Sanga restores Sri Lanka pride
Kumar Sangakkara took full advantage of the springboard start provided by the opening partnership to score his maiden limited overs century against the Proteas and set up Sri Lanka for a two-wicket victory (with a ball to spare) in the final Sunfoil ODI at the Bidvest Wanderers Stadium on Sunday.
It meant that the visitors had chased down winning targets in excess of 300 in both the final two matches of their tour and enabled them to return home from their South African tour with quite a lot of positives in spite of losing both the Test and ODI series.
The Proteas won the ODI series 3-2 on the back of their victories in the first three matches.
It was a tremendous game of cricket in which both AB de Villiers and Graeme Smith scored centuries for the Proteas after they had been sent into bat. Coincidentally they finished on 125 although De Villiers had a not out next to his name and thus both equalled the record for South Africa’s highest individual ODI score against Sri Lanka held by Boeta Dippenaar.
They also shared a third-wicket record partnership of 186 against Sri Lanka which improved the previous mark of 178 established by Jacques Kallis and Herschelle Gibbs in the 2002-03 season.
While the Proteas had only managed to score 33/1 in their first 10 overs their Sri Lankan counterparts – Upul Tharanga and Tillekeratne Dilshan – blazed away to 72 in their first 10 and that proved to be the essential difference in the end.
Thereafter the experienced Sangakkara was able to pace the innings perfectly and stay ahead of the Duckworth/Lewis equation which was vital after an hour’s play had been lost to rain early in their innings and the skies remained threatening for most of the remainder of the day.
Sri Lanka appeared to be cruising home at 274/3 after 44 overs with 39 runs required off the last 36 balls before De Villiers produced some inspired captaincy to back his two spinners at critical stages of the death overs. Duminy took 2/13 in three overs including the key wicket of Sangakkara and then Robbie Peterson, entrusted with the final over, took 2/1 off four balls before Sachitra Senanayake, playing his first ODI innings, struck the fifth ball for six to win the match.
Sangakkara was named Sunfoil Man of the Match while the Sunfoil Man of the Series award went to De Villiers who scored more than 300 runs in the five-match series. — Official CSA report
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