Root's reign as England Test captain got off to the desired start as he himself laid the platform for a 211-run win with a terrific first-innings 190 against the Proteas on the opening day at HQ.
Victory was wrapped up inside four days, while the workload for the seamers was drastically reduced after spinners Moeen Ali and Liam Dawson took centre stage in the tourists' second innings on a turning pitch.
Despite the quick turnaround between the first and second Tests, England have therefore opted to retain the same XI as they look to take an unassailable 2-0 series lead ahead of further encounters at the Oval and Old Trafford.
"We're going to go in with the same team," Root said. "It gives us great balance if spin does come into it later in the game, we've got plenty of options.
"Our seamers, it might be that they play a bigger part this week, but that quite excites me. They only bowled a handful of overs in the second innings last week. It means they're nice and fresh, and when they get their opportunity they'll still be pretty fresh coming into the second innings later in this game."
One of his seamers, James Anderson, has not bowled much in training this week, but Root was quick to allay fitness fears over England's leading Test wicket-taker of all-time, who has struggled with shoulder and groin problems recently.
"He had a little bowl today," Root added. "Jimmy knows his body, he's obviously had a couple of injury issues over the course of this year and I think he's just been smart with the way that he practises.
"He's a senior player, he knows what he's doing. He's done it for such a long time now so I'm sure he'll be desperate to set the tone when he gets the opportunity.
"It's really important that he's smart in how he looks after his body and I think how he's gone about it this week is when he has bowled he's made sure that he's been right on it and he's got something out of it, but at the same time he's got plenty in the tank for when we start on Friday."
Root is expecting a backlash from their opponents, who have captain Faf du Plessis back in the ranks although paceman Kagiso Rabada is suspended, controversially, for swearing after dismissing Ben Stokes last week.
"They're a side that pride themselves on coming back from defeats like last week," Root said. "They're a strong side, they've got a lot of experience and I expect them to be right on it first ball on Friday morning."
Du Plessis missed the start of the series opener in order to remain in South Africa following the birth of his first child, but was present to see his side slide to defeat under Dean Elgar.
He said: "I had the baby with one arm and watched the cricket with one eye. I saw a lot interesting things from the side which is probably a bit of outside perspective, you don't always get that.
"I'm really excited to be back with the team. It was tough going for us, the previous one, we weren't as good as we would like to have been but in cricket you get another go and we're looking forward to this next Test."
Fast Results
Scores
