South Africa vs Sri Lanka 2017: 3rd T20I, 5 best moments from the clash at Cape Town
Seekuge Prasanna played an illustrious cameo to help Sri Lanka overcome a target of 169 in the final over to win the T20 series 2-1. Nirosha Dickwella played some blinding shots to race past a half-century, his first in T20s. Tahir's three-wicket burst put Lanka on the back foot but Prasanna took them over the line.
Earlier, South Africa were helped by a brilliant knock by Ab de Villiers in his comeback match and rode on some late order hitting by Mangaliso Mosehle. Mosehle's three sixes in the final over took them to a competitive total after the spinners had choked the run flow.
In the end, the total proved to be low and South Africa didn’t help their cause as they dropped far too many catches. The injury to strike bowler, Lungi Ngidi, also handicapped them in the death overs, where Prasanna made merry.
Brief Scores: South Africa 169/5 (de Villiers 63, Hendricks 41) lost to Sri Lanka 170/5 in 19.5 overs (Dickwella 68, Prasanna 37)
Result: Sri Lanka won by 5 wickets
Take a glance at some of the top moments from the final game of the T20 series.
#5 Reeza Hendricks shows his class
Reeza Hendricks is primarily an ODI cricketer and his selection in the T20s took people by surprise and was frowned upon. Given that he had made less runs in the CSA T20 Challenge also did not help his cause and he had to sit out the first two games.
Coming in for the final clash, Hendricks creamed some drives through the cover region, finding great timing in his shots. Hendricks leant into his shots, flourishing on sheer timing.
With de Villiers for company, Hendricks became even more confident but as the Lankan spinners started getting a grip, he failed to rotate the strike well enough. He eventually fell for a well made 41.