By this stage, Yorkshire regarded Yardley as the heir to Brian Sellers as captain, and the England Test selectors also began to prepare him to assume the England captaincy. At the end of the 1938 season, Yardley was chosen to tour South Africa with MCC as vice-captain to Wally Hammond. He made a good start to the tour, scoring centuries in his first two innings, both surpassing his previous highest score. "Wisden" noted that he made a good impression on spectators in these early matches. In his fourth match, he captained the MCC in Hammond's absence for the first time. When Len Hutton was injured in a tour match and missed the first Test, Yardey made his debut but scored just seven runs in a total of 422 and did not bat in the second innings. Hutton returned for the second match, and the successes of other batsmen meant that Yardley was not required in the other Tests on the tour. However, he scored a third century when he captained the MCC against Border.