the game towards the end. 

Part of it was down to the strategy to try and bowl more spinners on Day 5 – even Steve Smith bowled an over of his strictly part-time leg spin. 

But even that was a ploy that didn't have much impact, and Agar was arguably the least effective of all their bowlers. 

He took one wicket through both innings and would not have been missed too much if he was not playing. 

His overs were a bit of a reprieve for the South African batters, given he did not trouble them. 

So while it is safe to say that South Africa drew the Test through a combination of grit and luck, it is hard to ignore that Australia also played into their hands in some ways.