Winning against South Africa is a confidence booster Dickwella

Winning against South Africa is a confidence booster Dickwella

To get a sense of just how big a series win in South Africa was for Sri Lanka, spectators did not even have to wait for the game to finish. Unaware that there was still one run required for victory in the third Twenty20 international on Wednesday (January 25), Asela Gunaratne turned to his teammates on the sidelines and roared. Then he grabbed a stump and started running towards them, before the reaction of the crowd told him that his celebrations were premature.

When the allrounder sealed the game off the next delivery, Sri Lanka celebrated anew - and once more it was as though they had won a world championship. Since their first visit to these shores in March 1998, Sri Lanka had lost eight series across the three formats, the last of them a 3-0 bulldozing in the recent non-contest of a Test series. This 2-1 win might have been over a virtual second-string South African side in the shortest format, but it had been a long time coming.

"Winning against a big team like South Africa is big," said Niroshan Dickwella, whose 68 helped to seal the series. "It's a great confidence booster. The whole team is backing up our strengths now. We are going to play well in the one-day series as well."

Perhaps most impressive was the fact that Sri Lanka recovered from 1-0 down in the series, when the effects of four defeats on the bounce could easily have left them deflated beyond repair. Instead, they rallied at the Wanderers, clinching a tight game at the death, and overcame the loss of their captain for the decider. The effects left Dickwella feeling buoyant.

"We could have won the series 3-0," he claimed. "It was in our hands in the first T20 but we lost it unfortunately. In the other two matches we were cool and calm, we held our nerves and we played. That was the main reason we won the other two games. The first one was a 10-over match because of the rain but I think we could have won the series 3-0."

Sri Lanka's improvement has been most evident in their batting. Having spent the entire Test series failing to come to terms with conditions, the visitors finished the series by completing the second highest run chase in T20 internationals at Newlands.

"The wickets are better. In the Test series, the wickets were quite greenish and the ball swings a lot," Dickwella explained. "In this T20 series, they prepared better wickets for the batting team. The better batting team wins hopefully. In this series, the three wickets were pretty much batting wickets so that's why it's easier for us now."

South Africa were ultimately undone by the five catches they dropped in the field at Newlands, which included three in three balls. Dickwella benefitted from two of them, the first when he was on just 19. Farhaan Behardien admitted that it "took the momentum away from our bowlers", and Wayne Parnell was particularly affected. He started his night with a wicket, then saw four chances dropped off his bowling to end with figures of 1 for 42.

"We've fielded superbly in the last few months, so maybe it was just the occasion for one or two younger players in one of their first internationals - maybe it was a bit too big for them," said coach Russell Domingo. "Hopefully they will have learnt from it. But there are a lot of positives to take. You never want to be losing these series, so that's the disappointment, but there were some good performances."

South Africa's night was made worse by the loss of fast bowler Lungi Ngidi, who limped off the field after landing awkwardly on his hip whilst fielding. He will be assessed on Thursday ahead of Saturday's first one-day international in Port Elizabeth.