Johannesburg – Sri Lanka merely delayed the inevitable as they lost five more wickets in their second innings after South Africa enforced the follow-on which left the tourists teetering on a whitewash defeat with four wickets in hand.
A total of seven wickets fell during the morning session first South African bundled Sri Lanka all out for 131 before Kagiso Rabada removed Kaushal Silva for a golden duck with his first ball in their second innings.
South Africa’s all-out pace attack was full of value during the morning session as they saw off the Sri Lankan batting line up before the lunch break to force the follow on.
Sri Lanka were all bundled out for 131 in their first innings to trail South Africa by 295 runs before the lunch break, and were trailing by 171 runs with four wickets in hand going into the evening session.
The tourists managed to score 111 runs for the fall of five wickets after lunch bringing some sort of respectability to an otherwise abysmal match.
There was a change of pace compared to the frenetic morning spell with Sri Lanka digging their heels in ever so slightly.
Dimuth Karunaratne and Kusal Mendis (41) spent nearly an hour at the crease without any major hiccup adding 37 runs to the score.
Mendis’ useful knock came to a crashing end as he played a Wayne Parnell delivery onto his stumps to leave Karunaratne to fight on.
Karunaratne (50) did a splendid job as he went on to score only Sri Lanka’s third half-century of the series before was bowled by Rabada.
Rabada and Duanne Olivier were the chief destroyers in Sri Lanka’s second innings with both taking two wickets each.
Proteas captain Faf du Plessis provided another highlight of the afternoon when he grabbed a superb one-handed catch to remove his counterpart Angelo Mathews from an Olivier delivery.