Melbourne, Feb 26 : South Africa captain Graeme Smith has said that his team aims to follow its recent series win in Australia with a home triumph that will represent a "comprehensive beating" of the world champions.

Speaking on the eve of the first Test which starts at the Wanderers Stadium today, Smith said his players were "relaxed and focused" ahead of the most eagerly anticipated series in South Africa since the country returned to international cricket in 1991.

Australia and South Africa are eying the top spot in the ICC Test rankings ahead of the three-Test series, which begins here from today.  

It can be recalled here that Aussie’s are clinging on to the top spot - a position it has held for almost six years - with 126 points.

However, the Proteas, with 121 points, are also not too behind them.

With 118 points, India is placed at third position.  

Sydney  - Money can't buy love, it is said, but can it happiness?

In these times of economic gloom, the Australian government has spent 1 million Australian dollars (647,000 US dollars) on "happiness workshops" for its bureaucrats and teachers, much to the chagrin of taxpayers, news reports said Thursday.

Canberra  - The free trade agreement that Australia and New Zealand will sign in Thailand this weekend with 10 South-East Asian countries is the biggest that Australia has negotiated so far, Trade Minister Simon Crean said Thursday.

"It's the most comprehensive that ASEAN has ever signed," Crean told reporters at Parliament House in Canberra before boarding a flight to Bangkok.

Sydney  - Paul Camilleri of Sydney's plush Restaurant Sojourn is offering a three-course lunch for 30 Australian dollars (19 US dollars).

"It'll be more bistro food, but I don't make any money anyway," he said.

Credit-crunch lunches are all the rage in corporate Australia, where the table talk is of job security not annual bonuses.

The McDonald's down the road has never been busier. But it's hard to say whether those who used to slide their chairs in at Sojourn are the same ones queuing for quarter-pounders.

Sydney  - Firefighters were gearing up as soaring temperatures and strong winds predicted for Friday increased the bushfire threat for communities in the Australian state of Victorian.

Ten major bushfires were still burning across the southern state, where wildfires in February claimed 210 lives, destroyed 2,029 homes, displaced 7,500 people, blackened hundreds and thousands of hectares of forest and farmland, and killed livestock and native animals.