Sri Lanka's progress impresses Arthur

Sri Lanka's improved showing in England has impressed Mickey Arthur, South Africa's coach, who has been observing their progress ahead of his team's tour of Sri Lanka in August.

Under the leadership of Mahela Jayawardene, Sri Lanka dispelled the myth of being poor tourists by squaring the Test series 1-1, winning the five-match ODI series 3-0 with two games remaining and the one-off Twenty20 international. Arthur expects some tough competition when South Africa visit for two Tests and a tri-series also featuring India. South Africa haven't won a Test series there since 1993 and struggled in their last tour in 2004, which included a 5-0 whitewash in the ODIs.

"They (Sri Lanka) seem to have got it together and are playing really well", Arthur told Supercricket. "Their confidence will be up, especially so when they're back at home. The wickets will be tailor-made for Murali (Muralitharan) and they've also got Chaminda Vaas in their ranks. He gets really good swing early on and then mixes it up later. But he also runs down the wicket and creates a lot of rough for Murali."

However, Arthur pointed out that the success of the Sri Lankan side still revolves around a few individuals, even though youngsters like Upul Tharanga and Chamara Kapugedera have performed creditably.

"They still rely heavily on Muralitharan, Sanath Jayasuriya and Kumar Sangakkara - they're virtually the guts and soul of the team", he said. "So, the first job for us is to neutralise them and really do our homework on them."

Arthur expects the pitches in Sri Lanka to be similar to what the South Africans would experience during next year's World Cup in the West Indies . He made his observations after watching the ongoing third Test at St. Kitts between India and West Indies.

He added, "A lot of the pitches in the West Indies are going to be relaid before the World Cup so nobody really knows what to expect. I'll be flying over after the Champions Trophy (in October) to have a look."