The day was nice and bright on day 3 , however, 13 overs left for the second new ball, and the South Easterly wind blowing across the park would favour the Proteas was true as the Gospel , predicted by the experts before start of play.
Trailing by 116 runs with 7 wickets in hand, Sri Lanka fell prey to the South African plan of getting at least one of the two inform batters dismissed just before the new ball was due whilst exposing the middle order was a perfectly thought out plan.
The South Easterly wind will aid the South African seamers as the two bowling ends at George’s Park have different conditions for the batters to cope with. The Duck pond end was variable with extra bounce whilst Park end was more predictable.
Mathews and Kamindu Mendis, whilst the old ball was in operation, did well to leave deliveries outside the off stump and not playing at balls with a vertical bat.
Marco Jansen got a back of a length delivery to get big on a helpless Mathews as he got undone at the extra bounce he extracted that caught the edge of Mathews bat, and he was caught behind by wicket keeper Mark Verrynine for 44 and that too with the old ball with Sri Lanka losing their 4th wicket with the score on 261 and the healthy partnership 67 broken.
When the new ball was taken with Sri Lanka on 266 Kamindu Mendis batting on just 2 runs short of his 50 edged an extra bounce delivery bowled with the new Chery by Marco Jansen and the gates opened with Sri Lanka on 268 for 5 wickets.
Dhananjaya de Silva and Kusal Mendis were struggling against the new ball and were very tentative in their stroke play. The new ball is a challenge during the first 10 overs , frankly, both Kusal Mendis and DDS simply could not cope with Marco Jansen and Kagisgo Rabada.
Dhananjaya de Silva poked his willow in the very first over of South African 3rd seamer Dane Patterson in the days to be caught by Aiden Markram at second slip and Sri Lanka nose dived to 297 for 6 wickets .
In the same over Kusal Mendis left a line delivery, not judging the length, and Sri Lanka dipped further to 297 for 7 wickets. Patterson had his dream over with 3rd scalp of his memorable over as Lahiru Kumara fell victim for a brilliant catch at gully by the tall Marco Jansen with Sri Lanka looking down the barrel on 297 for 8 wickets.
The first 10 overs are a challenge with the new ball, and this was proved far beyond doubt because DDS was dismissed on 14, so was DDS.
Prabath Jayasuriya proved this when the tail wagged, with his contribution of 26 runs to help Sri Lanka be bowled out for 328 runs , 40 runs shy of the Protease total.
Patterson ended with his best bowling spell of his career with 5 wickets for 71 runs , whilst Mahraj with 2 gifted wickets for 65 runs , Marco Jansen 2 for 100 Rabada 1for 56.
South Africa ended day 3 on a high with 191 for 3 wickets with Temba Bavuma on 42 and Tristan Stubbs on 36.
A lead of 231 with 7 wickets in hand is a match winning equation in favour of the home team. Miracles are what Sri Lanka would hope to save this test