South Africa will be less than impressed with their performance during the first day’s play in Port Elizabeth and will be looking to bounce back against Suranga Lakmal and Sri Lanka when play resumes.
The Proteas would have been expecting a much stronger performance on the first day after winning the toss, at home against a traditionally weak Sri Lankan team when playing away from home.
Even though South Africa made a strong start, running up a 100 run opening stand, they found a way to consistently lose wickets throughout the second and third sessions, handing Sri Lanka the first day honours.
Stephen Cook (59) and Dean Elgar (45) were the ones responsible for the strong start before Suranga Lakmal came back for his second spell and got amongst the wickets.
Cook was the first to go, with Elgar departing just four overs later. Hashim Amla then struggled through 76 balls for just 20 runs as JP Duminy built a good knock of 63 at the other end.
When Duminy got himself out to the crafty bowling of Rangana Herath, who took the two wickets Lakmal didn’t, the pressure was transferred to the lower order who simply didn’t handle it as the Proteas crashed to 6 for 267 at stumps.
Quinton de Kock did manage to get through to stumps, sitting on 25 not out but with Vernon Philander now at the crease, the tail has well and truly been exposed, leaving plenty of pressure on the wicket keeper to continue building the Proteas score and be not out at the end.
Day 2 Prediction
It was surprising how well the Sri Lankan’s were able to bowl yesterday given the wide held belief that their pace attack simply wasn’t going to cut it in South African conditions.
While it was still only Lakmal who really did the damage, they looked threatening, especially as the afternoon moved on and they find themselves in a good position.
With only the tail to run through and a relatively new ball, Sri Lanka should be looking at limiting the Proteas to a score of well under the 300 mark, at which point they bring themselves into the match.
Their batting line-up away from home though has been known to be feeble and it would be a shock to see any change here so they could still be looking down the barrel by the end of the day’s play no matter how quickly they roll the Proteas.