Sri Lanka's stoic resistance came to a grinding halt as Kyle Abbott struck two decisive blows early on Day 5, dismissing Mathews and de Silva leg before wicket. Inspite of both of them reviewing, the onfield decision stayed.
Chasing a record 488 for victory, some gritty batting from the openers and later Angelo Mathews had given them a slight chance of scaling the target, although the likes of Chandimal and Kusal Mendis threw away their wickets.
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The Proteas will take a lot of positives out of the Test as Cook once again underlined his ability to overcome his technical deficiencies through sheer grit. He notched up his 3rd ton of the year, the highest for a South African batsman this year.
Here are the talking points from the Test.
#5 Kusal Perera under heavy scrutiny
Critics were sceptical of Kusal Perera’s abilities in Test cricket going in to the series. As if the selection was not enough, Lanka decided to play him in what is considered the most critical batting position in Test cricket, no.3.
With an unmistakable resemblance to Sanath Jayasuriya in his batting style, Perera attacks the ball irrespective of the situation. But there is a fine line between aggressive batting and reckless batting and Perera has firmly crossed that line.
His first innings slash off Philander that evoked an easy edge to de Kock was followed by an attack on Maharaj when he was getting turn and bounce. Two single digit scores would mean Sri Lanka need to rethink their strategy of bringing him at 3.
#4 Kyle Abbott sends strong signals
Kyle Abbott was one of the huge positives for South Africa in the Australian tour. The tall seamer is Steyn-like in the way that he moves the ball either way. He possesses a knack of bowling probing lengths and his precision and movement was too much for the Lankan batsmen to handle.
Abbott started Lanka's slide in the first innings by dismissing Karunaratne and Kusal Mendis early on to trap them at 22/3. He also knocked over Chameera to finish with 3 in the first innings.
His more telling contribution came in the second innings in Day 5 when he had Mathews and de Silva trapped in front to end Sri Lanka's hopes of chasing down a record score.
#3 Keshav Maharaj is here to stay
The lovely left arm spinner presented a huge case for himself in Australia with some tight bowling and crafty skills. He wasn't afraid to flight the ball, and got drift, turn and bounce in Australia. While he had to wait for another opportunity, he made it count when it eventually came.
On a Port Elizabeth wicket which aids spin traditionally, Maharaj found the right length and line to confuse the batsmen. He hit the rough outside the left handers’ off-stump to create more trouble.
He had little role to play in the first innings as the seamers wiped out Lanka although he did capture his role model, Herath's wicket. In the second innings, the Indian-born spinner got three wickets, Kusal Perera and Chandimal on Day 4 and wrapped up the game with the wicket of Pradeep on Day 5.
#2 Cook-Elgar getting into the groove
Opening has been a huge headache for South Africa in Tests ever since the retirement of Graeme Smith. After several failed tries with Stiaan van Zyl, a domestic veteran, Stephen Cook, was called up. The veteran showed his class with a century but his technique came in for some heavy criticism.
Cook silenced his critics with a patient, determined hundred in the day-night Test against Australia. However, despite Cook and Elgar both scoring hundreds in Australia, the pair did not even have a half-century partnership to show for their efforts.
They corrected that as soon as Lanka visited with a century partnership in the first innings. As if that were not enough, the duo compiled one more in the second becoming just the eighth opening pair in Test history to post two-century stands in the same Test.
#1 Sri Lanka need to rethink their strategy
If Sri Lanka had a plan for this tour, they need to rethink it. Their bowling exceeded expectations but their batsmen were reckless, to say the least.
The likes of Kusal Perera, Kusal Mendis and Dinesh Chandimal need to tighten up and they would do well to take a leaf out of Kaushal Silva’s book, who looked like the best batsman in the side with a solid technique and good judgement outside his off-stump.
They might need a rejigging of their batting order with Mendis moving to three and Perera possibly coming in at 7, below Dhananjaya de Silva. Mathews should also think of handing over first change bowling duties to Chameera as he looks ineffective with his military medium pace.
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