Twitter Reactions: South African batsmen surrender as Akila Dananjaya spins a web

South Africa won the series by 3-2.

By Aditya Gajanan Kukalyekar verified

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5 Min Read

Sri Lankan team
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Sri Lankan team celebrates a wicket. (Photo Source: Twitter)

If India are being humbled at the Lord’s by England with extreme seam and swing, Sri Lanka have thumped South Africa with spin yet again. In both the matches, the batsmen have surrendered abjectly without putting up any fight whatsoever. Akila Dananjaya bowled an exceptional spell and took a six-wicket haul as the opposition batsmen never got going in the steep chase of 300 runs in Colombo in the final ODI of the series.

The off-spinner opened the bowling as the pitch got slower and slower in the first innings itself. The demons in the visitor’s minds woke up it seems which they had dumped after the Test series. None of the batsmen apart from their skipper Quinton de Kock looked confident in the middle and surrendered to some brilliant spin-bowling from the mysterious bowler.

However, it all started with Suranga Lakmal castling Hashim Amla in the very first over which was followed by a flurry of boundaries thanks to Aiden Markram. But the sixth over of the innings turned the tide for the home side as Dananjaya came to the fore and dismissed Markram and Reeza Hendricks off the consecutive deliveries. He pinned Heinrich Klaasen in front of the stumps to leave them reeling at 39/4 in no time and since then it was all one-way traffic.

De Kock fought bravely with a half-century but even he was sent back the off-spinner before which JP Duminy was dismissed by Dhananjaya de Silva. They continued to fall like nine pins and were eventually bowled out for 121 runs to lose the game by a massive 178 runs. Dananajaya was exceptional with the ball in hand as he returned with he figures of 6/29.

Mathews leads with the bat

After opting to bat first after winning the toss, Sri Lanka’s woes continued at the top of the order. Upul Tharanga’s dismal series finally ended even as Kusal Perera also followed him soon. Niroshan Dickwella and Kusal Mendis then stitched a partnership to bring things back on track. But both of them failed to convert starts and at 142/4, one felt they will once again put up an under-par total.

But their captain Angelo Mathews dug in for the umpteenth time in his career and played a rock solid knock. He put up important 50+ stands first with De Silva and then with Thisara Perera and made sure his team stayed abreast with the total of 300. In the end, wickets kept falling but he also didn’t let the run-rate go down and eventually propelled Sri Lanka to 299/8 in 50 overs.

Unfortunately, Mathews couldn’t complete the well-deserved ton and remained unbeaten on 97 off the same number of deliveries with 11 fours and a solitary six. In the end, his innings proved gold for his team as they registered one of the biggest victories against South Africa.

This is a huge win for the hosts and though they’ve lost the series, the team will take a lot of heart from this performance. The visitors, on the other hand, would also be happy that they won the series but will leave the country with more questions than answers as far as their bench strength is concerned.

Here’s how Twitter reacted during the game:

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