By Neil Manthorp in Pretoria
SOUTH AFRICA'S frantic international season backfired on them yesterday when their key strike bowler Shaun Pollock pulled up lame with a groin strain on the first day of the second Test against Sri Lanka at Centurion Park. This was their 11th five-day match in six months.
Pollock's injury changed the course of Sri Lanka's innings after they had chosen to bat first on a green wicket and slumped to 72 for three at lunch, despite a flamboyant 51 from 77 balls by Sanath Jayasuriya.
Makhaya Ntini, 20, South Africa's first black Test cricketer, claimed the wickets of Jayasuriya and Aravinda de Silva in successive overs, but when Pollock left Ntini became expensive, and Allan Donald had no one to share the strike bowling burden. Sri Lanka finished the better placed, despite the loss of the final session to bad light.
Day 2: Donald defies injury
By Nick Alexander
A LIMPING Allan Donald moved within one Test wicket of the 200 mark with a brilliant bowling spell for South Africa on the second day of the second Test against Sri Lanka at Centurion Park.
Sri Lanka were all out for 303 at tea, losing six wickets for 76 runs after lunch. Donald, struggling with an injury to his left ankle, bowled unchanged for 11 overs, taking three for 34.
In his first over after the interval, he pulled up in pain. But in his next over he had Arjuna Ranatunga lbw for 73. Donald followed up with the wickets of Romesh Kaluwitharana and Pramodaya Wickramasinghe.
South Africa captain Hansie Cronje finished off the innings when Tillekeratne was caught at cover.
Sri Lanka fought back well in the field, off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan taking the wicket of Gary Kirsten with the last ball of the day.
South African off-spinner Pat Symcox was fined 500 rand (£62) for using foul language to an autograph hunter during the recent Test against Pakistan in Durban. Symcox, 37, has since retired from Test cricket.
Day 3: Sri Lankan grip loosened
By Neil Manthorp in Pretoria
YET another brilliant spell of fast bowling from Allan Donald gave South Africa an even chance of victory in the second Test against Sri Lanka at Centurion Park yesterday.
Sri Lanka took a lead of 196 into the fourth day with only three wickets left, and South Africa are unlikely to be chasing more than 220 in the fourth innings.
Having conceded a first-innings deficit of 103 in awkward batting conditions, South Africa seemed set for a battle to save the match until Donald ripped through the Sri Lankan top order to reduce the tourists to 40 for three. Hansie Cronje's innocuous-looking medium-pacers and two absurd run-outs, the second of which accounted for Aravinda de Silva shortly before the close, left Sri Lanka in tatters.
With Donald's first wicket, a brute that flicked Sanath Jayasuriya's inside edge on its way to the stumps, he became the first South African to reach 200 Test wickets.
He is the fifth fastest to the landmark along with Shane Warne, in 42 matches. Clarrie Grimmett reached 200 in 36 games, Waqar Younis and Dennis Lillee did so in 38 and Ian Botham in 41.
South Africa were as much indebted to Daryll Cullinan for their survival in this Test as Donald. The former Derbyshire right-hander scored his fifth Test century, and third against Sri Lanka, in tricky batting conditions, with his team-mates mustering a second-highest score of only 13.
Cullinan was simply disdainful of the seamers, but suitably respectful when facing Muttiah Muralitharan, who again turned his off-spinners enormous distances for his 12th five-wicket haul.
Cullinan has now been fully integrated back into the South African side and is set to return to England a far, far more complete player than the one who toured in 1994.
Day 4: Fifty for Cronje in 31 balls
By Neil Manthorp in Pretoria
A VICIOUS display of hitting from South Africa's captain Hansie Cronje took his side to victory on the fourth day of the second Test against Sri Lanka at Centurion Park yesterday.
Cronje struck the second fastest Test fifty in history after Muttiah Muralitharan's off-spin had threatened to undermine South Africa's batting again with three quick wickets.
The last four balls of Muralitharan's 17th over went 4, 6, 6, 6 as Cronje reached 50 from 31 balls - one more ball than Kapil Dev's 1982 effort against Pakistan but one fewer than fifties by Viv Richards and Ian Botham.
Cronje's eventual 82 from 63 deliveries, with six sixes and eight fours, was decisive, though the opportunity to win was provided by Allan Donald, whose five wickets bundled the tourists out for 122 after they had taken a first-innings lead of 103.