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Rampant Gibbs seals the series Wisden CricInfo staff - December 4, 2002
South Africa 190 for 2 (Gibbs 108*, Kallis 64*) beat Sri Lanka 184 (Pollock 3-40, Donald 3-18) by eight wickets A magnificently paced century from Herschelle Gibbs, and a typically robust allround effort from Jacques Kallis steered South Africa to a comprehensive eight-wicket victory in the fourth one-day international at Kimberley. With it, they completed a 3-1 series win, and rendered Friday's match at Bloemfontein meaningless. But Sri Lanka, who had pulled themselves back into contention with an impressive victory in the third match at Benoni, were left to rue a batting performance of untypical cageyness. After losing the toss and being asked to bat, they allowed themselves to be strangled by a South African performance that was never better than disciplined. Their lack of application left South Africa chasing 185 for victory. They had a moment of concern when Andrew Hall and Neil McKenzie were dismissed inside the first four overs, but Kallis is in the form of his life, and once he and Gibbs had seen off the early attentions of Chaminda Vaas in particular, the rest of the innings was a cakewalk. Gibbs posted an 87-ball century with his second six of the innings, and sealed the match with his third, as he and Kallis added an unbeaten 172 for the third wicket – a national record against allcomers. Kallis's 64 not out was his 50th in all one-day matches, and his fifth in his last eight innings. With a bit of gumption and a fraction more application, Sri Lanka could and should easily have posted a higher total. But, after cruising to 57 for 0 in the first ten overs, the introduction of Kallis changed the course of the innings irrevocably. Atapattu was run out for 38 off his very first delivery – a nifty piece of work from Mark Boucher, who casually gathered the throw from fine leg and whipped a sneaky backhand into the stumps with Atapattu strolling back into the crease (58 for 1). Sri Lanka's middle-order then threw away their good start with a succession of injudicious pull shots. Kumar Sangakkara paddled his fourth ball – again from Kallis – straight into the hands of Neil McKenzie at square leg (61 for 2), Aravinda de Silva launched Kallis down the throat of Makhaya Ntini at fine leg for a duck (64 for 3) and then McKenzie completed the catch of the tournament to remove Jayasuriya – an exquisitely timed leap at mid-on, diving backwards and plucking the ball with his right hand reversed like a baseball mitt (78 for 4).
It was the defining moment of the innings – from that moment on, Sri Lanka's only thought was to bat out their 50 overs. Russel Arnold added 34 with Hashan Tillekeratne in an 11-over partnership of the utmost tedium, although in his 100th one-day international, he at least hung around long enough to provide the innings with some substance.
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