By Srian Obeyesekere
Defeat stared Sri Lanka in the eyes in a wilting of four of the top order before South Africa’s quality fast bowling in a strangulation of five gone with nighteatchman Prabath Jayasuriya the exception in a wobble of a shaky 101 for 5 wickets, the first test well, good as lost chasing a colossal 516 victory target with two days remaining in a shattering propelled by an as awesome batting display by the hosts on brilliant centuries by the Protea captain Temba Bavuma and Triston Stubbs in a tantalising 249 fourth wicket bonding on a Kingsmead track progressively batting friendly by the third day in contrastingly exposing a Lankan inaptness to coming to terms against the volatile Protea pace attack.
On a day the South Africban duo of Bavuma and Stubbs turned a hitherto gloomy Kingsmead setting into a batting haven on putting the Lankan attack to the sword, the top four Lankan batters in Dimuth Karunaratne 4, Pathum Nissanka 23, Angelo Mathews 25 and Kamindu Mendis 10 was a starkly coming apart appaling scenario that left Sri Lanka tottering in the jaws of defeat with only three more specialist batsmen left with Dinesh Chandimal out there on 29 and skipper Dhananjaya de Silva yet to open his account having walked into the middle with the nightwahman hopes of seeing the final session through extinguished.
By and large, the South Africans had insulated themselves in this dual cause test battle as far as series winning status quo to the more higher echelon gallop that test cricket has opened up in the new vistas of the allure of Championship title stakes that has heightened the long version of the game with the two nations in with a chance of making the finals.
In that gallop, South Africa has certainly taken the honours by a truly brilliant all-round superior display with the ton up Bavuma 113 and Stubbs 122 fireworks tucked into a 228-ball stay filled with 9 boundaries, and 231-ball display enriched by 9 boundaries and 2 sixes respectively.
The one consolation bright spot from a Lankan perspective to take would be Prabath Jayasuriya becoming the second joint fastest to 100:test wickets in this his 17th appearance when he dismissed Tony de Zorzi in the South Africban second innings.
Sri Lanka 42 and 103 for 5 (Chandimal 29*, Jansen 2-22, Rabada 2-34) need another 413 runs to beat South Africa 191 and 366 for 5 dec (Stubbs 122, Bavuma 113, Vishwa 2-64
